Memorial day

                Happy Memorial day! Today is a day that we should use to take the time and remember the sacrifices that people have made on our behalf so that we can live in our free society and country. I know that our country is far from perfect, but I still believe that it's the best country on the planet!
I was not able to serve our country in the military. I have a partial hearing loss in my right ear and it prevented my enlistment into the Navy when I was 17. For good or bad, that's what I happened. I still wish, at times, that I would have been able to enlist and serve my country. But when I think about it, if I did enlist, then I probably wouldn't have married Shawna, and wouldn't have the great kids that I have today. So, while a part of me still wishes that I could have served, another part of me is very thankful for the wonderful life that I have. I life that I have because I went to college and worked hard all because I didn't serve. I hope that makes sense.

        In any case, I still have a passion for the military and a profound respect for what they have done, do and continue to do on a daily basis. If you have never read a first hand account about what some of our brave men and woman have done for your freedom, then stop reading my blog and go grab a book. There are a ton of books out there for you to read. I personally prefer books about special operation forces, mostly SEAL's, but any spec ops from Vietnam to the present. Some of my favorite include:
Lone Survivor by Marcus Luttrell
American Sniper by Chris Kyle
SOG: The Secret Wars of America's Commandos in Vietnam by John Plaster
Rogue Warrior by Richard Marcinko
Brave Men Dark Waters by Orr Kelly

       Also, if you haven't seen the movie, you really need to see Act of Valor. It comes out on DVD sometime in June if I remember correctly, and I will definitely be buying it for the house.

   The other day, Shawna said that she thought that it was inappropriate that our 5 year old was able to tell the synopsis of the Battle of Murphy's Ridge as told in Lone Survivor, along with how Danny Dietz was killed. I told her that it is an extremely important story and that those men didn't die for us to simply forget about them. They fought to the death against overwhelming odds and never gave up, never letting their brothers down. I try to instill that same determination in my kids. Never give up, never surrender. Stand for what you believe in, and always have your brother's back. God, family and country; duty, honor, integrity.

      Take the time today to remember the sacrifices of our military. Thank a veteran for his service, and find ways to help those returning veterans who might have a hard time coming back to the world. Watch the video and understand that you are free because of the sacrifice of great men.

Hydrant Wars!!!

                Today is the last shift for my Capt before he retires off into the sunset. As part of my going away gift, I decided to paint the hydrant behind the fire station. A little history is needed for you to appreciate what I did. Last year, we had a summer/fall of hydrant wars going on here at station 4.

                  A year or two back the hydrant got painted the Oregon Duck's colors. Really, all they did was add some green to the already yellow hydrant, and paint an 0 on it to mark their territory. I was actually surprised that the hydrant stayed that way for as long as it did seeing how we are deep into BSU Bronco country. But I guess no one was willing to repaint the hydrant. There were a few Duck fans out here, and they seemed to have gotten their way. I personally didn't care, I like both teams and the hydrant did look pretty cool. But alas, the hydrant couldn't stay supporting the Duck's forever.

                 In the beginning of the college football season last year BSU travelled to Oregon to play the Duck's on their home turf. BSU had won the year before at home, and Oregon was determined not to loose again, especially at home. Unfortunately for them, they did. Shortly after the loss, the Oregon hydrant was repainted with the BSU blue and orange. This was done by my Capt who is a BSU fan, but also likes to just jab at the other guys for the heart breaking loss. He claims that he just wanted to paint the hydrant the same colors as our engine colors (every engine has a different color combo on all the tools to ID where they came from. Ours just happened to be blue and orange).  B-shift didn't take too kindly to the new pain scheme, and so started hydrant wars.

                 During the course of the hydrant wars, the hydrant got many new coats of paint. So many, that it's joked that the hydrant will never rust or corrode since we never removed any of the old paint, but instead just added new paint. It went back and forth from Oregon to BSU several times (I actually lost count), then it went pink once or twice, and it even got a black and yellow paint job for the University of Idaho Vandals. All of the new paintings would take place on the shifts 4 days off. When B shift left on a 4 day, we (A shift) would paint it. When we were gone on a 4 day, B shift would paint it. It got to the point that you almost expected to see, and look for, a freshly painted hydrant when you came back from your 4 day. All the while, the other shift, C shift, just sat back and laughed and enjoyed the show.

                  B shift had essentially given up on winning the hydrant wars toward the end of the football season, and the hydrant had managed to stay blue and orange over a full 4 day. We thought we had won, but we had another thing coming. BSU had lost their most important game at the end of the season. A loss to TCU, which prevented BSU from going to a BCS bowl game. After the loss, C shift decided that they would jump into the hydrant wars and painted the hydrant purple and black. Even with the loss fresh in my mind, I had to admit that the hydrant looked really good. My capt went out and sprayed just enough yellow all over the hydrant to cover the TCU and walked away. That is how the hydrant was left through all of winter, until the other week.

 

                With his retirement, my Capt is moving to Wyoming because of lots of snow (he loves snow mobiling) and no state income tax. So as part of his going away present, I decided to revamp the hydrant wars, and I painted the hydrant the Wyoming Cowboy colors of brown and yellow. Yes, technically, it's supposed to be brown and gold, but the yellow works just fine in this case. So here's some before and after pics of the hydrant.

              As you can see, I added some fresh yellow paint, and then added the brown. It actually looks pretty cool. Every time We pull into the station, I say "Go Cowboys" and my Capt just laughs. He noticed it the first time we got back to the station after a call when it was all done. Luckily it was pretty warm that day and the paint dried super quick so I was able to get the entire thing done in less than an hour before we got another call. The rest of the guys at the station thought that it was pretty funny to, and have so far left it untouched. I have my doubts that it will stay like that when I come back to work from my 4 day now that he is gone, but at least they left it until after the retirement.

            So, to Capt Lonnie Sutton, even though you will never read this, thanks for all the great memories and laughs. Enjoy the retirement and don't have too much fun on your sled.



Open Water Swim

                 The other day I finally got my first open water swim done. It's been a long time coming, let me tell you. I was really excited that I was able to get out of the pool and into something more triathlon if that makes sense. Granted, the pond swimming was not nearly as picturesque as the one above, but it was similar. Boise is known as the city of trees, and it was definitely green around most of the pond. Jeff and I were finally able to connect and get out in the water. The weather that day was perfect, a little windy, but nothing too bad. Nice and sunny, and the water was awesome. I was told about this pond from Antonio over at Tritown Boise, and this is where they actually hold some of their open water training sessions. So Jeff and I decided to try it out last Friday afternoon. I do have to say that I caught a flash back of California when we were getting ready to hit the water. The smell of neoprene coming out of the back of a pick up truck, having a towel around my waist so I could change into my wet suit in public, walking across asphalt and dirt to hit the water. It was crazy.

       The route that is plotted on the map provided by Tritown shows a triangular course across the water that will give you 0.55miles of swimming. But, if you don't know what those points are, it's kind of hard to figure your distance. Jeff and I plotted our first point, across the pond to where there was a break on the shore from the trees. We'd swim for that point, which would be the longest part of the triangle, and then reassess from there. We had no ambition about pushing the pace in the open water for the first time. The only goal was to just get out there and swim in the wet suits and practice trying to spot and stay on course for our destination.

Stepping down into the water I immediately felt the buoyancy of my suit just getting up to mid thigh. I've worn wet suits before for surfing, body boarding and body surfing, but this suit is way different when it comes to the buoyancy. I also noticed that when I was swimming. Usually, in the pool, my kick doesn't make much of a splash and stays right at the surface. But with the added buoyancy of the suit, I was putting out these monster splashes with my kicks that were totally unintentional. I guess that means that my buoyancy in the pool is pretty good???

        Another thing that I noticed while in the open water? I really pull hard to the right with my stroke. I was afraid that this might be the case. I have read multiple places that talk about how only breathing to one side will produce the uneven stroke that then pulls you to the breath side. My pull might not be as bad as I imagine since I was swimming with Jeff and he pulls to the left. Wouldn't you know it, he breathes off his left and I breathe off my right, and thats how we started off swimming too. Jeff on the left and myself on the right. So maybe my pull isn't as bad as I'm imagining it. I did start making the conscious effort to "swim left" as the only description that I can come up with. Instead of just swimming, I try to imagine that I need to swim more towards my left and try to compensate that way. I do this by keeping my left arm further out and away from my body on the pull phase of the stroke, and then crossing over a little bit with my right on the stroke as well. It seemed, so far, to work a little bit.

       I also learned that it's a huge pain in the ass to try and spot and swim and keep swimming. Another issue when you only swim in a pool and don't have anything to do but stare at a black line and look for the wall. I also noticed that I have a very hard time trying to get into a rhythm and pace myself in the open water, at least for this first go around. I don't have the stupid wall to kick off and tell me how far I've gone, and I am notorious for taking off on the swim way too fast before settling down. I've been working on this in the pool. Trying to not push out a sub 1:20 for my first 100yds because after that, it just gets me more tired. Instead, if I can keep my first 100yds in the 1:30's I seem to have a better rhythm and pace overall. In the open water, you don't have the luxury of the wall to know your distance and then check your watch.

       All of this brings me to the struggles of the open water. I'm definitely comfortable in the water, there's no fear being out there and not being able to see the bottom or seeing how far the distance is and not thinking I can make it. It's just the little things about the swim technique that need some serious fine tuning to be successful at navigating the open the water. All of this will come in time, I know. So for this first season, I will just do my best. I know that I can make the swim distance, it's just a matter of how much extra swimming I might be doing because of the poor navigation. My strategy is to start in the back of my wave, and try to follow someone around my same speed, and hopefully they will navigate the majority of the course for me. I'll still look up and spot here and there just to play it safe.

        Jeff and I hit the water and started the swim, I estimated that the distance across the pond to be close to 500yds, and based on my time to get across the pond, I'd say that was fairly accurate. I could tell though that I was going to have some problems with my suit. First off, just the short distance that we swam, I was already getting chaffed on my neck. Secondly, I felt like my shoulders were actually constricted and not able to move as freely as without my suit. Not clausterphobic or anything, but just resistance. Once we got to the other side I stood on the bank and pulled more of the suit up my arms toward my shoulders, which seemed to totally help when we continued our swim. Once on the other side, Jeff and I talked about our next move, where we were going to swim to next. We decided that since we didn't know the exact points it was useless trying to finish this triangle. Instead we opted to swim around the parameter of the pond in the same direction that the triangle would be laid out. This gave us way over the 0.55 miles that was plotted, but still allowed us to know that we got at least a decent distance swim in for the day. So off we went circling around the pond. At one point Jeff totally swam over the top of my legs. I caught a glipse of something coming up behind me, but didn't know that it was him until he was on me. I guess that's something that I'm going to need to get used to being in the open water.

         Hopefully, I will get at least 2 more open water swims in each week until the event, that would give me 6 more swims. I'm going to try and stay out of the pool for the remainder of the training sessions if I can possibly help it.  I can't wait to get back into the water and see how bad my spotting and pulling continue to be!

Riding the course

        This last week I got out and rode close to half of the bike course with Jeff, my friend who is doing the event with me. The full course is 56 miles, and I got over 30miles of the course, and pretty much all of the major climbs done on that ride. The course is an out and back, but the back doesn't bring you back to the swim, it takes you into down town Boise, where T2 is waiting for you so you can then run on the fairly flat Greenbelt along the Boise river.

             The training ride went pretty well. There's actually part of the course that you're not supossed to ride on before the event because it goes onto private, corporate, property and they get all butt hurt when you come hauling rubber, dodging cars on their property during buisness hours. But it's very easy to get around, you just stay on the main road. The only reason I can see why they chose to go out onto the property is to add a little bit of more distance, to get the full 56 miles, and maybe a little technical stuff with multiple turns on a flat section of the course. But really, for the training purpose, it doesn't matter. The bigger issue is that I got all the climbs in.

              Jeff and I started ~4 miles from the swim start. According to the elevation map, that is mostly all down hill anyways coming out of Lucky Peak Resevior. We started with one of the 2 main climbs that we will have to face. It's a steady climb, but wasn't too terrible. I was able to keep a decent 14mph pace on the hill. After that hill is a little bit of a down hill before it flatens out and then gets a few rolling hills here and there. The next major climb is around mile 18 on the course, and dear God, is it a toughy.

             The biggest climb is up and over a good size hill while you pass the gravel pit. Because of the counture of the road on the hill, you can never tell where it's going to end until you reach the very top. It seems like you just climb,......... and climb,........ and climb. At one point I did start to wonder when it was going to end. You just climb higher and higher, round a corner that you think for sure would lead you over the top only to see more hill going up. Here's the elevation map so you can see what I'm talking about. Look at mile 18 and look how that line goes up almost vertically? Yeah that's the climb I'm talking about. I guess so long as you don't get a flat or other bike issue on that part of the course, then it's not too terrible. It's just a part of the course where you try to just not spend too much energy. The plus side is that there is an aid station after the climb. The crappy part is after the turn around you have a 90* left hand turn to make, and then you hit another decent steady climb.

              Maybe it was bad for me because we had to come to a near complete stop to check for traffic before we could make the turn into a hill, but man that wasn't fun. Having no momentum and trying to get up a steady hill like that was almost as bad as the biggest hill. The rest of the ride was fairly uneventful. My low back did start to cramp up on me and force me out of the aero position, but other wise nothing to really write home about. I do need to mention that I don't have a power meter or heart rate monitor, so I just have to base everything off of my perceived excertion and my cadence. This makes those fake flats, as I call them, a little more deceptive. I try to not worry about my over all speed, but rather just how I feel while I'm in the saddle, and what my cadence is. I've been trying really hard to keep my cadence higher, around the mid 90's for my rides. This puts me into an easier gearing, usually one up on my cassette, and I'm hoping that it will then just save my legs a little bit for the run. Once I get onto the run, I will have the best judge of how I'm doing, as it's the most familiar territory for me. So for this year, it'll be a little easier on the bike to save some for the run so I can finish strong, Vs a stronger bike and loosing it on the run.

              Which brings me to my last observation on the bike that I noticed yesterday. Yesterday I went for a ride while the kids were sleeping. I was hoping to get a 20+ miler in for the day. I wanted to kind of push the pace a little bit, but keeping the cadence higher versus worrying about my speed. The ride was really good, and as I was coming close to home I noticed that going past my house for another mile and then coming back would give me a 40K (just under 25mi, and the olympic distance for the bike) so I did just that. When I got home, I quickly placed the bike up against the van and then grabbed my running shoes and went for a one mile run, turning my ride into a "brick" workout.

                I've done several of the brick workout before, but this was the first time of doing a brick while not attached to both a trainer for the bike and a treadmill for the run, and it was totally different. My legs were definetly more jello after this ride, but the typical shin stiffness that I've experience before was never there. This did make my run easier. I had some stiffness here and there, but nothing very big or very painful. When I did the other bricks, I would get out of the saddle and stretch out my calves and the rest of my body as I could while still on the pedals, but this time I didn't. It was a last minute decison to run, so I never thought about stretching out. The other big thing that I noticed was how slow I felt like I was running. It was an almost out of body experience running after the ride, and it felt horribly slow. Hitting my watch after the mile run showed that I had pushed out that mile at a 7:10 pace. That's a scary thought to me. I pushed out a 7:10 mile without really trying after the ride. That was way better than I thought, and makes me wonder where I should be. I'm thinking that an 8-8:30 pace for the first mile or two after the bike and then pick up the pace as I see and feel fit. With the last mile or two really pushing the pace to finish strong.

              My swiming is still chugging along, and my running is going smooth. I did order some tires off of Ebay after I wrote my last blog, and got nervous when I discovered that I bought them from a Taiwanese buisness. They still haven't shown up yet, but should be here any time, and the seller assures me that there won't be any duty tax that I'll have to pay before I can get my tires. I need to get some open water swims in, which I plan to do this week. Last week I missed an open water session, but used a kick board propped up on my water bottle as a sighting device while swiming in the pool. As of today, I have 3.5 weeks until the event, and I can't wait, but am also nervous. If I think about how close it is, then I get nervous; but if I think just about the event, then I'm excited. I honestly just want it to be here so I can get it over with. I know that these last 3.5 weeks aren't going to make a huge performance advantage for the race, so all I can do now is just try to stay healthy and keep everything loose.

5 weeks to go!

Five weeks to go, but who's counting??? It's been a week and a half since I posted last. Sorry for the delay, but the increase in volume had seriously sucked my other time commitments dry. So the last week and half have been crazy busy with all the biking and running. I didn't get nearly all the swimming in, but that's ok. In fact, the last week, I don't think I came any where near my illustrious goal of 120miles on the bike for the week.

I know that I did somewhere in the range of 90-100 miles. I say that because one of my days was on a spin bike here at work. I was working an extra shift and left my bike at home thinking that I was going to be at a different station. Last minute I get moved to my home station, which was awesome. I'd much rather be out of my home station where all my stuff and food is than another station. Only problem was that my crew, especially the Capt Jeff, is serious into cycling. Not a big deal IF I had taken my bike to work that day. So without my wheels, I did the next best thing, grabbed the spin bike and let it abuse me. Unfortunately, our spin bike has no computer at all. I was not only unable to gauge my distance, but I was also unable to even get a cadence of my rhythm. So I had to guess about my overall distance, but with being on the bike for 90 min and doing some intense intervals, I was calling that day a 20+ mile day. The following day, I did a 40mile solo ride south of town.
For that ride, I got up early, before the kids woke and left shortly after the sun was up over the horizon. It was cold when I first started out. Luckily I had my Zoot long sleeve running top on, but my legs were chilly. I still don't have a ton of cycling gear, so I have to piece together what I can. I want to say that the temp was in the high 40's maybe, with a little breeze and sunny. A beautiful day except for the chill. When I got home, my feet and hands were numb and even after a hot shower I couldn't get warm. The only big problem on the ride was that I got hungry, real hungry. I didn't really eat before I left. I had a Gu gel pack and hit the road. Just over half way through I had another gel pack, but with still about 8-10 miles out, I was just starving. Next time, I'll plan better, or at least get up earlier and eat. I love riding away from the people and the cars. Boise is known for being fairly friendly when it comes to the cycling community, and it really is. But I still enjoy getting out and away from the city when I ride. I purposely choose roads that will be less traveled with cars for not only the safety, but just the enjoyment of being away. That is one thing that I love, I can be a few min ride or run in certain directions and get away from the concrete jungle of the city. Smell the manure and "moo" at the cows as I go buy. I definitely didn't have that option when I was living in California!

With all the volume increase that I've had this past couple of weeks, I've noticed that my cycling has gotten a little slower in the pace category. I'm chalking that up to exhaustion more than anything else. I can tell you that I have definitely felt more tired over the last week and half than I have before. I know that it doesn't help that i continue to struggle with getting to bed at a decent time and getting good recovery sleep. When I go to sleep, I'm out and dead to the world (mostly). But like last night, I was planning on going to bed early; 10-1030 LATEST. But when child #2 doesn't go to sleep until 1030, you don't get to go to sleep until after 11. Not that we didn't try, but he just wasn't tired. He's in the process of starting to ween from his afternoon naps. Some days he takes them, and some days he doesn't. Well yesterday he did, and because of his nap, he wasn't tired at 9 when we put him to bed with his brother. Every 10 min he was getting up and wondering around the house looking for us. So I'm continuing to work on the sleep category.

Running is moving along, still haven't decided anything about my shoes, and I'll probably just keep my Inno8's that I have right now and call it good. They still have a decent amount of tread left, and I'm fairly confident that they will get me through at least the Spudman Triathlon at the end of July. I did, however find a new running partner. It's the daughter! Shawna had taken the boys to a play date and left me with her. Well, it was a beautifully sunny day, a little chilly, but otherwise perfect for running. I bundled her up with a jacket and a towel (all I could find in the garage for her legs) in the single jogger stroller; grabbed some snacks, her bunny and sunglasses and off we went. I had to return a video to the library, so I figured that I would stop there for my run. The library is about 2.25miles from the house, and I thought that I'd do at least 6 miles. Hit the library on the way out there, turn around at 3 miles and head home. At the 3 mile mark though, there was still not a single fuss, whine or complaint; so I pushed out another mile before turning around and heading home. A total of 8 miles and she was a champ! There were a few mishaps along the way; dropped sippy cup, dropped sunglasses, dropped snack trap, but otherwise it was great. My pace, of course, was slower but not that much. I kept an 8:15-ish pace except the last mile coming home when I really turned on the gas a little bit. You can only go so fast while pushing a jogging stroller and having to worry about driveways, crossing residential streets and wondering what and when will fall out of the stroller next.
The last thing that I wanted to mention was that I've noticed over these last couple of days that my strength seems to have taken a toll with all the endurance work that I've been putting in, and I don't particularly care for that loss. Now that the volume weeks are over, I'll be seriously working on getting those Strength and Conditioning (S+C) days in. Once the Spudman is over at the end of July, I'll be hitting the weights harder to regain the strength that I've lost. I might have one more tri after Spudman, and that will be in the middle of Aug, and could be either a sprint or olympic distance. I still haven't registered for it yet. I'm waiting to see how my body holds up and how I feel when it gets closer. Right now, I'm seriously considering doing just the sprint distance as I think that I'd be fun to just  go out there and hammer it really hard for just over an hour and then call it good. I don't know, we'll see what happens.
I've already started looking at my training after this first, inaugural season is done. After the season is over, I plan on re-working my swim technique to get faster (possibly swim smooth) and my cycling. My current Capt will be retiring at the end of the month, and my new Capt is really into cycling, so I plan on learning a lot in the off season and really improving my cycling this fall and winter.

I have just under 5 weeks until the big event. That means 4 weeks of the CFE, with still an emphasis on some more volume, but emphasising the S+C portion as well. I will do a taper week the week before the event, and then it will be time to rock. I will be hitting the bike course later this week with Jeff and we'll get a chance to see what most of the course looks like for the bike, so I can't wait! The bike is now complete and ready for the event, except for maybe some new tires. I still have the stock tires on them, but with over 900 miles on the rear, we're starting to push the envelope a little bit on the life span. I'd rather spend some cash now and get fresh tires, than have my race ruined because of a blow out. Now, it's off to Ebay to shop for tires and then shower and bed!