The Antidote to Discouragement

Whenever I get down or feeling sorry for myself, I find that the best remedy is to seek out something or someone inspiring to remind me that, as Richard Bach says "Argue for your limitations, and sure enough they're yours".  Here is this week's remedy. Contracting polio at a young age, Dergin Tokmak learned to walk on his hands, and after seeing a movie about breakdancing, became a dancer. He integrates his crutches and incredibly strong upper body into his amazing dance moves. This is well worth a watch, and reminds me that whatever is getting me down in the present moment is simply something I have not yet set my mind to overcome.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 14: Damaged, Discouraged, and Depressed

It's raining. For the next ten days at least. And cold. And raining. And my back is not only not better, it's worse. A massage yesterday did nothing to help. Some time every day in the hot tub at the club isn't cutting it either. I'm supposed to spend next week as a "big bike week" doing tons of bike mileage, and I can't even sit up in a chair for an hour without my back killing me. That terrible fear that my injury will take too much time out of training and I won't get enough miles in before Ironman keeps lurking at the back of my mind.

And did I mention it's raining? And cold?

I normally get the post-vacation blues when coming back to the soggy NorthWet in the wintertime, but this is a thousand times worse. I need to go read over some of my old posts where I actually have a good attitude, and kick my mental butt back into shape. That is all.

Hunting and Gathering the Wild Coconut

If there's one thing I love about the tropics, right up there with warm ocean and sunshine, it has to be coconuts. I could eat coconut all day every day. And nothing is better than a fresh one, tossed out of a tree by the storm, and opened on the beach.

My daughter spotted this one when we were taking a walk, and she was intent on carrying it back and seeing if she could get it open. I have to admit, it was quite funny watching her pound it with sticks and rocks to no avail. And if I had a video of my son trying to open it by throwing it on the rock wall, and it bouncing up about crotch high and nearly nailing him, it would probably go viral on Youtube. But nothing made a dent in the coconut itself.

I remembered from travels in the South Pacific, seeing big sticks which had been driven into the ground and secured, pointy-end up for pounding coconuts against. So hubby and daughter went to work with a pointy stick and the sharp edge of the rock wall, with the net result that it split open to reveal a perfectly ripe interior, and delicious coconut water inside. We've been eating fresh coconut for days now, and perhaps it's about time to head out on the hunt for another one. Island eating, paleo-style.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 15: Hawaii 5-0, or is that Hawaii 4-6??

We've been here in Hawaii just a bit over a week. Sure, it's vacation, and it's been great to just be able to swim out in the ocean most days, except for two when the flooded rivers dumped a ton of yucky mud into the ocean and made it more or less unswimmable. But mostly I've been using this time to do a run focus, ramping up my running mileage to 34 miles in the last week, which is about double what I've been running. Unfortunately, I should've thought to bring something other than my Vibram Five Fingers along, since all of the running is on pavement and I'm not used to cranking out that many miles on hard surfaces without any cushioning. 

Fortunately for me, my feet have taken the challenge well, and I haven't had any problems running all that mileage in the Five Fingers. My only hitch while exercising here is that I hurt my back surfing a few days ago, I bailed off of a wave when another surfer and I were on a collision course, and while my body was twisting one direction, the wave sent my torso in another. Ouch. I probably wouldn't even have noticed it at 25 years old, the last time I surfed, over two decades ago! But now at almost 46, yeah, I notice. My back has been sore and tight since, but fortunately hasn't bothered me while running.

But that just brings me to yet another one of those "this is why I train" moments. How cool is it to be able to just get on a surfboard on the North Shore of O'ahu (granted, not during the winter big wave months) and have the strength, flexibility, balance, and stamina to surf for 2.5 hours?? When you train your body in all-around fitness, not just endurance  but all of those other components as well, you can go out and do whatever it is that you want to do. And right now, with the crystal clear waters and reefs right off of our balcony, that looks like an hour or two of snorkeling...hang loose.

Now This is How To Train

Up at 6:45 a.m. Walk out the door to the beach, just a few steps away. Spot four sea turtles right off the beach. Jump in the warm water and swim along the beach. Hose off in the already warm morning air. Come in and grab a banana and a cup of Macadamia Nut Kona coffee. Throw on the Vibram Five Fingers and some running shorts and head out on a six miler along the beachfront road, hearing the surf all the way. Come back into the condo, make some Coconut Banana custard for breakfast along with a cup of green tea. Bask on the balcony. Smile.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 16: On Vacation

Yep, I'm on vacation this week. And that includes from training. Oh. Well. At least from structured training. Because you know I packed my running shoes. And my swim suit. But not my bike, so I'm not REALLY training for triathlons, right?

Seriously, my plans are just to chill, and enjoy whatever workouts I can fit in while we're gone. And get a good margarita or two and enjoy them on the beach. Then I'll be good and ready to hit some long hard stuff when we get back. And yes, I know several of you are wanting me to put some recipes up on the blog, especially for that Paleo/gluten-free Chicken Pot Pie that my family loves. I wish I could say that I'll get that done this week, but I didn't even pack my computer along, so unless I stumble across a keyboard somewhere, this will be the last missive for awhile. But I will definitely get some food stuff posted when I get back, I promise.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 17: How NOT To Train

I just had to post this today - what a total abomination of the word Ironman!! You can rest assured that I am NOT training this week by eating a TWO POUND cheeseburger. Blech! I'm guessing that the folks at the end of this "Ironman" finish line do not look much like the folks who will be crossing the line at Ironman Coeur d'Alene.

In other news, I am coming to the end of my twenty weeks of "Out Season" training with Endurance Nation, and it's still kicking my booty around. It's been great to have relatively short, very focused workouts through this winter's bad weather. Even on a run like last night where I headed out into 38 degrees of wind-blown sleet, having the sets of half-mile and mile repeats to focus on left me no time to contemplate my own misery.

Even better, I spent two hours last Friday on the Ironman Coeur-d'Alene bike course, courtesy of the Computrainer setup at The Multisport Advantage triathlon shop/training center. Even though I'm still riding the Power Cranks which makes the steeper hills a bit tough, it didn't seem too terribly bad. I guess that bodes well for June 24!

Baby Food... The New Paleo Gu??

Anyone who has done a serious distance event has probably suffered from Gel Overload: a syndrome in which you never want to look at a little foil packet of flavored sugary goop again. Ever. They fall into the category of a necessary evil, even for those of us who try to eat Paleo most of the time, there's no way to really get around the fact that our paleolithic ancestors did not go out and try to Swim, Bike, and Run for twelve straight hours at the outer limits of their stamina and abilities. Especially not in stupidly hot, windy, or miserable conditions. They would probably laugh at the notion. Get too hot? Sit down in the shade for awhile. Tired? Take a nap. Hungry? eat real food. Foolish endurance athletes.

But if you're going to subject your body to an Endurance Torture Session (aka Ironman), you have to replace the glycogen that you're burning with some very simple, easy-to-digest sugary crap. Even the Paleo Diet for Athletes says so. However, assuming that you're not training at quite the same intensity that you race at, there's no reason to use that nasty little packaged sugar glop for every training session. And as someone who would prefer to fuel up with real food, I'd rather turn elsewhere for my calories.

Enter baby food.

Say Whhhhaattttt? Well, good quality (organic) baby food is real food in its simplest and most digestible form, right? And now instead of being in those little glass jars (they are just SO 1960s), it comes in little foil squeezable pouches, just made for clumsy little toddler's hands (or the shaking hands of someone about to bonk on a long bike ride).

Don't get me wrong. I like being all Laura Ingalls Wilder. I like to crockpot up my own homemade applesauce as much as the next gingham-clad barefoot HouseFrau. But have you ever tried to take a mason jar of applesauce on a long bike ride? Not so easy to fit in your back jersey pocket, is it? So enter the squeezable baby food packet. Now I'm not talking about mashed peas and carrots, mind you. The good ones are like mango-apple-banana, or peach-apple. They're pretty yummy, very transportable, and they go down fast. Just like a Gu, but without that nasty sticky gross texture and flavor.

Of course, when it comes closer to racing, I'm going to put the fructose on the back shelf. Real fruit (mashed or otherwise) is simply harder on your digestive system and more difficult to digest and utilize than pure unadulterated sucrose, glucose, and dextrose. Yes, I'll be using the gels when it comes to race preparation and racing itself. But in the meantime, I can do my palate and my body a favor and fuel with real food. Conveniently packaged. Hey, at least it doesn't have round-faced Gerber babies on the packaging anymore, so us athletes can buy them without shame, even without a toddler in tow.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 18: Dancing on the Razor's Edge

To some extent, Ironman training is living on the ragged edge. You want to train as much as humanly possible, yet somehow manage to avoid overtraining and injury.Yesterday was a shining example of how not to go about this: Get up, down a ton of calories. Bike to the pool, swim 3500 yards. Focus on pacing for 200 repeats - 16 of them (some broken into smaller chunks, most straight). I'm happy that I kept mine in the 2:30 - 2:35 range, which bodes well for triathlon swim times this year. Bike to karate dojo, train with black belt partner. Bike home. Eat hundreds more calories. Robotics team arrives, we're in the middle of three straight days of work getting ready for the State Tournament. When they leave I hop on my bike on the trainer, knock out 1:20 with 8 sets of 2 minute ALL OUT intervals. Folllow that up with a Brick Run at an 8:23 pace. Cook homemade Chicken Pot Pies for dinner. Eat a whole one. Fall asleep watching old M*A*S*H* re-runs at 8:55 pm.

By my count, that's five hours of exercise for the day, but I woke up without feeling overly sore or tired. I am managing to sleep 7- 9 hours a night (good), eat mostly paleo with lots of fruits and veggies (good) and generally manage stress levels and other performance-wreckers with meditation when needed (good). I've only got three more weeks where the karate black belt confirmation training will overlap the Ironman training and then it's heads-down towards the Ironman all the way.

Here's to dancing on the razor's edge.

Timing Is Everything: Nail Your Kick Timing For a Better Distance Swim

Swim coaches love to talk about what your hips are doing in the water. They're under-rotating, over-rotating, sliding from side to side. Very few people talk about the timing of what your feet are doing, yet the timing of your kick drives your hip rotation and affects your entire stroke. Proper hip rotation and therefore proper core engagement and therefore proper power in the swim stroke are all connected to kick timing, and without it, no amount of isolated hip motion is going to help. Improper kick timing usually causes a visible over-rotation of the hips, and can really only be solved by correcting the kick timing.

If you contrast the photo of the swimmer above, taken from GoSwim.tv's excellent video with the photos below of swimmers I found on various underwater videos on Youtube, you'll see the difference that the correct kick timing makes on hip position and rotation. The swimmer above has timed the downbeat of her kick with the extension of her opposite arm. Her hips are stable in the water, with power clearly coming from the twisting of the torso. The swimmers below are timing their downbeat kick with the arm on the same side of their body, causing an over-rotation of the hips and hence an under-utilization of the power of the torso in their stroke.

Here's an example from another angle. In this photo, you see Olympic medalist Ian Thorpe, the downbeat of his left leg clearly corresponding with the extension of his right arm, his hips very stable and not over-rotating or dipping down in the water.

Versus this swimmer whose left kick is accompanying his left arm stroke instead, thus causing his left hip to dip way down and creating a situation where he can't use the rotation of his torso for power in his stroke.

Kick timing can also be diffficult to work on. Some people get it instinctively, but for others it takes a lot of work. Your timing is often indelibly stamped in your brain-muscle connections and it takes hard work to re-wire that.

For triathletes and lap swimmers trying to improve their body position, their core rotation, hip position, and the power of their stroke, kick timing is an essential skill to work on. I will try to explain proper kick timing here and how I go about helping people achieve it.

It will help if, as people read this, they go back and watch this video with the proper timing as that gives a visual reference to the whole thing:


First, some basics. There are three main types of kicks that we use in the crawl stroke.

#1: Two-beat kick: One beat for each arm stroke. This is used primarily for distance swimming and is the most effective kick you can use with the least amount of effort. A good two-beat kick will keep your hips up for good body position, and will drive the correct core rotation to engage your major core muscle groups to power your stroke. In a two-beat kick, the downward extension of the kicking leg corresponds to driving the gliding arm into its full extension. I like to think of it as drawing an "X" across my body, stabilizing my hips and preventing them from over-rotation. If done right, you will feel this downbeat of the kick powering your arm into that glide. Re-watch the video  and look at the pause-point where her leg is at full extension of the downstroke and the opposite arm is at full extension. Although the swimmer in the video is using a six-beat, not a two-beat kick, you can still see what I mean about the timing of the primary downbeat kick.

#2: Six-beat kick: Three beats for each arm stroke. You will still have the downbeat kick in exactly the same place as it was in the two-beat kick, which is to say powering the opposite arm into full extension. The other two beats come in between the downbeats. So it sounds a bit like a waltz, with a feeling of 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3. Again, the downbeat kick is the primary driver of the core rotation, and prevents over-rotation of the hips. The additional kicks are in there to provide power for swimming at faster speeds. As you pick up speed, the primary kick stays the same, but the secondary kicks pick up more and more power. Of course, with this power comes increased oxygen consumption, so by the time you reach a full-on six-beat kick, you're going to be sucking up more oxygen than you would want to for distance swimming. The swimmer in the video clip I posted is using a six-beat kick. Many distance swimmers use a modified six-beat kick with a heavy two-beat downstroke and very light secondary kicks.

#3: Kick like hell. This is what you do when you sprint. Unfortunately, all too many triathletes use this option for regular lap swimming, thus eating up their precious oxygen supply. If you are kicking more than 3 beats per arm stroke, you are kicking TOO MUCH. A video analysis will show you how many kicks you're getting in there. Many swimmers kick 4 beats per arm stroke (an 8-beat kick) which has the unfortunate side-effect of having the downbeat kick coincide with the opposite arm half the time (good) but with the same arm the other half of the time (bad). You can spot these swimmers a mile away by the drunken-sailor-like roll that they swim with. One hip consistently dips down while the other stays stable.

HOW TO CHANGE YOUR KICK TIMING:

When I work with swimmers on kick timing, I usually have them start with a pull-buoy. The reason is that if I don't, their regular kicking pattern will quickly re-establish itself. Also, it removes the need to have to kick hard to keep the hips up. I will also note that it helps to have some good basic body-positioning stuff down in order to work on kick timing (head down instead of up, front arm gliding instead of pushing down on the water, kick is efficient without too much knee bend or "bicycling" of the legs).

With a pull buoy, you can start to work on the timing of the downbeat kick. You can work on just one leg at a time. Get a good pulling rhythm going with your arms, and then try to insert just a left leg downbeat kick to coincide with the right arm's extension. Then work on the right leg-left arm combination. Then you can work on both. Then work on eliminating the pull buoy. When the two-beat rhythm clicks, it should feel like each downbeat kick is driving your opposite arm into the glide. Once you get a two-beat kick down, it's not as hard to add in the other 4 kicks to make up a six-beat kick.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 19: Taking My Inspiration From Some Amazing Teens

Better than last week's picture of me in my neon yellow balloon shorts, circa 1989, this is triathlon, new millenium style. I just got my jersey from Endurance Nation, and gave it a test ride/run brick since we were having such a mild day outdoors. I'm enjoying pushing the workouts on the Power Cranks, and I promise some gear reviews (including the cranks) coming soon! Looking at this picture feels good - I feel STRONG this year, and I am looking forward to really competing this season. I can't believe I'm almost forty-six, I still feel like a kid inside (until I catch a glimpse of my grey hairs that is!)

In other news, my kids' FIRST Tech robotics team that I've been coaching (consisting of six middle- and high-school-aged kids) had a big tournament on Saturday at Oregon State University. Of course, this meant staying up until midnight on Friday night still tinkering with the robot and the programming, even though we had to get up at 5:00 Saturday morning for the competition. Yes, this is an actual photo of my living room at close to midnight. The reason there's a striped bowling ball in there is because one of the tasks that the robot has to be able to accomplish is to push a bowling ball up a ramp.

 In their usual, skin-of-the-teeth style, they staged a big comeback, from nearly last place after the first three rounds to making it into the finals, and eventually securing a trip to the State Championships in two weeks. Whew! I was a nervous wreck for the whole day. I swear, I could easily do an Ironman with less effort than it takes to sit back and chew my nails while they compete. It's intense. Yet I am immensely proud of them! They designed, built, and programmed a robot. One that can pick up crates with articulated arms, rotate the crate into position, fill it with raquetballs from the floor, lift it on top of a scissors lift, and push it into the air. Anyone who bemoans the youth of today just needs to meet one of these teams of incredible kids (the competition was full of them) and see what they can do. I tell you, it gives you hope for tomorrow. BTW, the small cutie on the left and the tall goofball on the right are both my kiddos.

While I am definitely enthusiastic for them, and will be so excited to see what they can accomplish at the State Tournament, I'm also itching to dive into triathlon season. The first spring races are now only a couple of months away, and I think I hadn't realized how much I missed competing last year. I know I filled my time with lots of cool stuff, but I do really love the arena of competition and how much it fires me up to do my very best. I feel like I have been very very effective at using my limited time this winter, and I'm going to come out of the gate running strong. Just like our robotics team, I hope that the goal of competition spurs me to do my very best, even more than I think I can accomplish. I also hope that I can compete with the good grace, good sportsmanship, and overall positive attitude that they display at their tournaments.

A Week of Food, for a (mostly) Paleo Family of Four

Feeding a family healthily is not as easy as it sounds. There are time pressures, money pressures, and the constant pressure of being surrounded by infinite volumes of unhealthy non-food stuffs. A trip into the local grocery store is a minefield of sugar and processed grain products, and an evening out at many restaurants is no better.

So what does a primarily paleo family eat? How is it prepared, and how can you feed your family quickly, easily, and healthily? I thought I'd share our week of food here in hopes that it answers some of these questions for people trying to transition their family to better eating habits.

First of all, a disclaimer: You'll notice that we're not completely paleo. My kids do eat rice, including the boxes of crispy rice cereal and one bag of rice pasta a week. If I make a stir fry, or some Mexican or Indian food during the week, they'll often have rice with that as well. Depending on my training load and carbohydrate needs, I might also have some plain white rice with my meals. We don't eat other grains.

When I go to the grocery store for the week, the first aisle I hit is the fruit and vegetable section. My typical load for the week is something like:

2 onions
4 - 8 yams
5 small zucchini
20 medium carrots
3 stalks of celery
4 or 5 cucumbers
2 heads of lettuce
3 bunches of dark greens (kale, spinach, etc.)
3 peppers (red, yellow, green)
2 avocados
2 tomatoes
1 pound of mushrooms
Other snacking vegetables (snap peas, jicama, etc.)

5 pounds of oranges
5 pounds of apples
5 pounds of bananas
2 pounds of blueberries (frozen, from last summer)
1 pound strawberries (frozen, from last summer)
Seasonal fruit (melons, berries, etc.)

All of our milk (not pictured) comes in the form of raw goat's milk from a local farmer in 1/2 gallon glass jars. We pick up 3 gallons once a week and return last week's jars. I buy a pound of raw goat's milk cheese for the kids per week, and two quarts of goat's yogurt.

Our eggs come from our free-range chickens. We go through about 2 dozen a week.

Some of our meat is from the 1/4 cow and 1/3 pig we bought last year. Buying in bulk like that gives us local, pastured meat at about $3.50 per pound (including steaks and roasts). I usually pull out 2 - 3 pounds from the freezer each week. Some meat comes from our local store, where they sell local, grass-pastured beef, I typically buy 2 pounds of hamburger a week, plus 2 pounds of organic free-range chicken. At Trader Joes, I'll buy a pound of fish or shrimp per week.

Canned goods:
1 - 2 jars of organic pasta sauce
Canned tomato paste + sloppy joe mix
Enchilada sauce or curry mix

Nuts, seeds, and snacks: I typically buy:
2 pounds of nuts (we like the almond/macadamia/cranberry snack mix from Trader Joes)
2 bars per person (Lara bars or Kind bars) for out of the house snacking
A big box of natural fruit leather from Costco once a month
A big box of Seaweed snacks from Costco once a month
2 - 3 bags of jerky if we are going to be out of the house and need quick snacks
Fruit-flavored mineral water - one bottle per kid per week
2 bottles of Coconut water - I use for my workouts
Almond meal & coconut flour for making waffles or pancakes
3 bars of dark chocolate
1 -2 cans of full-fat coconut milk

I'll write more about meals later, but typical meals for the week include stir fries with rice, shrimp, and veggies, taco salad night, chicken with curry sauce and veggies, sloppy joes without the buns (the kids like to eat it from the bowl),  pasta (kids eat rice pasta, hubby and I will eat it over a riced cauliflower), pork chops with barbeque sauce, or paleo pizza with an almond-meal crust. Side dishes include yams, fresh veggies and dips like hummus, and sliced fruit.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 20: Gearing Up

It's getting to be that time in the training cycle: time to start thinking about gear for the race. For a sprint distance race, you can get away with wearing almost anything, eating almost anything, and drinking almost anything. I mean, how else can you explain this:

What was I thinking? Okay, to be fair, that was circa 1989. Everyone wore neon-colored balloon shorts. No, really. It sure makes you appreciate the tri suits of today, doesn't it?

But for an Iron distance race, every gear choice is important. The wrong socks can be 26.2 miles of blisters, the wrong drink mix can mean puking behind every porta-potty. The wrong saddle can mean a world of hurt in the nether regions for far-too-many hours.

So, it's time to start doing my training rides and runs with the clothing, gear, and nutrition that I'll be using on race day. In a couple of weeks I'm going to put a bunch of miles on my bike in what's known as a "big bike week". I'll be doing some comparisons between my favorite tri shorts to see which ones make the cut. One thing I discovered last time is that getting used to a thin pad instead of a traditional biking short with a thick pad makes life a whole lot easier in Iron land. For one thing, you don't have to change your shorts in T1, a feat which only people who have tried to pull on lycra over wet flesh with cold, shaking hands can truly appreciate. For another thing, I have learned that thicker pads don't really make for more comfort in the long haul, and in a day spent largely on the aerobars, a tri short is more comfortable for me. You'll be happy to know that nothing I am wearing will be in the color range of neon.

Next up on the agenda is to order some Infinit, an all-in-one nutrition solution that eliminates all of those messy gels from the bike. Last time I felt like I was carrying an entire garage sale in the back pockets of my jersey, and after hearing from numerous athletes who are Infinit fans, I am definitely willing to give it a try.

My biggest decision is probably going to be shoes. I've been doing all of my training runs so far in my Vibram Five Fingers, but do I want to go 26.2 miles on pavement in those? I'm not sure. My alternate shoes are Nike Frees, but now there are a lot more brands of minimalist running shoes out there. I'll have to go shoe shopping and see what looks like it will work best. I can always stick my Five Fingers in my Run Special Needs bag in case I need to go back to them.

I'm sure there's a million more details I'll need to work out in the coming months, but these are the ones to start with. Once I start thinking about all of this, it really brings home the sheer lunacy of the entire Ironman enterprise. All this gear, all these decisions, all this training, for one crazy idea. And yet, here I am, doing it again. Sometimes I don't understand myself, yet when I'm out there training I can tell you one thing: I love it. I ran to work today, and ran home, and it felt so darned good. I was just loving the pure feeling of running. And the feeling of the sweat running off of my body today on the bike trainer, where it's just you and the interval timer and the pain of it all. When you're done, it feels like nothing else. I know what it will feel like to finish the Ironman, and I can't wait.

The Whole30 Paleo: My January Experience

This year's holidays were a big difference from the past. A year of living mostly Paleo meant that I no longer even wanted to eat anything with gluten in it (bye bye bread, rolls, cookies, cakes), and I didn't even really overeat on sugar much. When it came to holiday meals, my body knew what "enough" felt like, and that generally meant stopping well before that holiday over-full sensation that many of us know all too well. I like that I feel so in tune with my body, and am inclined to choose healthy foods because that's what makes me feel best, not because I feel like I "should" or would feel guilty for eating otherwise.

Still, I had been indulging the sweet tooth a bit much, and January is a good time to re-boot healthy habits, so I decided to take the Whole30 Challenge and go thirty days on a strict Paleo regime. I also thought it would be a good opportunity to see if removing the smallish amounts of raw dairy that I normally eat would produce any notable benefits, and whether or not I could train at a high intensity on a strictly Paleo diet.

I have to admit that the first week was consumed with chocolate withdrawals. It's my last indulgence and a hard one to give up. I usually have a couple squares of good dark chocolate every day, and I realize that it makes a difference in my mood. To call me "cranky" in the first week of January would've been an understatement. The second week felt pretty great, but by the third week I felt frantically under-carbed after a lot of workouts. I felt like I just could not get enough carbs into my body and it made me appreciate the necessity of fueling workouts with a proper amount of glycogen. I ate a ridiculous amount of dried fruit (which had the predictable digestive effects), plus bananas and yams until I was sick of them.

There was one occasion on which I blew the Whole30 protocol, and it was definitely tied to glycogen depletion. After a hard swim workout followed by a tough interval run, I came home and prowled around the kitchen like a crazed beast. I ate some nuts, ate a banana, followed it with some dried mango, then opened the cupboard and poured myself a big bowl of organic rice krispies. Aaaaahhhhhh. All of a sudden, equilibrium was restored. So that was a clue to me that perhaps 100% Paleo is not going to be the way I eat for the remainder of my Ironman training.

After a month of eating 100% Paleo (except for one bowl of rice krispies), I have reached the following conclusions:

1. I need to fuel tough workouts with simple sugars. Sometimes I can get away with fruit leathers and bananas, but using drink mixes, gels, and bars gets to be increasingly crucial as you dial up the intensity and duration. I'm going to go back to following the recommendations in The Paleo Diet for Athletes for fueling my training sessions.

2. I didn't notice a difference between having some dairy in the form of raw goat's milk and giving it up on the Whole30. So I'm going back to milk in my tea and smoothies. Especially smoothies, I found that coconut milk and almond milk messed with my stomach and didn't give me the protein boost that using milk does.

3. Although I proved I can do without for a month without a great deal of difficulty (barring the first few days), I'm definitely going back to a couple squares of chocolate a day. Just for my mental health.

4. I'm not opposed to adding in "safe starches" (rice and potatoes) when necessary, especially if I feel like my glycogen is getting depleted. But being on the Whole30 made me more conscious of where I use these as filler, and what I can use as alternatives (like cauliflower for dishes with sauces).

All in all, I think the Whole30 is a worthwhile thing to do. It makes you rethink your approach to food and to try new meals. I used a lot of new recipes, and the ones that I liked will get included in my regular repertoire. It's a great way to reset yourself and to find out which parts of your diet are working for you and which are not. I'm not enough of a Paleo Purist to eat like this all the time, but it's a useful tool in finding the optimal diet for each of us.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 21: Testing, Testing... 1...2..3.. Testing...

Yesterday I did an "FTP" test on the bike. Technically, that stands for Functional Power Threshold. But in reality it's more like Fallingdown Tired and Puking, which is how you feel when it's done. Basically, 40 minutes of hell on a bike trainer.

But the good news is that on October 31, my average power output for the test was 178 watts, and yesterday it was 208 watts, which means I'm pushing more power on the bike, and hopefully getting ready to kick some ass on the hills of Coeur d'Alene come June.

Tomorrow I'll hit the running track for the equally un-fun 5k running test and we will see what that holds. My start of the season test was 27:12, and in December I did 25:59, so I'm hoping that trend will continue downwards as well.

I also did my first 1000 yard swim test since breaking my arm, clocking in at 13:54, for a 1:23/100 yard average pace. Not as fast as before the injury last summer, but not as slow as I feared either.

All things considered, as I head into the last 20 weeks of training, things look pretty good. I've never been someone who has looked too much at numbers - heart rate, pace, watts, etc. but now I kind of wish I had some numbers from previous years to see where I'm at. Mostly because with my injuries in the last few years, I have no idea if I'm just barely getting back to previous levels of fitness, or if I'm truly in good form. Just going by feel, it seems pretty good. I guess the proof will be in the pudding.

Getting It Done

There's a run scheduled for the day: 65 minutes. Two half-mile repeats. Two one mile repeats. All at 5k pace. That's gonna suck, I know this much ahead of time. Yep, on some tired legs with hours of work on them already this week, a 5k pace is going to be no fun to hold. Then I look out my window: pouring rain. Dumping rain, buckets of rain. As it turns out, more rain than has ever fallen from the sky on that particular calendar day in recorded history.

But I didn't know that when I first looked out of my window. No, at that point I thought it might stop. But it didn't. And didn't. And didn't. How much #@!$%! water can fall from the sky? Eventually, it was either get out there in it or not run at all.

So this is really where the rubber (on the bottom of my Vibram Five Finger shoes) meets the road. How many times do people say things like "You're so lucky, you stay in great shape."


Lucky? LUCKY? No. I don't even want to be out here running on a day like this. There's no stinking luck involved. It's just putting in the hard work when you have to, and looking forward to race day, when the payoff will be... wait for it... more suffering! Lunatic thing to do, this Ironman stuff.

So here's my little corner of Hell on Earth today, but I got 'er done.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 22: Notes from the Pain Cave

It's not the winter of my discontent, but it may well be the Winter of Discomfort down here in the Pain Cave, otherwise known as the "exercise room". This is where the hard miles have to occur when you're training for an early season Ironman and the winter storms are blowing outside.

Sometimes my daughter captures me and forces me to watch horse movies with her while I'm riding the trainer. She's twelve, and she loves horses the as only a twelve-year-old girl can. It may be true that women never love anything more in life than they love horses when they're twelve. And while I had my share of horse-loving years (including summers at horse camp on Grayback mountain), I have to admit that one can only watch so many horse movies as an adult, since they all seem to be variations on the theme of: Young kid's messed up life is saved by horse who no one thought could (be tamed, win the race, be the best in show, pick one).

Sometimes instead, I watch my Sufferfest videos and suffer, comforting myself with the notion that I'm getting faster. Some times I watch movies in Spanish with subtitles so that my son can keep up his language learning. Sometimes I just go batshit crazy. Occasionally I escape to the triathlon store with their Computrainer setup and suffer there instead, in the company of fellow sufferees.

The Pain Cave is so very very un-fun that by comparison, running outside in the hideous winter weather seems almost joyful. Yesterday's run saw me pelted by rain, sleet, snow, and hail, while being buffeted by wind gusts up to 40 mph according to the weather reports, yet it seemed a bit of a lark when compared to the anticipation of yet another trainer ride. The rivers around here are in full flood, and in places the bike and running paths have been buried under swift-flowing waters over the banks. At least the flooded forests make for some interesting scenery to off-set the drenching rain.

The silver lining on all of these clouds is that my times are still getting faster. My run is returning, if not to an exactly speedy state, at least to my previous version of what passes for speed. And my biking legs are getting there too. So when the sunshine finally burns through and the spring weather arrives, I plan to exit my pain cave like a hungry bear from hibernation, ready to eat up the road.

Countdown to Ironman, Weeks 24 & 23: Where's the Magic?

I think when you do something as monumentally difficult as training for an Ironman, you should suddenly, magically look really buff and tough. You would imagine that with this much bodily effort, this many muscle contractions, this many calories burnt, this many miles, you would come out the other side looking like a cross between a fitness model and a Greek goddess, right? But the truth is, if you watch the finish line of an Ironman, you'll pretty much see that apart from the pros and the genetically blessed, most of us crossing it still look like mere mortals. It's enough to make even Aphrodite pull her hair in frustration.

In the middle of a training cycle, you often don't even feel very energetic. You don't benefit from this busload of training because you're too busy being exhausted from actually doing it. The idea of course, is that once you taper the training off, you'll suddenly have this incredible fitness level. But from inside the Thunderdome of Pain (also known as the basement where the bike trainer resides), it doesn't always feel like it's there. I mean, what's the point of being an exceptionally fit person when you have to stop in the middle of climbing a flight of stairs because your quads are screaming for mercy from yesterday's track workout?

At this point, in the Heart of the Training Darkness, you just have to trust in the process and know that you'll come out the other side with an incredible engine-  that after the fatigue of the race wears off, you'll be able to do anything you want to with ease. I remember that the year after my last Ironman, I set all kinds of PRs at shorter distances, just because I had this huge base of training that I was building on. I know it will feel like that this summer when the Ironman is done and I no longer have to train as long, but I can enjoy the results of all the work I'm doing right now.

I have to tell myself these things on a day like today: a day where it's cold and it's sleeting and I have to drag myself off of my warm couch and away from my cup of tea to go brave the elements and get my run workout done. It will all be worth it when I cross the finish line, and all the adversity I face today only makes me stronger.

Blah, said Toad

Frog and Toad was one of my favorite books as a child, and then again as a book to read to my own kids. There are so few books for small children that don't want to make me scream internally when reading them to my kids (Bite me, "I Love You Forever").  But Frog and Toad is different. I think every state of life can be summed up by one Frog and Toad story or another. When I'm feeling down in the dumps in the middle of winter, I think of the story where Toad is at home hibernating under the covers and Frog keeps trying to wake him up. Toad just says "Blah". That's how my January has gone so far.

I don't know if it's the short daylight hours, the fact that our "holiday" was filled with activity and house guests, the walls of the house closing in on me, or some other random thing, but I've felt just Blah these past couple of weeks. I have to say, it gives me a lot of empathy for people who struggle with depression on an ongoing basis. It's really not fun.

Luckily, my workouts have not been suffering, I've been "gettin her done" as they say. Punching the clock, putting in the miles. Not really enjoying a lot of it, but doing it anyways. When it's cold or windy or rainy, it would be easier to pull a Toad and just pull those covers back over my head.

Couple the "Blahs" with the usual anxiety of the Robotics season - will our team get their act together, can I help them make it through the season, is there something I'm forgetting that will cause them a setback? and you also get a recipe for insomnia. Which I'm sure doesn't help the blahs. There's nothing like that feeling of staring at the ceiling at 3:00 am with a million things running through your head to really make your next day unproductive.

So what can I say that's useful out of all of this? Maybe that when you're feeling like this, it's more important than ever to have routines in place. Routines that you set down in good times, in easy times, can carry you through the hard times. If you're already grocery shopping for healthy food on a weekly basis, then it's not that hard to just keep doing it. If you're already exercising, getting to bed at a decent hour, and taking care of yourself, then at least if you just keep on keeping on, you can make it through. If you don't have those routines in place and you fall into a dark time, it's very hard to start doing something good for yourself at that point.

So here I am, Toad-like, blinking at the light and plodding on with life. I know I'll make it through. I know in another couple of months when the weather is warmer and the schedule is easier, I'll be okay again. Just wake me when it's spring.

Countdown to Ironman, Week 25: Halfway There

It's really scaring me, but I started this whole countdown thing and now I'm more than halfway through the 52 weeks. Why do I have the sneaking suspicion that the final 25 will go by faster than the first 27?? Hah, because they will and before I know it the Ironman will be bearing down on me like a scary train full of trolls. With big clubs. Who are going to beat me senseless. Well, that's how the training will feel anyways, I remember that much from last time.

So, it's Halfway Point Assessment time. Considering that when I started The Countdown, I was busy recovering from a broken arm and not doing much of anything, I think I'm in a better place now. That's good. In fact, I'm feeling pretty darned okay about my training. I have not been shirking my bike workouts through the dark and rainy months like I usually do, getting religiously onto the trainer four times a week. I've been maintaining my swim through 2x a week technique and light intervals, although I did swim a record-breaking four times in the last four days! That's vacation for you though. And my running, while not quite back in tip-top form is closing in on it.

And as for the so-called "fourth discipline": nutrition? I'm tackling that next, re-booting my good eating habits with the same "Whole30" Paleo program I did last year, one whole month of very strict paleo eating to bump me out of my sugary holiday bliss, which come to think of it really wasn't very sugary this year. It seems like my year of living Paleo-ish has successfully removed many of my bad eating habits, and I've felt really great this year. The holidays didn't even offer up too many temptations, although I confess that after this mornings New Year's Masters swim of 112 x 50 on the :45 interval, I did eat two of the awesome cinnamon rolls that one of our members brings. I think I've only had gluten a couple of times this year, but I have to say those cinnamon rolls were worth it. Nom nom.

So here I go, launching into the back half of The Countdown with vigor and high spirits. Happy New Year and I hope your fitness journey this year takes you to where you want to be.