City of Guerneville

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Trying to strike a balance with this post, too much web stuff lately. This weekend I'm going up to Guerneville with Katina, for the 1/2 Vineman Race. Guerneville is supposed to be a gay and lesbian destination, but I wouldn't call it the West coast equivalent of Provincetown. I was there last year but for the race so didn't get chance to see Guerneville that much. I think Guerneville is on the Russian River and there's a lot of great wineries in the Sonoma/Russian River area. One of them is Roshambo. There's a bunch out here (that's why they call the triathlon Vineman).

The Bedroom Closet

When we first moved into our house, our bedroom closet had a deadbolt lock on it – on one side a key hole, and the other a knob (some deadbolts have key holes on both sides). What was weird was that the key hole side was inside the closet and the knob facing the bedroom. If you can't visualize that, you could essentially lock someone in the closet if they didn't have a key. Freaked me the hell out.

When we got the locksmith re-keying all the locks in the house, he turned around that deadbolt so that the key hole side was facing the bedroom. We were thinking of removing it but he said to keep it because it's perfect if you had people coming over to work on the house or on vacation, you could just put everything in the closet and lock things up.

Every once in awhile, when I think about the lock, I still get freaked out. What the hell was that used for? Who was locked in the closet? Is the paint on the door covering up finger nail scratches on the door from someone clawing their way out? Was it one of those kinky closets? I kinda want to know and kinda don't either. The locksmith had said maybe it was for some crazy kid or crazy older person. Who knows except for that person who put that lock in there in the first place.

The Lure of IronTeam 2006

Probably not going to do IronTeam 2006. For anyone wanting to do an Ironman, it's a big time suck and it's very costly. To even get started you need to buy the following:

– bike gear ~$3,500 ($2k for the bike, the rest for clothes/shoes and maintenance)
– run gear ~$250 (shoes)
– swim gear ~$300 (wet suit, goggles, etc)
– other gear ~$200-300

Then there's the race entry which is $500 at least, and travel to the Ironman event, and races/travel in between at $100-200 a pop. Then there's food and stuff.

Once you get past that initial expense, it's still costly to keep doing these Ironman events. Still need to pay for travel and race entries, maintenance, and tune-ups. It's not a cheap sport (but it sure is fun!).

new car at the dealers…

Yea. Our BMW X3 is at the dealers. We'll be paying the Cars Direct price thank you very much. It will be nice to have real windows, leather seats, and a stereo system where I don't have to carry around the damn face plate.

dead snakes at mile 35 and 65

Don't play with dead snakes is Jim Barksdale's rule, so why is this entry in "ironman training". Well, that's because I encountered some dead snakes this weekend at Lake Berryessa, another weekend with the IronTeam. It's funny how tempting it is to actually play with dead snakes. If I hadn't heard JB's saying, I probably would've checked those snakes out.

I left for Lake Berryessa on Friday around 7pm. I got there at 10:30pm but should've gotten there at 8:45, 9pm, it was a bad night. The next morning we did roughly a 2 mile swim in the lake (we started at 7am). The swim was fun, 3 loops around a couple buoys and this one weird structure. After the swim, we went on an epic 92 mile bike ride that was over 7500 feet of climbing (Ironman Canada for example has a little over 3500 feet of climing over 112 miles). The bike ride was very beautiful with hawks flying about, vineyards, a couple dead snakes (deer, rabbit, etc), a dog chasing after me, several creeks we had to cross on foot, a tunnel, a downed motorcyclist that had to be helicoptered out of the area, lots of climbing, long descents, and a bit too many potholes.

When we got back, I ate my ice cream, we had a very nice dinner (hamburgers, potato salad, berries, pie), and there was even some entertainment our very own stand up comic on the team.

The next morning, we went out for a 2 hour run. I cut it a bit short, there was some waffle, bacon, and eggs that was calling for me back at the cabin. After that, headed home and didn't get lost this time. Awesome weekend.

Much to lucky to be part of lots of great teams over the years.

Recovery Week

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So much for recovery week last week (well, ends today). Next week is back up the pyramid with Week 33 of Ironman Training. This coming week supposed to be doing 8700 yards of swimming, 100 miles of bike riding, and up to 22 miles of running. Joy.

Yesterday was a good bike ride: Claremont Ave, down Wildcat Canyon, Three Bears, up Wildcat Canyon, and up South Park Drive. Going up South Park to end a ride really sucks but I actually started to use my core muscles to push through to the top. The difference is amazing when you shift your power to your hip flexors, stomach and back from just your legs.

The Post Club-Med-Cancun Diet

**draft**

The Post Club-Med-Cancun Diet (or the diet from hell)

So two weeks in Cancun with all you can eat, all you can drink, and all you can play (running on the beach, water ski, trapeze, tennis, weight room etc), I'm now at 189-190lbs. I was at 180-183lbs so I've gained between 6-10lbs in a couple weeks.

So here's the Post Club Med Cancun Diet in the negative:
– no (little) sugar
– no red meat
– no milk
– no juice (except orange juice)
– no (little) processed foods
– no white bread/white rice

In the positive:
– *lots* of water
– lots of oatmeal, (kashi or smart start cereal)
– lots of fruits and vegetables

95 mile bike ride and training status

I got my bike tuned up this Wednesday and it is nice. The gears were all degreased, the brakes aligned, the tires trued, and my computer fixed. So this Saturday it was a joy to ride.

Went off and did crazy 95 mile bike ride, here's the route (kinda) via Google Maps.

We started at the Sports Basement in the Presidio, over the Golden Gate Bridge, down into Sausalito, up Camino Alto into Fairfax. We went up White Hill? and then up some other hill into Nicasio Square. At that point it was 28 miles.

I went with Kamal to do a 30 mile loop which started with this one hill, up and over till we got to Marshall Wall. Now Marshall Wall is a bitch of a hill and there's even chalk marks of "Go Tyler" for Tyler Hamilton on the road. It's just long and steep but with very beautiful views at the top.

So down the other side of Marshall Wall, passed by Hog Island Oyster company, over to Point Reyes Station and then back to Nicasio and back to San Francisco. 95 miles is a long way to go and wasn't really up for it but I felt pretty good. I guess there was about 8,000 feet of climbing involved too, possibly more. Kamal says 10,000 but that doesn't really matter to me.

I have 2 1/2 hour run tomorrow and then recovery week in Cancun, Mexico! Haven't been able to train much during the week because of work but it sure is nice to be able to know I have a good enough base to take on a 95 mile bike ride on a whim.