The Aliens did it..

Well, I should have known the aliens were coming to harrass me at this race when we witnessed the "UFO" parade last nite after dinner.. yep, right down Main Street for the UFO convention in Roswell. I think some got confused though cause they had Star Wars themed "floats" Kind of funny actually. They were having a good time it seemed..

Gosh I felt so good this morning. We got to sleep in as the race did not start until 8:30! I started my 400 meter swim in "Bottomless lake Triathlon"- I am not sure why it is called Bottomless-maybe there is no bottom? Or maybe cause you cannot see the bottom? I made the huge leap to no wetsuit since it was such a short race. The temp was around 72 degrees. Felt refreshing-I think I had a good swim split-sub 10 min. I was on a roll! We had practiced transitions Friday with the old leave my shoes on the bike and jump on method several times so I was ready. T-1-got the helmet & sunglasses on at lightening speed. I was so happy and such a fast transition-damn I am good! When I got to the bike mount line I looked down to jump on the bike and WHAT? No shoes??...I was confused for a second then I realized- I had grabbed my HUSBAND"S bike!! (he was next to me in transition) Well, after all it is a Specialized like mine, it has 2 wheels-DUH! So what if it has a completely different seat post, is taller than mine-geez! That was probably the stupidest thing I have ever done at a race. So I run back, wasting all my not wearing a wetsuit time, and got my own bike. I saw confused looks by my friends as I am running back to T-1. Like what the hell? OK, I got past that..The bike was a very short 8 miles with one pretty steep hill out of transition but then it was just rolling hills. The road pavement sucked-very bumpy. I passed a few, got passed a few times. I am coming in for my leap off the bike. I take my first foot out of the bike shoes and somehow my other shoe comes out..then I am staring at dirt instead of pavement. I know I am going down so I steer more into the dirt so as not to hurt as bad from the fall. Oh damn!! Someone asks me if I am OK. I get up, dust myself off and then the chain is off the ring of course so there another 2 min. wasted.Now I am just plain pissed!! You know that little girl-I am not getting my way- angry! Like I wanted to stomp my feet. I get into T-2, grab my hat, put on shoes and of course start running the wrong way out of transition. As I got on the right path, I notice it is hot. Not just a little hot but scorching hot! Now, I am passed by a woman who is in my AG (she got 1st, I got 2nd). I am really mad! So I do what every good athlete does under pressure when they are tired and have had these calamities. I gave up..I mean in my mind I said f#^$#k it! I don't care anymore..I give up..I start to walk a bit on this very long 4k course. I walk the aid stations,. My husband passes me. I am pissed. Another team member passes me..Again-happy for her-but i am still angry. I feel like crying..Gee do you think I am dramatic enough? I finish around 1:10 or so, I don't stop to talk to anyone and I run and jump in the lake. That helped..Then it suddenly occurred to me that I should be thankful I can do triathlons at all. I am lucky I can walk, that I have my health, that I am even alive. So gratitude pulled me out of my sh^%&thole and pity party. I went on to celebrate lots of Outlaws getting awards today. My husband got 1st in his AG, I got 2nd. Then another big breakfast and pancakes at IHOP-YUM!! I have battle scars on my cheek which got me some well deserved sympathy. A little hard to swallow my pride when they ask-"which part of the hill did you fall on" And I gulped and said-"No hill, just going into transition-you know the flat part."
Moral to story: Don't do 3 races in a row when the first one is Buffalo Springs Half Ironman..
Lesson to me: I need to figure out why I keep sabotaging myself unconsciously in these short races when I could win..

Back in the saddle again...

yes-i did my 1.5 hour Wednesday workout today. I went with my neighbor Kathy, who is 10 years older than I am and kicks my butt in most events but i can pretty much stay with her on her recovery bike rides. My legs are still sore so hopefully didn't overdue it. My hubby and I are off to Balance One Club this afternoon to practice transitions since that can make or break you in a short distance tri as the one in Bottomless Lake is. Oh, and I can't wait to see all the alien activity down there since this is Roswell's UFO weekend. Now that should be for good people watching! I imagine this race to be HOT since it starts at 8:30 but I will go that much faster to get out of the heat! It is the club championships and so go New Mexico Outlaws!! So much fun to be on a team really-makes it much more enjoyable to see familiar faces each time we race..I was in such a slump last year, I hardly raced at all, didn't feel like training or doing anything. What a different feeling this year!

Independence Day!

(For starters-dog Mocha has started another life. She is fine-just has "colitis" from stress. Now what kind of stress can a dog who sleeps 23 hours a day, eats, takes walks and receives love all the time have? )

Well, here it is July 4th. I am suppose to do a 1.5 hour bike ride this AM and the wind is howling. My legs are really hurting finally. We did a speed workout yesterday on the track, short weight workout, then a swim. i am beat! These are the days it is hard to know when to push, when to take a day off. My inclination is the latter because we are doing Bottomless Triathlon on Sunday-short race-but I do want fairly fresh legs. We are taking 5 days off of training in about 10 days when we scoot off to California. Well, i would swim but the waters of Long beach look scary! There are always some kind of bacteria in them!

So I need to decide before it gets too hot here what I am doing. We have the barbecue thing later with the fam..Shall I listen to my body or push through it?

Why do we love animals so much?

12 years ago, we lost a dog that got hit by a car. We had only had her a year. That was so traumatic. As a result one of my kids, Heather & I went to the Humane Association right away and found the cutest dog ever-Mocha. The woman who was showing us around said, "Oh, and this is her sister" pointing to a black dog huddled in the corner in the kennel next Mocha's. Oh god, how can we NOT adopt this one too? Heather & I decided we could not split these 2 up-I mean what kind of person would split up siblings? So we went and adopted both of them but they had to get fixed so we didn't bring them home that day. I got home and told Hartley we adopted 2 dogs-sisters! he flipped out-"No I won't have TWO dogs, ever!" So Heather & I schemed and she went with him to the shelter to pick out which dog we wanted. Well, Heather turned on her Heather charm and guess what? They brought home 2 dogs (Hartley muttering something about not being able to choose). We have had these dogs since they were puppies. (Yes that is pee stain on our carpet-they loved to do that-we did not love that).

So these dogs have gone through raising 4 teenage daughters (well i think the 2 older ones were gone by now), 2 houses, building of one cabin and many, many trips to Chama. We thought we lost them once when a bottle of Tylenol was found empty on the floor and we thought it had been full. They were puppies and of course eating everything-they even ate holes in the wall in picture above. The Tylenol scare ended up to be nothing or they never reacted I guess. They once ate a whole bag of chocolate Halloween candy. Now there was some serious diarrhea after that. We think the neighbor was poisoning our dogs because Midnite became really sick and almost died in our last house. She was on steroids for years for the autoimmune disorder she supposedly had but funny how she could get off of the meds after we moved (I hated that neighbor). The steroids made her one crazy hungry dog. She once ate a hundred dollar bill, 2 tickets to the biggest basketball Lobo game ever, and loved tissues and papers. Once we moved into this house things calmed down a bit.Mocha and Midnite were now inside dogs! They loved it. We kept them in the kitchen at night, they hung out with us all the time. By this time of course they were very attached to Hartley, whom they followed everywhere. He, of course grew to love both our puppies over the years and they are "his dogs". So the last 6 years we have been in this house and kids are gone, they are really like our children. just enough a pain in the ass that you wonder why you have them, then as loving as can be and you cannot imagine life without these pets..

Imagine how difficult it was in September when the vet finally said it was time to let Midnite go. She had a tumor in her head, we had her to the vet many times, all kinds of meds. They are now considered geriatric dogs and each day a gift. I can't tell you how hard it was to see Midnite in the vet's office fully awake, about to go to doggy heaven. Her last act was to come over to me and bury her head in my lap. Kind of like saying-oh I am not sure I am ready. Or maybe saying goodbye. Hartley, Heather & I were there. We watched her go to sleep, painlessly and it was the hardest day i think I have ever had, except maybe when my mom died. Hartley and I can still barely talk about her. We took her to the cabin her last weekend on the planet. We knew it was time when she could no longer run and chase animals in the woods. Here is our sweet, neurotic Midnite with Hartley that last weekend.

Sometimes I can feel her in the house still. Of course Mocha was a bit confused after Midnite was gone. She couldn't understand why she was able to eat her food, un-harrassed. Midnite was the dominate dog and now Mocha had the whole space to herself. She didn't know what to do! She really didn't seem to skip a beat until she got out of the kitchen one day and tore down a bunch of our wooden blinds-this from a dog that has never had an act of aggression in her life (except toward other dogs). An expensive acting out for Mocha and us. i must admit, it was a bit of relief to finally have daily walks where Mocha did not go after other dogs, they did not fight with each other anymore (that got to be a problem later in life). So there really are positives in having just one dog. But we miss that black part lab,part chow dog.

Here is Mocha-the remaining canine in the family:

Mocha is now 12 years old. She is not eating these past few days, has some blood in her stool. She is still very excited to go for walks-that is a good sign. We are taking her to the vet tomorrow-dreading the worst but hoping it is a passing thing. Hartley and I can't stand the thought of putting another dog down right now, our last "child". But we know it is inevitable someday soon-we just are not ready yet. Are we ever ready to say goodbye to our pets-those furry animals whose only goal in life is to comfort you, protect you and serve you? I think not.

I found the hardest triathlon in New Mexico...

It is called "Grady Williams Freedom Days triathlon"in Farmington (Olympic Distance) and it was held yesterday. WOW! I knew it was going to be difficult but holy cow! The swim was fine-a big triangle around Lake Farmington, a pretty nice lake-68 degrees-comfortable. i figured out the easiest way to get my wetsuit arms out-do it before I get out of the water. 100 times easier. There were two transition areas, which were a pain in the ass so T-1 was get your feet dry, get your running socks and shoes on, put sunscreen on, stuff all your stuff in a big plastic bag with your number on it so they could transfer it back to T-2. Off on the run. it was a trail run, lots of ups and downs, I walked the "ups" and ran fast down. I felt pretty good, ate a couple of goos. there were 2 water stations with warm water. Thank goodness I had that frozen water bottle i carried with me but filled it at each water station. The trail was pretty well marked, but I can see how you could get lost (Hartley did). It started getting hotter.. .Got back to T-2 in good shape, transition smooth, then off on the bike. I felt great for the first few miles, then there was glass on the shoulder-I saw it, tried to swerve around it. I passed a woman in my AG on a mountain bike..Felt really good. Then the inevitable-I got a flat-on the BACK tire of course. I actually changed it in record time-about 10 min., but didn't get enough air in i think. The next 10 miles were straight up, straight down hills. I mean there were no flat area at all. I still felt OK, trying to catch the mountain bike woman, who passed me along with many others when I was fixing the flat. At the turn around, there was the only water station (there was suppose to be 3 on the bike). I ran out of water after that, only had the concoction in my aerobottle of carbo-pro, accelerade and sustained energy. Also had shot blocks. Anyways, I started to feel nauseated from the turn-around. Oh and now we had a pretty good head wind. The bike continued to be straight up and then straight down, only this time was more ups than downs. At one point I got of my bike and walked about 50 yards. then noticed my tire wasn't completely pumped up so put more air in-that helped. Oh and by this time the temperature was starting to soar-I think it hit high 90s yesterday. i felt like my skin was burning off. I just kept plugging away. Figured I had done BSLT last week so no pressure. By about mile 21 my heart was racing & the nausea was bad so I told myself to just finish this thing. Of course some woman who appeared to be in my AG (she wasn't) out of the blue just passed me. I tried to keep up but couldn't. Finished in around 3:38 I think. Don't know my splits yet. If it weren't for the tire thing, I would have beat the woman on the mountain bike and gotten 3rd. That really pissed me off more than anything-a woman on a friggin mountain bike beat me! Anyway, I kind of collapsed at the end. Angel Outlaw Amy gave me water and a power bar, Miguel poured water on me. I felt much better then. Wondered where Hartley went-he got lost on the bike too. He ended up doing about 29 miles on the bike and 7.5 on the run. Still got second in his AG. The best part of the race was having lunch/breakfast with some Outlaws after the race at IHOP. Man those pancakes were good!!

Hey I feel proud that I finished. This is one I may not do a week after a Half IM again!
I am sore today!