Excellent Vaca

Ahhh - what a kick ass time we had. Did some stellar rock climbing, hiking, etc. Amazing. We took some great photos. Got on the bike yesterday when we got home and spun down to GG - my bike felt weird. :)

asta la pasta

10 days of kick ass yosemite valley ! I am stoked!!! I will come back stronger than ever! I can't wait to get some vacation time in.... yahoo!!!!

The Secret Hill

Tonight Rachel showed us where the "secret" hill is. It is an excellent training hill - exactly how I pictured it in my mind. We all worked our intervals despite the thunderstorm and torrental downpour. I happily ate sushi and drank my miso soup afterward.

the legs are feeling recovered - much better than this weekend.

last night we had an advisory meeting for the women's track program. it went well - with lots of ideas for getting more women involved. I am excited to get involved and contribute to getting more women out there (aka more competition).

boxing

had a nice spin this morning before the drizzle began.

my mom showed me an article from the seattle pi about a new boxing gym on capital hill. I called and am thinking about going maybe once a week as a upper body cross trainer. my intention is just for the cardio/upper body strenthening, not the sparring or competition. ryan's a little freaked out about it - i just think of it as a workout. i miss hitting things. :)

I was looking into the month of June to see what else I can squeeze into my schedule as cross training... between swimming, cycling, track, yoga and now boxing, not to mention climbing and weight training... hard to prioritize. Life is too short not to fit it all in.

Monday Madness

Woke up with severe allergies this morning and through the afternoon. My body was slightly tired - and once I took a nap it seemed to clear my allergies up. It must be something in the air...

I did some reflection about the weekend. Sure I didn't have the best results - but if doing an event tired and heavy legged means still a top 10 - then I'm okay with that. It was a great learning experience and I have some areas that I would like to work on (climbing and dialing in a TT position). I would like to try and dial in the best TT position as possible... could you help me with that sometime in the near future?

Also - Yosemite Valley is flooding right now - we may not go to Cali. We'll see what develops during the week. There is a small chance I will do the MT Ecology Race instead!!!

Wipped out

Dude. Talk about being tired.

Worked it this weekend - the end of a three week build cycle. Boy am I stoked - and more stoked then I actually show - how excited I am to relax this week. My body is tired - from about my waist down - and my mind is exhausted too.

In retrospect - I would have taken Thursday off from Seward. However, my fitness is that much stronger now. The TT was good - 9th place with 26.08 and 4th in the crit, 15th in the RR with a 9th place overall. Melinda rocked the house with 7th place in the RR and 10th overall. A very commendable effort.

My legs were pretty heavy in the TT and then during the RR. They felt pretty solid for the crit - but with only 20 minutes it was either collect the preme or go for the gold. I won $40 - but didn't get the points overall to shoot me up in the Omnium. Oh well - lessons learnt.

Hills - I must get faster on the climb. I know I have the mental endurance - but I need to work on the climbing to be unstoppable. UNSTOPPABLE.

Ok - now I'm really delirious - bed time for me. Happy birthday my friend. Great party.

Sort of Seward Spank...

Went for an excellent massage this morning -and for the first time I didn't have anything specific for her to work on. She even commented on how relaxed my body was - including my calves and back where I usually have issues. A tall tale sign that I'm finally learning how to ride my bike!

Had a great ride today - rode down to Seward to watch the 5:30 roll out - and jumped on. Managed to keep up and stay with them and sprint at the end of the effort - beating 5 guys right at the end. You have to finish strong, right?

Tomorrow we're leaving at 1 if you want to hitch a ride with us. LMK.

Hill repeats

Had some nice grinders today and was able to quickly recover from once I stopped chugging up the hill. My fitness is getting better and better. Tomorrow morning I get a massage. Nice.

Loop 2

Got a really good workout last night. I was feeling slightly under the weather in the morning - popped some Vitamin I down and felt better in the afternoon. Matt and I worked on lead outs - he reminded me to be spinning closer to his wheel vs. pushing a harder gear and grinding it to stay close. It worked great. By the third try I had it down and it felt good. It still has a ways to go and practice will make it perfect - but in the meantime I'm happy with the results.

Tonight is a hill workout - should be good. I had a crazy dream last night that you and your dad came over and weed eatted my yard. Strange.

A little tired

I think I'm fighting something again. My throat has been sore today and I've been pounding the fluids down. Hopefully a good nights sleep will kick whatever I have lurking.

Spun for 1/2 hour on the trainer today - watch LeMonds 1989 Tour - excellent motivator. Going to bed to try and stock up on sleep.

Champ

It's amazing how when you think positively about something - train right, eat right, surround yourself with laughter - and when the planets align just right, you can accomplish anything you put your mind to. It's an surreal feeling. Someone please pinch me.

I am blessed. Somehow I ended up with this talent and I am thanking my lucky stars for it. I thought I would be a good business person - wall street - or a lawyer. Thank goodness I didn't fully pursue those endeavors. Failing accounting in college was one of the best things that happened to me - well not really. But it definitely helped.

Holy shit. Thank you for being a part of my life right now - I'm dumbfounded at how this is all working out. Absolutely stunned.

Getting Ready...

Tomorrow should be fun. I'm really looking forward to it. So I heard there's a climb - but I've been working on the hills so that shouldn't be too much of an issue. Plus look at TST - that was much harder and longer.

Joyce sent out a team email today regarding team tactics. Rachel is our point of contact - at which she will communicate what plan to execute. It'll be interesting to see if we accomplish those goals. Rachel and I talked yesterday about it - we're not sure where or when to make the attacks but I think tomorrow some shit is going down. I'm super amped.

Mellow Ride

It was really nice out this evening. We did a short 1.5 hour spin down to Boeing and back. The legs are feeling good. One more day of spinning and then vrrroooooommmmm. I'm looking forward to State. Should be fun.

I felt like my handling skills improved a lot since early this week. I am able to take corners much faster and apex the angles even better. Excellent - things are coming along.

On a side note - I'm meeting with the Larabar marketing director tomorrow. Kristin referred him - I called and spoke with him for a while. Then he called Joyce and she told him she has time to talk in 2 weeks. Is that blowing him off or what? I made an executive decision to meet with him any way tomorrow night and have a conversation. That should be interesting. He mentioned free product....

Tour of the busiest arterials in Seattle

Melanie and I risked life and limb today on our rush hour ride up North. It was a nice and welcomed change of scenery compared to my normal easy routes. We headed up through Greenlake to Shoreline, and then passed Aurora, Lake City and 145th. A lot of lights - but nice once we got on some side streets without heavy traffic.

The legs are feeling pretty tired after Monday and Tuesday's efforts. I woke up this morning and went to the pool with my friend Lin and the legs felt fatigued when kicking. I promptly came home and went back to bed. For some reason my body decided it was excited about swimming in the morning and was ready to rumble at 3:15 am. I couldn't shut my brain off for about an hour. That hasn't happened in a long time. I dreamt about racing, about telling my previous employer what I really thought of them, and then decided to count underhand softball pitches in slow motion to try and get my mind to relax. I slept for another hour to hear the errrrnt errrrnt errrrrnt of the alarm clock. Brutal.

Sushi night tonight - charged up and stoked for the weekend. Did you still need a ride?

Hanging with the boys

Power lifting (aka sprinting) two days in a row now - felt good. The boys push me - I really like being pushed. It's humbling yet makes me strive to get better and beat them. I'm looking forward to the day. ;)

I've been sleeping like a baby the last couple of nights - my body is getting ready for a hard effort this weekend. I'm super excited. When do we get to ride together again?

Sprint adjustment

Excellent work out today. It feels like things are coming along with the sprint. I'm very happy that I still have things to work on - it keeps me motivated and wanting to get out there day after day. Like you said, the bike tracking will come with time. I'm looking forward to that day.

Even though I only did one hill effort - I think that's where I learned the most today. I could really feel the fluidity of the pedal stroke. It's coming along - now the trick will be able to apply that same motion on the flats. It was also great learing the lead outs - thank you for that.

Now if I can just get my bike worked on...

It's funny how...

....my life now revolves around cycling. Not just a little - but a lot. I enjoy each minute of it.

The TT was good - it's all about a hammerfest and how long one can endure at a super fast/above threshold pace. I'm still fine tuning it but have been able to put my mind in the same spot as before and just go for it. I like TT's. They are a true testament to how much power you can put out - they say to the world - this is how I cycle. But there's also something to be said for road racing -suffering in numbers. Wouldn't being a strong TTrialist translate to some of the best riders? Sure there's a tactical aspect but if it came down to a TT... then may the stronger woman win. And I hope and pray that it's me. :)

Ryan mentioned minimizing the overall distance traveled. Perfect example - corners. Taking the shortest line mathematically and using the power in correlation to it. Hmmm... something new to think about for the next tt.