This is more than a little belated since I've been home for almost a month now, but since I've barely updated at all in the past year I'd say it isn't such a bad offense.
I spent about a month between April and May training in Tulsa with my friend and pro triathlete Jessica Jones. One of the things I love about what I do is the opportunity to meet so many great people and how so many times it has led to such good friendships, often beginning from mere days-long training camps. I met Jessica at a RaceQuest Travel camp last Memorial Day up in Lake Tahoe and we got to hang out a little in Kona, and when she offered to have me come down to Tulsa to train with her, and winter was never ending and I had nothing better to do aside from training by myself, how could I say no?
I'll say the training there was pretty good. I can't really complain much. Drivers were courteous to bikers, I got to swim in a long course pool that is likely the most beautiful facility I've used, and biking and running along the river trails was also excellent. It didn't hurt to also be a 2-minute walk from a Chipotle. Well, maybe that's a bad thing. I can't decide.
The only really unfortunate thing was that for the first 3 weeks I was there I was unable to run because my back was seized up. I skipped some swimming too in the initial week or so, but was fortunate that for whatever reason, biking didn't bother it. Except getting on and off, but as long as I was riding, things were fine. Then finally one day, out of nowhere, it just didn't hurt anymore. I suppose I shouldn't say "out of nowhere" because I did get chiropractic treatment, but just as weirdly and mysteriously as the pain had shown up, it was gone.
After the first week we were joined by another pro triathlete friend, Logan Franks. Jessica knows Logan from Team RWB, and I actually knew Logan from when he was with us at QT2. So funny how everyone knows everyone, just through slightly different channels. Logan also brought his dog, Ubu, who is a really awesome dog who almost makes me want to get one of my own. He also loved licking sweat off your legs after a workout. Logan wasn't training for the race either, so we were both mostly just tagging along for workouts.
I have to say, for once it was nice not being the one who had to train. I trained plenty, but there were certainly times when we went to the pool and Jessica had to swim 4000 meters when I would just wait a bit before getting in and/or get out early. I can't keep up with her in the water anyway, so I promise this didn't make me a bad training partner. I mean, it didn't make me a great one either, but at least I usually drove us to the pool where we got to listen to what Jessica referred to as the "Russian Roulette" that is my iPod. You never quite knew what was going to pop up.
I finally got out to do some running as well, and that was nice. Well, mostly. Obviously starting up to run again after some time off is always difficult, but it was nice that it at least didn't hurt. I was still stuck running alone though, because while I can hang on the wheels on a bike with some pro triathletes, I certainly can't run with them.
It's a lot of fun sharing some time with people who do the same things you do. Always on the same page with workouts (well, that was easy since we just followed whatever Jessica was doing!) and nobody made fun of anyone for going to bed too early. There was surprisingly little down time though, what with all of the training and Jessica's kids. But we did get to spend a nice afternoon kayaking at a local lake, so it wasn't all training all the time.
Eventually our training came to an end and it was time to head back to Texas for the race. Jessica flew down and her mom picked her up since she lives down in Houston, and Logan and I drove down to meet up at the house we were staying at with Jessica's coach, Kevin Purcell. The house worked out great, not too far away from the venue. I was once again thrilled that I had not signed up, although I was definitely jealous that they were experiencing record cold temperatures and race day was about 20 degrees colder than last year. The swim was even 100% wetsuit legal. Oh, well, it was still better to be on the sidelines that day.
I got to see a lot of other friends who had come down to race and watch, so that was a lot of fun. Jessica had a very solid day in what was only her third Ironman, coming in seventh place, so everyone was happy. And after the race, we got to celebrate with her birthday cake which her mom had made since her birthday was the day before. Overall it was a really fun trip.
Sadly, the next day, it was time to drive home. Driving home is never as fun as driving down. I opted to forgo the 4am start on day 1 and any attempts to push to get home in only 2 days and instead got up and ran before packing up and hitting the road a little before 10am. My initial plan was to go just east of Birmingham and stop basically in the same place as I'd stopped by first day on the drive down, but once I got to that point, it wasn't that late and I wasn't sick of driving yet so I decided to push a little further. Sadly, once you get past that point, there isn't much there. So when I finally felt like I wanted to stop, there was basically no civilization for a while and I wound up crossing time zones and stopping just past Chattanooga. But, the good news there was that I was that much closer to home and had that much less road to cover.
It also meant that I got to stop off the following night in New Jersey to visit my cousin Matt and his wife Carolyn and their daughter, Maddie who just turned 1. I see them a lot when they come up north to visit my aunt and uncle, but I've never seen where they live and since they were right off the highway on my way and it was too far for me to go all the way home, it made for the perfect final rest stop, and only a little over 4 hours to go the following day.
So, finally, after being gone for almost 2 months, I made it home. Of course once again I feel like I never want to drive all over the country again, but I suppose as long as opportunities keep coming up and I've got nothing better to do, I'll take them. That said, I wouldn't mind if I had more reasons to stay put!
Since then it's just been adjusting to being home again. I made an early attempt at open water swimming with my crazy friends who seem to think that as long as the ice has melted, the water is ok to swim in. That first attempt was... a little too cold for me, as it involved being able to see our breath and slightly numb lips. I know wetsuits are helpful, but they're not that helpful. Fortunately a week and a half later the water was perfect, so that has been fun. I biked with some friends I haven't biked with in years, caught up with some people, attended some family parties, and the weather has at least sometimes been decent. It's definitely better than it was when I left.
I think that's about as caught up as I'm going to get.
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