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proof of aeroness June 30, 2008

Posted by Kylie in : biking , 1 comment so far

It’s all in the sunburn. Not a bad one as I’ve been liberally applying sunscreen (with a desire to avoid what tan lines I can when I wear my princess dress). But still a bit of one. Where? Only on the inner edge of my arms and by my thumbs. Guess that part isn’t used to sun and could use even more — and at least I know it means I did a good job staying aero during Sunday’s ride.

so many watts I broke my bike June 4, 2008

Posted by Kylie in : biking, Planet X, PowerTap , 2 comments

Yesterday’s schedule called for a 15mi time trial test on the tri bike. I knew of a loop that I thought would be great for it, and that I pass on the way to work, so I headed out there. It’s a 4 mi loop that is basically flat and has a single stop sign I have to really pay attention to, plus 2 that are a T intersection. So by going the right way you can really sit at a consistent number and “git ‘er done”.

It was my first time trying to hold a set and hard power number for that long. It was tough! But finally I got to the part with instructions “for the last mile try to tear the cranks off the bike” and I begged and pleaded with my legs — “Just one more mile, and then I promise I’ll back off, and shift, and you can have a nice easy spinny loop before we head off to work” and they did it, just for me!

I cruised for a bit, and started downshifting. KAPABLAM! The rear shifter exploded in my hand. Well, it hadn’t felt like it was shifting well during the test, so I was mostly just thankful it waited til after my 15 miles to poop out on me. But it did mean that I couldn’t shift, and of course with the lack of tension on the cable the rear derailleur moved to “hardest to pedal” gear. And then the front was like well, no, I don’t want to make your life easy, so if you shift to the little ring I’m going to not catch.

So after all the promises I made to the legs, and how they held up their end of the bargin, I didn’t get to give them the nice easy spinny part they love. And instead had to have a very low cadence and make it back to the car that way.

But at least I suffered for the prescribed 15 miles first. And legs, I know I don’t always keep my promises, but I was trying — really! I’ll make it up to you. How about a swim this evening?

definitely a memoriable memorial weekend May 27, 2008

Posted by Kylie in : running, biking, mountain biking, mike, marky , add a comment

I took full advantage of the 3 day weekend — the first one I’ve had since classes started in January.

Saturday Mike, the mountain bikes and I all climbed our way up the same basic route we did back in December. It was still beautiful and fun. We went a bit farther this time, and made it all the way to the summit of the fire road. And again froze our asses off on the way down. It took forever in warm water in the shower to get my toenails not blue. And I might never listen to Mike about when to bring my cold-weather gloves again. But about 22 miles and 6000 ft of climbing kicked off the weekend right.

Sunday started with a pretty relaxed 30 mile loop on bike paths, basically flat (just under 1000ft of climbing). Then some shopping for a dress for one of my sister’s wedding in a couple weeks. A fun dinner, and then a nice evening 4.5 mi run.

Monday no alarm clocks were allowed. And we relaxed in the morning. But got out the door barely before noon for a great climby loop chasing Mike or sometimes riding with him — 71 miles and a bit under 10,000ft of climbing. Knowing it was going to be a long day of climbing, I just spun up pretty much everything, relaxing and enjoying the gorgeous views from the ridge road and seeing down the valleys. I loved the miles and miles with no cars, since about 20 of the miles each way were on roads that are currently closed to cars (ok currently closed — but lots of bikers still play up there). And the french dip sandwich at the turn around, complete with a fire to dry off and thaw a bit from that last cloud, also rocked. Oh yeah, and on the final stretch, I got a bit playful and I think Mike got tired of me finding sprint points ;) I just knew I could make it home from there!

And thanks to Marky, a nice little run followed the ride. Just 20 minutes, 2.2 miles, but there weren’t really any completely flat parts.

So I earned my spaghetti! :)

Oh and the “song” stuck in my head lately? “It’s too cold for holes in my arse… it’s too cold for holes!!” (inspired by a pair of bike shorts that were torn on a fence).

learning the Marky Way May 21, 2008

Posted by Kylie in : running, biking, marky , 1 comment so far

More focus this year. Not on just doing, but on improving. On building speed, so that instead of having a long run I have a strong long run. Sometimes it hurts. As I started my run this morning, I really thought just stopping and stretching for the hour would feel so much better. But while visions of coachy-pants danced in my head I kept going. And of course the warm up loosened up my legs, and things fell into place.

After the ultra to kick of the year, it feels odd to have my “long run” day be 8 miles. But the focus this year is on shorter races, so even the long run is shorter, and at a better pace. Today I threw in some intervals, doing a mile hard, 1/2 mile easy, and repeating that 4 times. Then (because Mike was about to catch me and because a certain hill and I fight over who gets to make me hurt more) I added a HARD 1/4 mile on a bit of an uphill to finish off the mainset.

And about that spinny bike ride I did last night? Well it felt awesome — my focus was on a higher cadence to let the legs spin a bit more, but even with keeping the highest cadence I have in a while, the winds made for a bit harder of a ride than I had pictured. Oh and I’m bad at the high cadence game — you’d think that means I’d go into easier gears even for slight hills, but often for me it really means I just push a bazilliondy watts up the hills to keep the cadence up. I can be soooo lazy about shifting.

So my legs are a bit sore, and I can feel it walking today. Man I love that feeling. I wasn’t really getting it the same with the ultra format of training. And it means time to see if my massage girl Brianne has time for me on Friday! Because only this kind of leg feeling makes a massage reward even sweeter.

watt was I thinking? May 15, 2008

Posted by Kylie in : biking, mike , 1 comment so far

Ok so it’s a geeky title. But no surprise then, right?

I rode this morning — my 20.5 mile out and back that is basically flat. And it was a bit windy, but nothing super crazy. I just had no power. None. Felt like I was running on empty or something. Even 100 watts felt unholdable. Not a great feeling, but I did the whole ride, home, and off to work.

Talking to Mike just now he reminded me that I haven’t been sleeping well at all — or have been working til crazy late for some unknown reason. Oh yeah. I always forget that sleep is a part of performance. But today’s looooow power numbers for similar perceived exertion to other rides sure reinforced it! Maybe next time I’ll remember.

no longer screwed May 11, 2008

Posted by Kylie in : biking , 1 comment so far

… and it was bad — ’cause it was my bike cleat. At my 33 mile turn around point today I finally checked the cleat that hadn’t been clipping out easily. I had forgotten about it with the long stretches without stopping ;)   And it was missing a screw, and the others were loose. So I tighted them, and crossed my fingers that it would get me home. And it did… but slipped out of position pretty well. Guess I need to fix that.

guess it is time to move May 6, 2008

Posted by Kylie in : biking, R3, marky , add a comment

With the rides I do all the time, I love that my Trifuel training log lets me compare my times over each course. I often have goal times for “someday”. Recently, my 20.5 mile mostly flat ride had a goal of 1:10, and my rolly 30.5 mile route had a goal of 2:00.

Well Saturday I climbed on my R3 and headed out on the 20.5 mile course. Nothing too exciting at first, but I was feeling pretty good so starting going a bit harder. I returned home in 1:09:29. That’s 4:22 faster than ever before, and 8:15 faster than my average. Wooo! I’ll take it.

Today I went out on my 30.5 mile route, feeling a bit stiff. My legs were not warming up too well, and seeing my power numbers in the first interval put me in a “get it done” frame of mind (not a “grab that PR” one). But I figured I’d still sticking to my coach’s prescribed 5 min on, 3 min off intervals. At the turn around, I though I might be a couple minutes ahead of whenever I’ve done it before, but I wrote it off to remembering the time wrong, and just kept doing. About 7 miles from the end I could tell another PR was coming, and it was good motivation to hold where I was through the set after the intervals were done. Got home… in 1:53:13!! Yup, a good 7:58 faster than ever before, and 11:16 faster than my average!

I’m pleased, and gave the legs healthy food and the rest of the day off. Time to move and find new routes to set goals for… or to just up those. Did I hear 1:05 and 1:50? :)

Oops - should tighten that! May 1, 2008

Posted by Kylie in : biking, mike , add a comment

I started my ride on Tuesday planning to get in just over 20 miles with one of my favorite routes from my door. Mostly flat, and very little traffic (and many miles on a bike path). I was feeling pretty good, but realized I had forgotten my phone. Did the little hill at mile 1, and on the descent from it at about 30 MPH all of a sudden I had almost no control of the bike! I was fishtailing, and heading straight for a T-intersection where I was coming from the hard to see direction. Hoping no car was going to turn and right into me, I braked and looked at the back of my bike, expecting a flat and wondering how that had happened, and so fast.

Instead I found that the wheel was no longer in the drops! Yes, the wheel had basically fallen off my bike. Luckily the brake calipers held it sort of in place, so it was still in the chain. I smelled burning rubber and took the bike to the top of the T to put the wheel back in. And found a couple HUGE bald spots on my tire. Oh right, 30mph to 0 without spinning… yeah, that will take off some rubber.

Popped the wheel back in place, remembering how I had thought it was a bit loose that morning but hadn’t bothered to tighten it since I had raced on it that way and figured it was fine. Um oops.

I headed down to the running path I was just above, and where Mike had either just passed our would be passing soon on his run. I found him, and just rode home easy next to him while talking.

So it was a short ride, and a pretty easy one, but sure was scary! And next time I will be less lazy.

PossAbilities Triathlon

Posted by Kylie in : running, swiming, Race Tales, biking, mike , add a comment

2 years ago I almost skipped this race, but ended up going since I’d done it every year I’ve done tris. And while there I met a pretty cute boy, and now I get to keep him, so we like doing that race and signed up again this year.

So off we went to the races in a clown car! We took Mike’s 2door Civic. My bike fits standing in the back seat with only the front wheel off, and his fits in the trunk with the seat folded down. Then the wheels and our race gear squeeze in around, and when we get to the race site you wonder where all the stuff we have in there was stored for the drive.

I got ready, leaving my shoes on my bike for the first time. I had practiced it the night before on our street, and figured why not. Then a quick warmup, and to the line. Where I realized I was not interested in running. I felt exhausted and just wanted to play on my bike. As the national anthem was sung, I remembered my bike shoes were still velcro’ed — so getting them on would be a bit more complicated than I had practiced :) Mike told me it was too late — to not race (which I didn’t reallly want to do anyways) or to fix the shoes. And he even noticed how I just wasn’t giggly excited like I usually am before a race. So the horn blew, and I just ran.

I didn’t really push it — cheered for Mike as he went by the other way, and got to run with some of the kids from the Exceeding Expectations program (they were all there racing, so it was fun to see them). Finished the run, put on a helmet and dropped my visor and GPS and jumped on. Shoes on successfully, and I pedaled.

I still wasn’t really in the zone, and the bike was over. Into the water and I swam a bit hard. But it was sooo crowded. With the serpentine swim I kept getting pushed into the lane lines if I tried to pass, or caught up in others arms. So I just swam hard and passed pretty much everyone around me. I’m by no means a good swimmer, I just think that is often one of the weakest things for most people who show up to the little local races.

Out of the water, jog to the line. I didn’t even notice the time, just gave Mike a high five and was ready to go pack up so he could get on his way.

Mike had a conference in Palm Springs all weekend (which meant I got to commute with him on Friday, which was fun). And then he had to leave immediately after he was done racing to go for more, but would be back around 2 or 3, so I just hung out at the race site until he was back — there was a tri club meeting, and it is my gym, and I had a book. I was a bit sunburned when all was done, but it was a good day.

This post has me sounding like I really didn’t like the race. I did — I felt ok for it, and it has a great atmosphere. I just felt kind of blah in general, and for some reason wasn’t too excited about it being race day. It was fun to cheer for some of the exceeding expectations kids (I just couldn’t cheer for the ones that beat me ;) ). And I do like the feeling of that race: some very fast people (Kate Major, Julie Swail) but also tons of people just giving triathlon a first go.

not a bad weekend! April 6, 2008

Posted by Kylie in : running, swiming, Race Tales, biking, pics, mountain biking, mike , 4 comments

Saturday was a 5k. The same course I set a PR on last year. I went faster :) 23:44! Although their times were a bit odd in that I was in a group and they have no one right by me — my watch had me at 23:19 and a 7:21 pace since the course is long, but also didn’t have the 5 seconds of getting to the start line. Either way, a PR. And yeah, it kinda hurt. But it was a beautiful course, and I’ll take it! Official stats:

23:44 (7:38 pace) — 282/3015 overall, 43/1505 women, 8/171 W25-29

Sunday was Mike’s and my first off-road tri, and from there we were going to head to Redlands and see some of the Redlands Classic bike race on our bikes, so Saturday night we packed up the car and the bikes had a sleepover in the car (which left our house looking a bit empty).

The mountain bike race was chosen since Mike won an entry by winning the Redlands Tri, and since I have wanted to do one for a couple years we went for it. Although it was a bit confusing at the start (missing Mike’s early reg and no one sure what we needed to fill out) we got registered and got a great spot set up in transition. Wetsuits on, and down to the beach. There were only 2 waves (it was a pretty small local race) and Mike’s was off fairly quickly. Supposed to be 5 minutes after, my wave was bumped to 20 minutes after. I watched Mike come out of the water in second :) and got ready to go. And our start time was bumped back by another 20 minutes. So much for that well-planned gel and warm-up! About 20 minutes later, we suddenly we had a 30 second warning, just enough time to wipe the fog out of my goggles, and we were off. I had a pretty good swim, and felt my spotting was not as bad as usual.

It has been a while since I had to wiggle out of a wetsuit on my own! I made it, pulled on bike shoes and a helmet and was off in about 5th or so according to one of the race guys telling us things. I passed a couple other women early in the loop, and later was passed by a couple. Oh, and in one section, there were TALL weeds, taller than me on my bike, with just barely a path through them. One of the weeds caught my handlebars and pulled me into the weeds. Where I didn’t fall over since they were strong, and just had to pull out of them and keep going. And then I made it up and over a curb without pausing (I still feel like I have TONS of mtb skills work to do!). One loop down, off the bike at the dismount, run through the TA, and then back on the bike at the mount line for loop 2. Weird, but it worked (there was a one loop race as well).

Second (and final) loop about 10 miles into the race I could feel that PR from the day before. My legs were tiring fast! The 2 women I had just in sight moved well ahead, and I started wondering how that hilly 3.2 mile run would feel. But first things first, and I kept pedaling. And found that I had launched one of my 2 gels, so I had one and wouldn’t have one at the start of the run. Oh well, keep moving. As I came around the final turn there was Mike (and a camera)!

Back into transition, and a nice smooth change into the run gear. My mtb shoes are so hard to get off! I will have to try out my new ones (with a tongue instead of elastic) next time.

I got off the bike in about 7th place Mike thought, and I started my run. My plan was to enjoy it. There were some pretty trails, and I knew my legs were fairly shot. Someone forgot to tell my competitive side though! It was a tough course, with the first part having tons of climbing. I guess the ultra training has helped — feeling pretty bad I still passed the 2 women right in front of me! And then later another one that had passed me on the bike, and into a fun little single track, and with .8 miles to go I could see another. But she had a decent lead, so I didn’t think I’d make it. Then she walked a hill, and I went for it and made it past. Since most of the climbing and harder downhills were all in the first half, this last mile was a lot of fun. Almost done, around a turn, and again Mike. He was chatting, so I had to talk for him to see me. But he still got a picture as I told him that if I beat him to the finish line he owed me lunch *and* dinner (he already owed me lunch).

He did beat me to the line, but still ended up buying me dinner. He’s that awesome.

The other nice thing about a first off-road tri is the automatic PR! :) Although I didn’t do too shabby:

2:29:36 — 53/112 overall, 5/20 women, 2/5 W25-29

After the race we hung out for quite a while waiting for results. They still had nothing, and finally announced that they’d have to mail out the awards and weren’t going to get them done that day. It was chipped timed, but they were having computer issues. Honestly, I’m not so impressed with the race organization. For how expensive it was, I expected better. While I had a lot of fun, it was so behind schedule and disappointing to not get results, so I’m not sure if I’d do it again. When they announced results would be online this evening, we left, and headed to Redlands and had a nice easy 11ish mile ride around the Redlands Classic course. With In N Out burgers on the way, and then great Thai food before heading home.

Mike had a great race as well and was 2nd or 3rd overall! He says 3rd, but right now results have him 2nd. So the results might all change — oh, and it now says splits won’t be available until Wednesday night. So there are definitely some issues still there.

Oh… and for those of you still wondering how Oceanside was, Mike did a great job and I got some great photos. It’s all over on his blog, and I don’t have the energy to type it up now :) But I had fun cheering for people and hanging out with Marky and crew.