Police half no show!!

Hey there,

It's time for another update. The training is going ok, or at least it was. Lately I've gotten a sore throat and have been weak at times since the weekend so I know my body is trying to tell me somthing. Time for a break??? I would have to disagree, but hey, sometimes your body knows best. Sorry I didn't show at the Police half, some of you may be wondering why. I didn't feel particularly happy about racing since the temp is so low. My asthma makes it particularly difficult to run hard. My running still isn't there so to say I was unmotivated going into the weekend would put it mildly. Then when I woke sunday morning I had a sore throat, so that settled it, I'm a no show. I hope the rest of you did well.

I did a couple rides already with the tues/thurs IG crew. They were good, really hard though. The first was a hills night in tuscany(Calgary) with a short hill that we did just before IMC last year. I at first figured that Greg would take it easy on us since it was our first outdoor hill ride, I was dead wrong. I think I managed 8 repeats alternating hard/easy (if there is such a thing as a easy hill). At one point I remember doing a hill with Greg on my tail watching my technique. At the top he gave me a few pointers then he has the nerve to ask if that was a hard or easy one???? I'm like, you couldn't tell??? What can I say obviously I have lots more work to do to be able to climb like him. I will try to push him though mark my words, if I have to TT it down the hill to get a head start on the next one I'll do it. hee hee

The second was last week ummm somtime before the cold crappy weather came back. Greg wasn't there actually so he phoned Leslie and gave us the workout by phone. It was pace lining with some tempo, again I thought hmmm doesn't sound too tough. I was wrong again, Chris immediatly takes off head down TT into the wind all the way to Cochrane. I thought we'd be pace lining, riding "together" but I was wrong. So Trevor and I hook up and make it our goal to catch him. I don't know about Trevor, but I had to work my ass off just to keep up. We took turns evenly pulling and slowly slowwwwwwwwwly we pulled Chris back. We tried to get the rotation going, but Chris would have none of it and took off on his own again just before we got to Cochrane. Trevor dropped back and I stayed just with in reach till we stopped at the top of the Cochrane hill, man was I ever wiped, so much for aerobic, hee hee. But what a way to break in the outdoor season, too bad I'm sittin in doors now.

So with the crappy weekend, trying to taper a bit for the Police half, then getting the sore throat I haven't really done much for 4 days now. Oh well I think I am dodging most of the cold by taking vitamins, plenty of rest, and of course garlic pills. I should be ready to go by wednesday for sure. Looking forward to this weekend. the forecast looks like +14 for the long ride, it should be good to get out there again and letter rip. Cheers all,

DP

Hallo!!

Hey bloggers/Creepers

The weather has been a lil cooler this week again, even involving some snow eh. I think I still did all my runs outside, but I've had to put the bike back on the trainer. Last weekend I was able to get out for my long ride. It wasn't that long perhaps 2:15, but it was nice to roll into Bragg creek again. I visited that lil town a lot last year on the way to either Elbow falls or Millarville. I think I convinced Leslie and Chad to go with me this weekend, maybe we can make it all the way to elbow falls. Although I think that'll probably be more then 3 hours. Wednesday is always the tough running day. I did 75 min with 4x5min, my legs are aching today from the effort. We also had a pretty good swim later that evening, so good we actually got kicked out of the pool and had no time to soak in the hot-tub grrrrrrrrrrrrr. Oh well I think it was around 2500m in 1:10? Short stuff too, somthing like 5x100(pull on the evens) 20 secs rest, 4x25 hard on 1 min, 4x100(50 ez 50 build)15 secs rest, 4x25 hard on 1 min, 3x100(25ez,25build,25mod,25hard) 10 secs rest, 4x25 hard on 1 min, 2x100 pull 5 secs rest, 4x25 hard on 1 min, 1x100 hard. So as you can tell the key was trying to recover on the 100s, lots of rest on the 25s to go fast. Good workout Greg. Today should be fine for another out door ride, I hope. I might join a easy running group here at work, they have started running wed. at noon. I don't think they do much more then like 20 min so I should be able to just add it on to the schedule. The police half is comin up not this coming weekend but the weekend after. I still don't feel like doing it, but who knows I will treat it like a workout and not care about the time. I'll be faster then 1:45, slower then 1:30 that's the only prediction I'm making. Put it this way, I'll get further then last year which was maybe 100 metres? /knockingonwood Who's looking forward to the May long camp???? I AM!!! Here's to riding till I drop, picking myself up and riding more. I'll be packing the polysporin(no pardon on the pun). Here's a picture of me at Bragg creek this weekend, if I didn't have the head covering on you'd see my new buzz cut, woooooahhhh. Cheers,

DP

Interesting Dream

Hey,

Ok so I had this dream on friday night. I'm sure more of you have had this dream where you get to the start line, about to hear the gun, you look down and low and behold you forget your shoes. Or you forget somthing else major just before the gun. Oh well this one had a bit of a twist to it so I thought I'd share.

Ok so I was being dropped off at the start area ready to do my Ironman. I'm not sure the location or even who dropped me off. I assume it was a friend or family member, I don't think it was Lisa, but not sure. Anyways I got my wetsuit on and went into the water to do my warmup. I had plenty of time, nothing would go wrong right?? WRONG!! Anyways I decided to swim a bit out and follow the shore line. As I was swimming along I noticed the wind pick up. Ohhhh I look out and see some big rollers way out on the swim course. They may have been 3-4 ft rollers already. Yikes, starting to get worried. By that point I was a little ways out but I could see the bottom of the lake. There was a pier near by to break up the waves as they came in to shore. The lake was a lot bigger then lake okanagan, other then that everything appeared like Penticton. Oh well I look down and suddenly see this huge shadow down on the bottom. Could it be ogopogo??? Nooooo it was a monster shark!!! Hammer head and 12 ft long. I wasn't freaking out yet as he probably saw me long before and was still on the bottom. Anyways I decided not to risk it and shinnied myself up on the fence/pier thing. A bunch of other swimmers were getting close and I yelled at them to get away, SHARK!!! So as I sit up there safe I look down and see that the shark really had no interest in the swimmers, he was clearly feeding on schools of fish down there on the bottom. So I decide I can't sit there forever and can't really call for a boat, it was windy only swimmers near by could hear me. I'm not exactly sure how I got back on shore, pretty sure I swam since the shark didn't seem interested in human meat. So I get back to the start and this is where we slip into the familiar dream. We're in the water, gun about to go off and I think to myself OMG my bike or none of my transition stuff is set up yet!!! So I think delayed them, yelled at the starter to hold off a bit and I run around trying to find the people that dropped me off. I get the race director/officials to even call for them over the loud speaker to find out where they're at. I had none of my stuff there, not even my bike. Oh well I think they promised to set up my stuff and that I should just go swim, and that's where I woke up. I told lisa my dream just so I'd remember it. That's it, that's my dream, so you can bet I'll be lookin for mr. hammerhead come Aug. 30th. Maybe it'll help me swim faster???

I had a pretty good weekend of workouts. Friday I did my long run well not very long 90 minutes which I ran at the talisman. I was planning on swimming after, but I went there early and there were no lanes open at that time so I just went home. Yesterday I did 2.5 hours on the bike and followed it up with a pretty hard transition run. I did my usual pond loop which normally takes me 27:40, with a little less slush and pushing a lil harder I managed 26:30 yesteray. wooo that felt good. Today I've already gone and done a hill workout, ran to the biggest hill near by and did 8 hills 1.5 min in length. Not quite the 2-3 min that I was supposed to do but I did the whole hill in 1.5 min and the last grade was so steep I had to run on my toes. Not an easy hill to run. 2-3 min on the treadmill would have been way easier, I also ran most of the way down since walking it would take too long. Doesn't sound hard, but trust me it hurt. My total run including the run home was 1:12. Off to the pool later to swim with Chad and Leslie. Greg is sick, poor guy he's had a run of bad luck lately. :( Oh well that's all for now, TTYL,

DP

It's on!!!

The food challenge again this month. No pop, fast food, beer, chips, chocolate for the month of april. A guy I work with was talkin about doing that this month. I've already failed in a way cause I had some chips and chocolate yesterday, but from this day forward. NONE, I promise. I can even tack on a couple days to make up for April 1st.