Osoyoos Pre-Race

I watched the Vancouver Subaru sprint and half iron the weekend before Osoyoos and came to the realization that a half iron was a ludicrously long distance for a race!

I've done enough halves (halfs?) that I know the distance and how long it will take me, but as I've only done sprints this year it seemed like a long, long time to be racing.

I felt terribly unprepared in general.  I don't know why as I've put in the time and distance but somehow it didn't feel like enough. That's probably a good thing as any race I've gone into cocky has inevitably turned out to be humbling.

Part of feeling unprepared is that I haven't been as focussed on my training as in past years.  Work has been extremely stressful for quite a while and I really haven't been able to plan anything much in my non-work life. Stress has also had other fun effects.  A bad day  at work after a bad night's sleep and a kinked back lead to the mother of all taper tantrums/meltdowns on the Thursday before the race. As an FYI, a large, open plan office isn't a great place to lose it, I suggest you plan your breakdowns for more private locales.

Happily, that seemed to clear my nerves. I was still concerned about my back but a massage appointment on Friday morning fixed the worst of the issue and I felt I could complete the race.

In being "planning challenged" I was very disorganized in my preparation for the half: I signed up a week and a half out from the race, I found a hotel the weekend before and arranged a car rental on the Wednesday prior.  So in packing on Friday before heading out I knew I would forget something. On Facebook I offered Okanagan cherries to the first person to figure out what I forgot.  There were 40 replies, the most popular item was a race belt, an item I have yet to forget but apparently a lot of my friends have. Happily no one thought I was clueless enough to leave my bike behind.

The definitive list of things I forgot:
- bento box (I could have survived without, must learn to be a better roadie!)
- earplugs
- helmet number. OK, not something I packed but I forgot to put it on my helmet and only figured it out 70km into the ride
- instant oatmeal. Quick oats are pretty sludgy when you just add boiling water rather than cook 'em for 5 minutes

I stopped in Chilliwack on Friday night and had a short visit with my dad. Saturday was a mellow day, on my way up I drove the bike course then registered, napped at my hotel and did my short pre-race workouts and the pre-race meeting. I didn't see Andrew Graham but did meet up with Kristie briefly.

Then it was back to the hotel where I ended the day calm and looking forward to racing.

Bahamas Marathon - Pre Race Report

Just for Amy and Kathryn I'm working on my race report on my flight home from the race. (Nothing to do with not being able to sleep, nope this is all to keep you happy.  Hope you appreciate my sacrifice!)

Despite being in the travel industry for eight years I've never been on a FAM trip so had little idea of what to expect.  I was nervous about sharing a room with someone I didn't know and in general about the group dynamics.

At the Toronto airport I spied various people who looked like runners.  One of them was handing out shirts so I guessed it would be my group. Right I was. I met a few people, chatted and tried desperately to remember names.

At the resort (Superclubs Breezes) we checked in and I ended up rooming with Wendi, a very nice and very cool agent from Toronto.  She was very experienced both with running and with FAMs so an excellent person to be around.

The view of the Breezes pool 

I was the only person from the group signed up for the full marathon, I was infamous before anyone even met me.  I told people in the group the distance I was racing and they responded "You're the one!"   When people asked what distances we were doing and someone said "She's the full" it sounded remarkably like "She's the fool!"

In the days prior to the race we did a variety of agenty things - site inspections of the Breezes property, the Atlantis resort and the Sandals resort; a Dolphin experience; wandering downtown Nassau.  It was interesting and fun but not necessarily the restful type of things you want to do prior to a marathon (the Atlantis site tour was three hours of walking).

Hanging out with dolphins 

At the aquarium at the Atlantis

View from the Executive Lounge in the Cove tower at the Atlantis resort

Just as difficult as staying off our feet was eating sensibly.  We were faced with tempting buffets for breakfast then uncertain stretches with no food and a couple of seriously unhealthy dinners (but soooo good!).  If you're ever in the Bahamas, go to Twin Brothers at Arawak Cay for the fish fry.  Pretty sure deep fried conch (pronouced "conk") isn't recommended pre-race food but wow it was good. Ooh, and do brunch at the Atlantis and have dinner at the Sandals.  You'll thank me for the recommendations.

Grilled red snapper at Twin Brothers fish fry

So after three days of doing everything wrong we finally came to the marathon.

I picked up a copy of the race program and looked at the race registrants.  There were maybe 120 people signed up for the marathon.  I joked to the other runners and to my parents and coach that I might actually place in this race!

It was good to know in advance that once the half marathoners turned off I'd be pretty much on my own.  Running in a crowd is a very different energy than running alone so it was good to be prepared.

After a pasta dinner at the Breezes buffet, a good portion of which I managed to wear (no pre-race nerves!), we had an early night and tried to have a decent sleep.  We set four alarms and of course I woke up five minutes before any of them went off.

How not to install an App

I've been reading ebooks on my iPad, specifically slogging my way through 'The Idiot' by Dostoyevsky. I downloaded a bunch of free books from Project Gutenberg, which offers books whose copyright's have expired for free.

I'm still warming up to the idea of using an ereader so I'm not keen to start dishing out money for ebooks. 'The Idiot' hasn't exactly kept me up nights reading, but I was pretty sure that had more to do with the material rather than the technology.

The Vancouver Public Library has links to various free ebooks and articles, including BC' Library Online (bclibrary.ca). Seemed like a great way to access ebooks for free, all I had to do was download a compatible ereader App to my iPad and I was set!

Or maybe not.

My steps:

1) Download the Bluefire Reader App to my iPad
2) Go to BCLibrary.ca to sign out a book on my iPad - yay digital library!!!
3) Download won't work. Go to App help page to figure out why.
3.1) Realize I need to download books to my PC and need Adobe Digital Editions to do so.
3.2) Get a little annoyed.
4) Download Adobe digital editions to my PC/desktop (after booting up the computer, which of course takes forever).
5) Go to the BC Library website and sign out a book and (try to) download it.
5.1) Reread the obscure instructions then realize I apparently have to use Firefox, not Explorer (not because they actually tell you, but because it's in one of the illustrations).
5.2) Download Firefox.
5.3) Get serious about being annoyed.
6) Go back to BC Library online and download the book file to my computer.
7) Open iTunes. Which prompts me to upgrade. Why not? How long could it take?
7.1) Find out how long it can take.
7.2) Grrrr.
8) Connect my iPad to my computer and be prompted to update to the latest OS. Why not, I've been at this for long enough, might as well make it truly epic.
8.1) Discover that it takes a long time. A really long time.
8.2) Get an error message that the device has gone into recovery mode.
8.3) Swear loudly.
9) Learn a great deal about recovery mode.
9.1) Learn how long it takes to for an iPad to recover.
9.2) Swear. Not quite so loudly though, I'm a bit tired and really just want to go to bed.
10) Once everything has rebooted, recovered, rehabilitated and what have you I go back online to transfer the book to iTunes then to my iPad.
10.1) Yay! That was a lot of work but worth it. I feel the satisfaction of having figured it all out.
11) The books don't show up on my iPad. Anywhere.
11.1) Swear halfheartedly.
11.2) Give up and go to bed.
12) One day later realize I'd downloaded audio books, not text.
12.1) Feel like an idiot.
12.2) Download a text version book.

Granted I messed up a few things (audio books - doh!) but the process was still a major hassle. There are some good books available at BC Library but the selection is fairly limited. Presumably this will change as the library gets more use.

I found the BC Library website unwieldy and poorly organized. Again, something I hope will improve as the site gets more use.

That said, I'm really enjoying 'Breakfast of Champions', Vonnegut is way more readable than Dostoyevsky.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Interruptions

Sometimes life gets in the way of training. I wasn't expecting to get in a run this weekend but thought I'd take my runners to Calgary with me just in case. Then I managed to tweak my back bending over to put something (not my runners) into my suitcase. One solution to the "to run or not to run" question.

After a bit of panic, I managed to find someone able to see me on Friday on short notice and I had a quick physio session that made it possible for me to sit for the flight to Calgary. Straight from physio to airport.

The reason for the trip was to attend the memorial service for my Uncle Andy, who passed away the week before last. There was no question of staying home to nurse my back. The ceremony was very casual, as is fitting for a celebration in Andy's honour, with some great stories.

It was definitely a sad reason to visit but was really, really nice to have the Thompsons and Russells all together. We need to meet up more often (perhaps Maui could be the new Shuswap?). We do need to get together at the very least to get into the legendary scotch bottle.

I have a very cool family. We're a small crew and don't really do drama, which is fine by me. I think I'm doing another road trip next summer to see them all.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

All Right Already!

Apparently people do read my blog and a few of them even like it. I always thought it would be great to have adoring fans but it turns out they can also be demanding. So fans, here's a post for you - now leave me alone!

What's happened since my last post?

I did finish the Calgary 70.3 - blew up on the bike (I'd been sick, remember), had a slow run and a long day and came away generally unimpressed with the race. The raison d'etre for the whole trip to Calgary turned into the least fun part, happily the rest of the trip was a blast. Next year I'll do a race first then head out across the rockies.

I then decided to take a break from running to give my foot a rest and I focussed on biking and swimming.

Swimming with Fast Lane at Kits pool was phenomenal and I felt that I made huge gains in the water. I've built on those gains in the fall by signing up for Dolphins and, um, mostly sleeping in. Something about getting up at 4:30am in the off season is just plain wrong. Various people have tried to point out the error of my ways, none have come up with a suitably compelling reason.

I had fun doing long rides with the IMAZ crew, building up distance for the Gran Fondo. I got sick with a horrendous cold the week before the ride and wasn't 100% (not even 75%) on the day of but still did the ride. It was tough grind at the very end, everyone seemed to have issues at about the 100km mark, but fun. I'm not sure it was $250.00 worth of fun, however, so I'm passing on doing it next year.

Apparently riding 120km mostly uphill while suffering from a cold is not a good way to kick said cold. The cold took another week to go away then a cough settled in that lasted for almost two months. The upside was that I discovered you can get cough syrup with codiene without a presciption and that the stuff gets me seriously high!

In late September, after not having run for two months, not having exercised in almost a month and with my plantar faciitis issues unchanged, I decided it would be a good idea to sign up for a marathon. There was a ridiculous travel industry deal for the Bahamas Marathon, I figured even if I crawled the marathon it would be worth the trip.

I went back to phsyio and figured what my issues are. Basically I'm an idiot - a weak core and unstable supporting muscles were causing the problems. This was bad in that the plantar faciitis was caused by neglect but good in that there's a workable solution. A week of doing the plank and various exercises from Janet and I was doing great. I'm not 100% but getting there.

I got back on the bike, riding with Barb Zimich's group. She's a fantastic coach and I'm really enjoying riding with her. Her surgery and the cold weather has put an end to that for now but I'm really looking forward to riding with her in 2011.

So that's where I'm at. I will publish my Fall Classic race report soon. I promise. Really.

Quick Update

All right, all right a race report is coming. Just not quite yet.

I'm digging myself out from under laundry and various things left undone at home plus absolute chaos at work is leaving me a bit tired at the end of the day. Our server got tempermental while I was away and the day I got back it died entirely. Nothing like trying to deal with two weeks' worth of work plus a technology crisis (I'm to go-to person for tech stuff, however anything that requires more than a reboot is beyond my abilities to cure).

A quick summary of my trip:
Stayed in:
- Chilliwack
- Penticton
- Rossland
- Turner Valley
- Calgary
- Sorrento

Got lost leaving Phoenix, saw the house I lived in from 3 months to 3 years old, drove through the Crowsnest Pass for the first time in at least 30 years, discovered how truly beautiful Southern BC is, lost count of the number of passes and summits we drove through (are all passes summits and vice-versa??), was shocked by the extent of the forest fire smoke, and almost never ran out of things to talk about with my Mum.

I discovered the depths of rage my mother harbours towards slow moving motorhomes that don't move to the right when there's a passing lane. I'm not saying this isn't justified, but it was a bit surprising.

I visited with 14 relatives, 6 of whom 11 or younger. Swam with 4 of the six youngsters. Remarkably few of my 300+ photos, however, are of any of the relatives.

Stayed in a hotel, motel and B&B plus various spare rooms.

Got a throat infection, which sucked for many reasons - bad timing before my race, I didn't want to infect everyone we visited, and I didn't want to miss out on any of the visiting. Had respritory issues from the smoke once we passed Kamloops and I'm still not breathing normally (there's smoke in Vancouver too).

Somewhere along the way I also did a race. Despite the fact that the whole point of this trip was to get me to the race it ended up being the least interesting or fun part of the whole trip. Despite that, yes, you'll still get your race report. Just not today.

EEEEWWWWW!

After an unhappy gastrointestinal day (you do not want more details) on Thursday last week I decided I'd de-germ my waterbottles.

I didn't quite get around to it, however, until I saw the gunk on Teresa's Fuel Belt bottle on our run yesterday. I looked at the same spot on my FB water bottle and it too was gunky. A useful training trip, when you are 40 minutes into a 2 hour run on a warm day it is a bad idea to become revolted with your water supply.

At home I filled the sink with hot water & bleach (not at all eco friendly but kills bacteria real good) then disassembled my water bottles and threw them in. I know that gunk likes to hide in the lid so I removed the nipple (yes, I said nipple - grow up!) so everything could soak and be scrubbed. On the water bottle I used on Thursday I found some seriously nasty grime - it was black, slimy and hard to scrub off. In fact I couldn't get some of it off at all. It irks me to toss an otherwise perfectly good water bottle but I think it's off to the recycling bin for this sucker.

Hopefully I've fixed the source of my GI issues from last week. If nothing else I have a whole lot of squeaky clean waterbottles

Quick Update

Since my last post we had time trial week.

Swim: 1500m - 28:17
I've never done a 1500m time trial in the pool so no idea where this puts me in terms of training. I'm usually about 30 minutes in a tri but that's open water so I'm not kicking off the wall every 25m.

We'll just hold onto this number for reference!

Bike:
16km TT - 31:28
Not a good time for me compared to the last year's time I can find - 28:50 from August and 29:41 from April. Something to work on, I guess.

Run:
5km - 24:15 (pace - 4:51/km)
3km - 14:24 (pace - 4:48/km)
This workout was nasty. We showed up expecting a 5km TT, but arrived to find out that would be followed by a 10 minute recovery and a 3km TT. I thought I was going as hard as I could for the 5km but somehow I managed a faster pace for the 3km rather than the 5km.

Alan said we weren't pacing properly. I think I just take a long time to warm up!

This week things are feeling solid. I'm finally feeling in the groove, I'm feeling strong and focussed and fit! It might have something to do with just coming off a recovery week, but I also think I've adjusted to my training schedule. Regardless of the why, I'm happy to be happy!

Uncle!

I'm taking a break from the photo challenge. It became work and stress and something I couldn't deal with so I'm on hiatus for March.

Spring pretty much always brings me down. I can't remember a year when I approached my birthday (April 1 - please mark your calendars) in a good mood. It's not that I mind birthdays or getting older, half the time I can't remember my age anyway, it's just the time of year. Maybe allergies are to blame - lack of sleep and oxygen can definitely get in the way of joie de vivre. Perhaps my version of Spring renewal is more like a really painful case of pins and needles in your arm as sensation returns after you fall asleep on the couch in an odd position. Or maybe I just don't like March? It certainly doesn't seem to like me.

Regardless of the cause, the effect is that I'm easily overwhelmed and pretty low in terms of energy and attitude. In order to keep both my sanity and my friends (been a wee bit cranky lately) I'm simplifying - no photo challenge, doing workouts at home when I can rather than trecking out to join the group or skipping workouts entirely in order to cook a decent dinner.

We hope to return to regular programming in April.

New Friends

Through work (and an invitation from a very generous supplier) I got to join the "A List" and take the Alberta Train to Whistler yesterday. It's a leisurely way to get there at three hours one way but very pretty at least it is once the sun actually rises and you can see the view. The rest of my photos are here.

Whistler was crazy busy but with a very different energy to Vancouver. Getting to Whistler is so restricted and so difficult that almost the only people there are involved with the games: watching, competing, volunteering, media. And the cranked up prices for everything felt par for the course for the village.

Trip highlights:
- Train to Whistler.
- Breakfast with pro bull rider and pro chuck wagon driver (promoting the Stampede). The bull rider lives in Turner Valley so I'm sure my Aunt knows who he is. I'm used to being able to impress people by talking about my hobby. Not so much yesterday.
- Free tickets to biathlon ($25.00 standing area tickets so not quite A list anymore, but more fun!)
- Watching biathlon with all the crazy Europeans. I need a significantly weirder hat to be a true fan.
- Cheering for the Canadian in the mens' 12.5km pursuit.
- Hanging out with Clayton, who is up there volunteering but had the day off .
- Being in the village when Canada scored its second gold (of course we were watching a different sport at the time, but we were there!).
- Getting interviewed. Amazing how I normally just blather on about nothing in particular but put a camera in my face and Voila! I blather on about nothing in particular. I haven't checked yahoo sports to see if they actually used the clip.
- Trainride back (would have been awkward if this didn't happen)

It was a long day, up at 4am and back home at 10:30pm, and I was pretty wrecked at work today as I'm a totally wimp when I don't have enough sleep but it was an amazing day.

Biking is good for my sanity

I rode on my own this afternoon as I had a work commitment this morning. I'm very glad I did as I had a chance to clear my head and get a bit of perspective.

Biking is good for that - you have to pay attention to traffic and the world around you but this doesn't take your full concentration so you can let your mind wander. It's my version of meditation, instead of saying "ohm" I keep a consistent cadence.

Today was a wonderful clear day and the views on my ride were stunning. Initially I kept wishing I had my camera but then decided just to soak up the beauty. For a good chunk of the ride I had such deep and intellectual thoughts as "Ooooh!" or "Pretty!"

This helped to clear out the mental cobwebs and somehow while thinking of nothing very much I managed to figure out something from work that's been bothering me for some time and I may even have come up with a potential solution.

Glad to be back on my bike.

Ice Bath - In Pictures

A photo essay on what is required for an ice bath.

Fill a large receptacle with cold water:

and add ice:
Brew up a cup of something hot:

and sweet:

Then get something warm to wear:

something to read:

and a watch so you can time it:

Now jump in!

Tunes

I've been in need of new music, I haven't had anything that's really grabbed me in a while. Happily the end of the year means lots of "Best of 2009" lists. One was on a clubmate's blog, which had some good suggestions (thanks Rob!).

Another friend suggested I check out Metacritic.com. After going through their best of 2009 list I bought Merriweather Post Pavilion by Animal Collective. I haven't had a chance for a really good listen (the IIHF Junior Championships are on and hockey takes precedence) but from what I've heard so far I'm thinking this is going to get a lot of play.

Canada just scored - gotta go!

Obligatory Goals for 2010 Post

Triathlon is a very goal-driven sport and it's the start of the new year, traditionally a time for goal setting (and reflection), so as a triathlete blogger I believe I am morally obliged or somehow required to be posting more than photos.

That said, this year I don't have a lot of aggressive tri related goals. I love the sport but I don't have a race I'm psyched for or a huge goal I want to drive towards. I'm debating Ironman in 2011, but I have eight months to make up my mind on that one so it's not a big driver right now.

I had a chat with the coach in early December and he suggested a change of pace - do some bike races, such as the Tuesday night crit series or the new Vancouver to Whistler ride, and maybe some masters swim meets. The idea of doing crits and swim meets scares socks off me (at least I won't need them for swimming) but I think they'd be a fun challenge and a good way to push myself in the individual sports.

I'll probably do the Calgary 70.3 again as it's a fun way to combine a race and a family visit, but I'm not sure about other races right now.

Non-tri related goals:

• get my debt dealt with. I paid off my line of credit today so I'm pretty darned close!
• the photo-a-day challenge. This has a strong chance of going the way of most resolutions, but I have two other co-challengers (Amy and Claire) to keep me going.
• cultivate more positivity in my life. Wow, that sounds pretty new-age-flakey! A while ago I read "A Complaint Free World" after hearing about it on Oprah (did I just admit to buying an Oprah book? Don't tell my mother!). It's actually pretty badly written but the gist is a great idea and very simple - try not to complain for 21 days. Sounds easy but you'd be amazed at the amount of negative crud that can come out of your mouth! There's a bit more to it than that, but I won't go into it right now other than to say that the words you speak can and do affect how you feel and how you perceive the world. I tried this a couple of years ago and even though I never managed more than two days in a row I was a way, way happier person.

Not a huge list but once these are out of the way I can move on to others.

So those are mine, what are your goals for coming year?

Shoe Buying

I picked up new runers this week as the pair I've been using are beyond dead. The experience reminded me why I hate buying shoes.


Reason #1 why I hate buying shoes: Most stores only stock up to size ten for women. I generally take a 10.5 or, on really bad days, size 11.


Reason #2: Only one of my feet is size 10.5. That might lead you to think that reason #1 is only half as bad but as the other foot is 9.5 it actually makes shoe buying incredibly complicated. For some reason most shoe stores aren't willing to mix 'n match shoes.


Reason #3: AA width. I can cinch shoes up at the laces but the heel is pretty hard to fix - my feet either slip out the back or my heels get ripped apart from the rubbing. As I was gifted with cross country skis instead of actual feet, maybe I should wax them and head to the back country for some schussing.


Reason #4: Pronation. My feet are flat. Not flat as in "low arches" flat. Flat as in no arch, as in every part of the sole touches when I stand. Pancake flat.


Due to the above I can't buy cheap shoes as they'll kill my feet. Actually, I frequently can't buy expensive shoes as they don't fit either.


I think not enjoying buying shoes means I have to return my girl card, or at least that I'm on some sort of feminity probation. This probably isn't a good time for me to mention that I only have one purse!

Heavy Breathing

After the fun I had with breathing and running this year I went to a respirologist to figure out what was wrong. The process started in July and just finished up today - long enough for me to almost forget how it all started and begin to wonder what the point of the whole process was.

Long story short - I am definitively not asthmatic. Good news as I can ditch the various unnecessary inhalers. Anyone want some Flovent??

I now have to figure out if this year's issues were simply triggered by a terrible flu or if there was something else.

I also had an allergy test today. You will all be glad to know that I am not allergic to saline solution (one of the controls).

I am, however, violently allergic to grass and cats, strongly allergic to the histamine control solution, and somewhat allergic to the other six substances they tested (dogs, feathers, weeds, trees, mites [dust] and mold). I find it amusing that I had a stronger reaction to grass and cats than I did to the histamine. I thought I was more allergic to dogs, but perhaps the dogs that set me off are some sort of dog/cat mutant cross breed.

Because I'm a geek, I found the whole process fascinating. As I'm a super geek I got my coworker to take a picture of my forearm so I could document the skin test. (I'll add the photo when she's sent it to me.)

The hives are going down (except the grass one) but I'm still suffering from the desire to make dumb jokes about essence of cat and distilled dog. I'm thinking there's an allergist in my future.

I guess I won't be including any bird feather extract in my Christmas baking.

Planning

I seem to have developed an unhealthy attachment to spreadsheets lately - first it was figuring out my budget now I'm planning my running schedule. Playing with percentages and various other math-y features (like an adding method that you then copy and paste to get dates in sequence - COOL! [I think I need help]) makes it easy to see how much or little I need to build up to a goal.

I'm sure I'm doing all sorts of things wrong, I'll hand over the planning to Alan in January ("Here you go - fix it!") but now it's fun to try to figure it out myself.

This is spurred on by two things:
1) I don't want to die in January when the club starts up;
2) I signed up for a February half marathon;
3) I'm getting bored with the lack of schedule.

Okay that was three things ("Amongst our chief weapons are fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency and a fanatical devotion to the Pope ..."), math has never been my strong point.

I think number 1 is pretty obvious. I'm definitely not being a slouch at the moment, however the lack of intensity workouts right now will likely bite me big time in the new year!

As to number 2, a friend emailed me that she'd signed up for the Langley Half and if I signed up too she could give me a ride. I was so enamoured at the idea of a ride that it wasn't until after I committed my money that I realized that I'd also committed to run 21.1km. It felt a lot like the time I got conned into giving money to one of those guys running games at the PNE - I was so mesmermized by his patter that I didn't realized I'd paid for a game I didn't want to play until it was too late.

As to 3, that's actually part of the plan. I usually get burnt out by the end of the season and need a break from a structured plan. Rather than force myself to keep up a strict regimen I back off and do what I want so that in January I'm eager to get going. I'm not quite ready for hard core workouts (it's 1pm and I'm blogging in my PJ's instead of running) but I'm definitely itching to do more.

Alright - enough procrastinating. I'm off to run.

Rainy Day Ride

November in Vancouver means rain, rain and more rain. That's okay, it'll stop. Maybe not until March, perhaps April, but it will stop.

The rain does make it difficult to get out the door. Today I decided to sleep in, which was a nice change but a late start usually makes it even harder to get myself going. Today was no exception. I turned on the TV while eating breakfast and got hooked into watching downhill skiing, yet another distraction. Finally it was almost noon, I'd seriously mulled setting up the trainer but my dislike for the trainer trumped my dislike for courting hypothermia so I got myself together (as in four layers of warm and [hopefully] dry gear) and headed out.

Biking at this time of year is a bit nutty - it's cold and wet and dark and drivers are seriously distracted. As I haven't been biking a lot lately I'm pretty wary in traffic so I didn't get up much speed until I hit 4th and Highbury and rode along the beach. It's really beautiful there in this weather, best of all there's hardly anyone around so I practically had the road to myself. It was cold though so getting to the hill up to UBC was great as it meant I could work up enough energy to get feeling back in my hands. My hands didn't warm up much the first time up so I turned around at the top and headed down so I could try again.

After the sixth time up Spanish Banks Hill I figured my hands were warm enough and this was potentially getting silly so perhaps I should continue on. I rode around UBC and found a new route I like and will probably do on a regular basis - Marine Drive to the Arthur Lang but going under the bridge rather than over then ride on a road parallel to Marine (Kent?) to Ontario and back home. Heading up Ontario was great - 20 blocks of climbing to warm up again. After that it was a bit of a slog and my hands went from cold to numb to painful but it was only about 15 minutes to home so not too bad.

I have no idea how far or how long I rode for, my bike computer died and I'm putting off buying a new one until I have other expenses out of the way, but it was a fun day.

I came home to read a post on motivation by fellow club member (LETC's Male Triathlete of the Year - congrats Rob!). I'm pretty sure I fall into the intrinsically motivated camp, I'm certainly competitive but that's not what is most rewarding for me in triathlon. Despite the complaints about the weather I love being out on my bike, if I could find decent gloves and glasses that don't fog up every time I stop I'd be happy riding for four or five hours right now.

My fall project - straightening out finances

Ever wonder where your money goes? I have and finally got fed up enough to do something about it. I guess this has been my big project for the Fall.

As background, I had an expensive Spring this year. I paid full rent for a two bedroom place for two months while I tried to find a new roommate and figure out what I wanted to do for a living situation then shelled out for moving costs. Prior to that I had my "rubber ducky" debt - every time I thought I'd started getting control and paying it down it would pop up again, like a rubber duck pushed under bath water - so this just added to it. It was frustrating to see all the money going to paying off (or in this case not paying off) debt when I could spend it on so many more worthwhile things.

At one point I was even convinced Visa was messing with me as there was no way I could be that fiscally irresponsible.

I tried budgeting but kept forgetting things like haircuts and bus passes so I was always way off.

Tracking backwards didn't seem to work either, so I decided to start tracking forwards, noting every single purchase I made and every penny I spent when and as I spent it.

I started in the beginning of September, initially writing things down in a notebook then I graduated to a spreadsheet, on which I then included my budget and debt tracking and now I have the urge to create account codes and pie charts (I need to spend less time with our company Accountant!).

By tracking what I spend every pay period I could more accurately estimate my budget for the next and I could see where my money was going. It's been interesting, not least because the desire to buy a chocolate bar is now frequently (but not always) outweighed by the desire not to have to write the purchase down - who knew laziness could work in my favour!

What has been far more interesting is discovering that a good budget actually works: my spending is in check without greatly impacting my lifestyle and, mostly importantly, my debt has shrunk appreciably and should be non-existent in the near future.

This is probably a terribly dull post for most readers, especially as this is ostensibly a tri training blog, but as the child of a banker this is a fairly big deal for me. And freeing up that money that was going to debt means I can use it for things like race wheels, or a new wetsuit, or going to a training camp. Can't wait for the 2010 training season!

Not much to report

The fall has been pretty mellow. A little swimming, to the two days of masters I've added on a swim on my own on Friday, I show up and figure out what I want to do when I get there. I'm really feeling like there are a lot of improvements to my form after a couple of months swimming with Peter, I'm looking forward to doing some longer time trials (really!) and seeing what I can do. Hmm, I could do that on a Friday I guess, I'll just consider angry-I-refuse-to-swim-in-a-slower-lane-but-will-take-up-lots-of-space-while-using-(sharp-edged)-paddles dude and various other strange denizens of the Friday am swims extra challenges to get around.

Not much running. I ended the season really feeling unspired about running so I took a bit of a break from it. Then I started running in the mornings with a friend from swimming, which worked great until she gave up her gym membership and she had nowhere to change after. No great tragedy, we switched to running home after work, initially I'd run to a B Line bus stop and bus home but I've worked up to running as far as Clark and just walk the rest of the way. This week I may go as far as Commercial. I'm also hitting the treadmill once or, well, less than once a week, I plan to up that to twice a week!

I did a women's bike skills session with two of the coaches from Glottman Simpson, Stephanie and her husband Bjorn, and I'm considering joining the Glottman Simpson group to ride with them. The classes I made it to were fantastic, unfortunately I missed a lot of classes due to travelling for work.

Oh yeah, travelling for work - I went to the UK. Training-wise it was a bit of a wash. I got in a few treadmill runs and had an awesome day biking around with my uncle. I went for a work conference, so it was a whole of time in a hotel. Good to meet the various UK suppliers we work with. I tacked on a few days at the end and had time to harass my uncles, it was very good to see David and Stewart, although it was a bit rushed.

Other than that, I've been a bit of a hermit. I'm enjoying being a homebody, the quiet's kind of nice. Things will change, however, come the Christmas party season (I have an invite for a party in November! C'mon, at least wait until December.) and the New Year with the club.