"March" Your Way Out Of Here

A beautiful Saturday, I ran outside, in shorts at that.  Got sweaty and was almost hot...Almost. Today I wake up and the ground is covered in snow.  I am curse that stupid groundhog today, Old Man Winter and everyone else I can for teasing me like this.  I have been riding my trainer all winter, I can ride it for a bit longer, but it is really not nice to tease me like that!

This off season has not been particularly as good as last years.  Last year I was just getting started, everything I tried went well and I was loving the results.  Sure if you go back through the posts, you'll find something that threw me off, the struggles of going paleo at first and the wonders of plateauing during weight loss.  Overall though, things went very well last year and I am pleased with the results.

This year, its been, well different.  Through student teaching, injury and over training, lets just say I need some warm weather.  Student teaching was rough on my training schedule to say the least.  After the Atlantic City race, training took a back seat to everything else that was going on.  After graduation it was GO time!  I was back in the weight room, I was swimming, I was biking, I was running.  If it was a form of exercise, I was participating in it.  Not so fast killer....Next thing you know the injuries started popping up.  I was told to ease back in and I didn't.  I got hurt and I was told to take it easy......I didn't.  I paid, and I paid big time.   I had to take some serious time off, I had to get my back healthy and then I needed to reevaluate my training and what I was doing.  My first tri isn't until June....I needed to dial things back and so I did.  The other thing I did was something I hate doing, but knew I had to....I began to seek the advice of a coach.  Eduardo from Bodyfeed was awesome in helping me get back on my feet.  He wrote personalized training plans for me based on my goals and he checked in with me on a daily basis.  Better yet, it was FREE!!!  He is willing to do the same for anyone else as well, he is confident that if you are not satisfied you can leave at any time but you can get up to 3 months of training for free.

Once back on my feet, I began to feel healthy, happy and back to where I needed to be.  Not all of my training has gone exactly as planned but I am feeling good about it.  There have been days I have not wanted to do my workout for that day, there have been days where I have skipped but there is still no doubt in my mind that this is something I love! One of the groups that has helped my push through these times and led to some great workouts is Further Faster Forever.  It is a group on Instagram and twitter that is centered around triathlon and pushing/ supporting each other through training.  You can join on their site and check out all of the positive and motivating pictures on Instagram!

On Saturday post run I was leaving the club and someone at the desk asked me what I was doing.  It was a Saturday on St Patty's weekend so I guess they were expecting something along the lines of going out to blackout and not remember the night before and spend my Sunday laying around nursing a hangover.  I simply responded with well I am not really sure yet.  Their next response was the one that caught me slightly off guard though "Can't you just go out and do something fun for once?"  I didn't think I was a lame person.  I like to go out and have fun with my friends, I do enjoy going to the bar now and again and I think if you surveyed my friends they would say I can be a pretty fun guy.  I just thought that it was strange that because I wasn't going out to the bar they felt as though I wasn't doing anything "fun" Maybe I am lame and not fun anymore because I don't go to the bar every weekend and I am ok with that.

Sunday meant brick day for me, another reason I did not go to the bar Saturday.  Something tells me riding 15 miles on the bike followed immediately by a 5K would be anything less than splendid while nursing a hangover.  So I got home in the afternoon after AM water workout and running some errands.  I fired up the trainer and threw on some Walking Dead.  After my 10 min warmup I got into the groove and just started pedaling.  I did not want to shift gears or do 1 min in this gear and 1 min in that because I have a different day set up for intervals.  I spent this time trying to get used to being in the areo position and focus on my pedal stroke and play with my nutrition a bit.  I hit my 15 miles and it was immediately off, throw on my Newton Running Motion and grab my Powerbar gel.  I had my Garmin set to multisport mode so all I had to do was hit lap and it went right into the run mode.  The watch was covered just enough for me to see the distance, I wanted everything else to be off of feel for this run.  I did my 5K and when I hit the distance, I had no idea how long I have been going for.  I hit stop on the Garmin and excitedly pulled my sleeve up to see the time.  25:45!!  For those of you keeping tabs, this was maybe 1:30 off my PR time at most.  I was ecstatic!  It was a great way to finish out my weekend and I got to run outside to boot!  I was using Osmo hydration while on the bike and when I jumped off to go run I had a gel with me.  As I started running I had a stomach ache but nothing serious and after I took my gel it came back a bit.  Obviously it didn't effect me too much since I had a great run but I am not sure what it would do on a longer run.  That's why you practice your nutrition in training!

Today things are light, I have a swim, probably in my wetsuit since I like to do that once a week and some strength intervals.  Sticking to my plan and keeping things simple.  Light days are meant to be light so the hard days can be hard.  Hope everyone is enjoying their training thus far, can't wait for race season coming up!  I really appreciate all the support and look forward to hearing about your training and racing.


All for now
Keep FSU and Do It For Yourself



I do not post on here on a daily basis but you can follow my training and other posts here!

It's Been too long....

Where have the days gone? It is October 1st.  My first race is here and gone. School, work, lessons, planning, training...everything is in full swing and it doesn't seem to have a brake pedal anywhere to be found. 

Things have been interesting since post race weekend here.  As I said, the school year is in full swing and so balancing teaching and training has been hard.  I wanted to do one more race for this season before I clean and rack the bike but I don't think that is in the cards.  Balancing time to train in with work and school is tough.  I know this is a taste of things to come but at the same time it will be different.  Trying to find that balance shall be a challenge though.

After the success of the first race, I cannot wait to get to the next and the next and the next.  The entire weekend was absolutely amazing and the support from everyone made it even better.  People have been asking what my goal distance is and where I want to be.  Ultimately I would like to complete a half Ironman, preferably Miami.  Unfortunately there are too many unknowns for me at this point in my life to make a commitment to something that big.  First the cost...My bike is too small and needs work, or I need to get a new one.  It is $300 to register for the race...travel expenses etc.  I also have no idea where I will end up after graduation.  This is ok with me though because I do not want to take things too fast.  I want to take my time and ensure I am prepared and ready for what I am going to do.  I do not want to take too many steps or too big of a step. Next season I step up to an international and then 2015 is a half!

I know I have said it 1,000 times but I can't thank you all enough for the support I have received on this journey.  Both from long time friends and people who I have never met in my life.  It is incredible and I thank you.  I was talking with a friend a few weekends ago and he said "You know man you are just out there doing your thing.  You didn't need a pitty party, you didn't need any crazy products, you put in the hard work and you did it up man.  Keep going!" My man Heem! Such a stand up guy.

As for Atlantic City....call me selfish but I can't help but be honest and say that I was scanning the entire bike and run course, transition and finish chute for one person.  Not to take ANYTHING away from the incredible people who were there in any way shape or form.  They were incredible throughout the entire race and I'll never be able to thank them enough.  I was looking for one person in particular though...who never did show....guess something came up, or they just decided not to for personal reasons.  It sucks but hey I can't do anything about it.

I did have a 5k race last weekend but I will do an entire post on that because it was for a special cause and I have a good bit to say about it.  As for now, it is just swimming, biking, and running.  I can't wait to get my life back in December when this nonsense is finally over!!  I feel like I just wrote a bunch of fluff but didn't really say much in this post.  Bottom line is I am having difficult balancing time, can't keep my head straight and I just want to do another race so bad!  Other than that, my life is boring right now.

I am going to sign off and try and get it together.  Thanks for reading


All for now
Keep FSU and Do It For Yourself


ps. There has been a rule in place for the blog and people ask me why.  If you know me in person, you may not ask questions about any of the posts.  I have no idea who reads this, it does not tell me who the views are from and unless you drop something in the comments, I have no idea that you were ever here.  I appreciate all of the views and love the support, it means the world...There is something to be said about not knowing though.  If I knew who all of my readers were, I would tailor posts dependent upon who was reading them.  I do not want to do this...I want everything to be there out in the open so that people can see, I am just a real, average guy who is doing this.  There will be hardships on the way, however if you keep your eyes on the prize, you will grasp what you are reaching for.  If you have asked me a question already and I answered you, no worries, it probably wasn't something that was too big of a deal...just FYI :)

And so it begins...

Where to start where to start? The million dollar shot so to speak for all of my posts. So much to say and yet no idea how to put it all on paper, or computer screen I guess is what this is. I am sitting in my house with no power due to this wonderful storm ripping through Chester county PA. This is the storm I was waiting for all day sitting at work, but it never came. Go figure it arrives now when I would like to head to sleep but I can't being as I am like the princess and the pea when it comes to sleeping arrangements. I need a tv on, something sports related preferably, fan blasting right on my face, iPhone sleep app which plays songs and a few other planets to be aligned to have a good nights sleep. All which require a power source... Being as I can't have the previously mentioned I decided to take to the Internet to reflect on the days events. It was a fairly mundane Thursday for me. I went to work at 9am sharp and was there until somewhere around 8pm. Yes there was a lot of coffee involved to get me through this shift. 

This is our last week of group swim lessons before we get things kicked off for the summer and it has been a bittersweet week for me. If you go back through the archives of the blog you'll learn about my terrific day mid week and about how I lost my uncle. That hasn't helped but it also hasn't truly sunk in yet. Along with that it is the closure to my first year of school long lessons at my current club. This was something I needed to get used to. At previous clubs I worked on sessions that only lasted somewhere around 8 weeks. After that 8 weeks was over, I wrote report cards and said my goodbyes to some students. Most would return and others would not. At this club however I have had the same students since the fall when school started. This has been a great opportunity for me on many levels. It gave me a taste of what it will be like when I am teaching physical education in a school setting. I will have the same students for the length of the school year. So I had a great chance to build some relationships with students and parents. On the other hand there are always students you have difficulty reaching. I am sure any teacher will agree with this statement. You have students that it seems no matter how hard you try, they just don't want to be there. This can be challenging especially when it comes to teaching a life saving skill such as swimming. It was a great opportunity for me though and I am happy that I had this experience even with some of the challenges it brought forth in the day to day teaching. 

As I sit here with no power I find myself reflecting yet again. A lot of my friends are in town and they decided they wanted to, well you guessed it, go to the bar. I suggested a little joint that only charges $3 for whatever drink your order and has free shuffle board. Shuffle board brings back some great childhood memories for me and I'm not one for a huge bar scene anymore. They decided to go for a more college feel and so I declined to go. It's not my thing anymore for multiple reasons as outlined in previous posts and I am ok with that. I just surely wish there were other activities that were an option to see old friends that weren't centered around drinking. While I was away last weekend someone had brought up going out and my buddy said his "social life significantly struggled" since I had made this decision. Although he said it jokingly, part of me feels like it might have a little truth behind it. I have no interest in going to the bar and getting slammed only to wake up the next day wonder, what the heck happened last night?? However I don't want to hold people back from going out and having a good time. So I hope that is not the case by any means.  

One of my buddies walked across the street to say what's up and the conversation just felt awkward. I felt like I didn't know what to say and it seemed as though he may have felt the same way. I don't want to lose good friends because I don't have an interest in going out, but I also don't want to give up on the goals I have set for myself. I just wish there was a road in the middle that made this a little easier. 

Tomorrow I have yoga on tap in the AM probably followed up with 2,000-2,500 yds in the pool. My focus is on my race in September for right now. I have decided that I want to place in the top tier for my age group and I think it is a realistic goal for myself. (Power is back on so that's good!) It is funny because when I mentioned something about placing as a 23 year old in my race, someone responded with "they didn't care about competitive swimming as a 23 year old" which is fine but a little support would be cool. I have my goals just as anyone else and I don't think they need to be the same for anyone, actually they should be quite different from individual to individual but help a brotha out!

Memorial Day weekend is on tap and I don't have to work which is a great feeling being as I have busted my tail a bit this week. I say I am going to do yoga but I need to bite the bullet and head to the bank tomorrow as well before I have to go to work. I have decided I need to throw on my big boy pants and take out a loan for these summer courses. I don't really have any other option and I can't ask anyone else for the help. Not do I have anyone who will give me the cash I need to get these classes out of the way. 

I feel stuck in a rut here that I can't shake. I find myself thinking of the past when I need to focus on what's current and the future. It's a little more easier said than done though. Being as the power has kicked back on I am going to try to take this golden opportunity to try and get some sleep. I am going to bed with an open mind that tomorrow WILL be a better day and I will get everything figured out for this summer. Hope everyone enjoys there long holiday weekend! Thanks again for reading. 

All for now

Keep FSU and Do It For Yourself