For the love of jMatt

Here he is in all his glory…crossing the finish line in Kona.

Way to slay those lava dragons jMatt!

To all those who have loved and lost

Back when I was 15 or so I was dumped real hard like, twice by the same guy. Both dump-a-roos, for the SAME girl. I know, tragic! Funny enough, she had curly brown hair and big lips…but she was a lot softer spoken, dare I say, nice.

For everyone who has been kicked to the curb in their life, you’re better for it.

There are two videos, take your pick.

Cee Lo Green “Fuck You”
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Cee Lo Green – Fuck You
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A marathon, a sherpa, a gun, a hit-n-run, TACO the dead dog and off to Boston we go!

What a day, what a race, what a way to end the season!

3:40:31 and 1st in my age group!

The late TACO, my race inspiration.

Alright…let’s do this

I am off to Ashland, WI to face the demons.  Or maybe we should spin that a little differently…crush them!

Armed with my new compressions socks (which make me feel like a very naughty Catholic school girl when worn with a running skirt), Welle’s pacing (which will be written all over my arms) and my ladybird Erika (seriously, who doesn’t want her around?) for ground support, this should be one heck of a ride.

Totally ready for the challenge…bring it on!

If I can actually follow the pacing, here is how it should go:

Miles 1-8: 8:45min/miles

Miles 8-13: 8:15min/miles

Miles 13-20: 8:00min/miles

Miles 20-23: 8:15min/miles

Miles 23-26.2: How much heart do you have????

Checkpoints:

10k: 54:30, 8 mile: 1:10:00, 13.1 mile: 1:52:30, 20 mile: 2:48:30, 23 mile: 3:13:45

I’ll keep you posted and have photos on my return.

Good luck to Vicki, Scott (and Scott’s brother) who are running Chicago this weekend and to jMatt who is racing KONA!

Going Camando

After school conversation.

KP:  I’m never going to school with no underwear on again.

Me:  You went to school with no underwear on?

KP:  Yeah…I didn’t like it.  That hurts!

Dredging myself in chaos

Meet Murphy.

He’s our new addition.  I know, crazy right?

What the hell happened you ask?  Well, of course, there is a story and it involves drinking and doggy beer goggles.

Last Friday, the boys went off to a play-date after school and PJ went to a birthday party.  So Adam and I found ourselves with an hour to kill and decided to go to dinner, at Travial Kitchen (which, if you have not been there, RUN don’t walk…it’s great) before we picked PJ up from the birthday party.

To our great surprise, we hit happy hour while we where there and those $3 Benders went down way too easily.  In no time at all, we were off to pick PJ up at the Humane Society birthday party.

We went in, she wanted to look around, we said yes, I said I had to leave the kennels because all the doggy whining and crying was driving me crazy, PJ asked if we could look at the cats (I can do that right?  it’s not like I’m going to get another cat) and in the cat section of the Humane Society, in a little baby kennel, was Murphy.  The next thing I said was, “ohhhhhhhh, you are the cutest thing I have ever seen.”

Then we got him out of the kennel and played with him.

Then we put him on 24 hour hold.

Then we went back then next day.

And now we have a 2 month old puppy named Murphy.

Clearly, drinking and the Humane Society don’t mix!

One last gasp

The week before the ironman, I came home from a run with such exhilaration for completing the workout so perfectly, that Adam looked at me and said, “Why don’t you run another marathon and qualify for Boston?”

That’s all I needed to stoke that flame.  A quick email to Scott wondering if this was a bad idea or worse yet a HORRIBLE idea went off.  He suggested waiting until after the ironman was done and then decide.

So while Adam and I were driving home from the ironman, I flipped open the computer, Adam handed me a credit card and said, “Sign Up!”

Here is the email thread that transpired next:

Me: I want to go to Boston.  Whislestop…Oct 9.  Get me there.

Scott: Done.

So this Saturday, I will be attempting, yet again, to qualify for Boston.  Since I am now 40 the cushion is a bit thicker, I need to finish in 3:50.

I will see if the gamble of riding this wave of fitness will pay off or if it will all come crashing down.

Bets start at $1.

2B or not 2B

I knew, when I signed up last year to do an ironman, that I wanted to have a coach.  I wanted this coach because I knew that I could readily destroy myself and my race by manhandling my own training regimen.

So I started asking around and quickly came up with a few coaches to talk with.  After a few brief exchanges, it was clear who the most responsive and diligent candidate for the job was and in addition to that, he had a small posse of woman my age that were training for the same race.  In my mind, the combination of the two, was the perfect compliment.

The deal with having a coach is that you have to trust them.  You have to have faith that what they are asking you to do, will reap rewards down the line.  Sometimes that’s hard to do, especially when you know lots of (highly competitive) athletes, doing lots of things and all those things might be different than how your coach is doing it.  You can choose to trust or you can drive yourself crazy wondering if they are skinning the cat the wrong way.  I chose to, as I call it, drink the Welle-Aide.  Needless to say, that trust paid off for me this year.

After all the time and workouts and emails and discussions and races, when it was all said and done, my coach Scott Welle, deserves the highest of praise.  He has made me a much smarter, savvier and wiser racer.  He has made me stronger mentally.  And, he has made me pretty bad-ass-mean physically.  If you want specifics on how much time I have shaved off my race times this year, I can give that to you.  But know this, I am A LOT faster, after training with Scott.

If you are looking for a coach, contact him.  He does loads of other stuff besides training crazy people like me, so check out his web site (you will quickly find out he likes information–don’t be scared).

After 9 months with me…he gets my stamp of approval!

Thanks for the great season Welle!

Lois Lane just showed up

Did you know with the purchase of corrective eye wear, you also get copious amounts of free tude?

Bring on the low Brass

I’m loud.

I have loud children.

Our house is not that peaceful place where children do puzzles.  Our house is that place where the walls are typically shaking and you can hear what’s going on inside the house out on our street corner.

So when CT came home with the very large, very loud tuba…how could I be surprised?

It’s perfect.