Medved Winter Adventure Challenge race report

A few weekends ago I had the privilege of racing alongside my good friend Tim Howland for the 4th annual Medved Winter Adventure Race Challenge.  We'd raced it together in 2010 and I have a race report up from that year HERE.  This year was going to be a little bit different as there was hardly any snow (just a light dusting) and there was the addition of a 5k "snowshoe" race before that was factoring into your final score and time from the adventure race. 

Our good friends Laura and Ian Webber were the brain children behind this race from day one and they've had the great fortune of working alongside the folks at Medved Running and Walking and Goose Adventure Racing in an effort to make sure things run smoothly. I've always enjoyed the Goose races and it helps when you're friends with the Race Directors.  The race is loads of fun and the twist of the 5k prior this year was fantastic as well as it drew some folks in that weren't doing the AR and you had to pace yourself accordingly. 

The morning of, I met Tim in Webster Park and we both suited up for the 5k which started 45 minutes prior to the official start of the AR.  We got the bikes situated and were ready to roll.  I was stoked to see if we could win ourselves some sweet swag as this race NEVER dissappoints.  This year would be no different, but I digress.  let's get back to the start.

The 5k went off and there were two high school kids that immediately took off like a shot.  I was leery of chasing them down as I've been neglecting my running lately, but I know I can thro down a fast 5k if needed.  About a half mile in, I was able to pass them both while going uphill and I took the lead.  I was a little scared and thought twice about slowing, letting them re-pass me and saving myself for the AR.  But, what was rolling around in the back of my head was the fact that we needed to put as much time into the following teams in the AR as there was a slight time bonus for our finish.

I took a nasty spill in Webster Park somewhere in the singletrack and came down on my left knee pretty good when my feet slid out from underneath me on some ice.  I bounced right back up, but I think I brused my bones pretty good on that fall as my knee is still tender to the touch at the spot I came down on.  No worries, the pain was totally worth it when I hit the line in first and realized we had a 90 second advantage on what we thought would be our biggest rivals in the AR.  The icing on the cake was that I won a free pair of shoes by winning the 5k and I was in dire need of some new training shoes (the ones I was running in had 550+miles on them!!! Results for the 5k are found HERE.

Regardless, I went back and cheered everyone on.   Tim trotted in and I was glad to see he was saving himself for the AR.  We got our bikes ready, heard the instructions for the mandatory meeting and were off to grab the maps.  Things were pretty quick and we made a good decision to get the team challenge out of the way in the adventure race early.  This year was a two part-er and the first was to erect a tent and get in it, out of two hiking poles, some ropes and a tarp and tent stakes.  Easy.  Here is a shot of my buddies Doug and Ricky in their tent (their first adventure race too)

The next part of the team challenge was to build a fire big enough to burn a rope in half.  My teammate Tim took the knife and flint and we quickly picked up some kindling and he got to work trying to get some sparks to fly.  After watching him try to succeed to no avail (it was like trying to watch a midget hump a door knob - Dodgeball reference) I grabbed the knife from him, flung it open and showered the kindling with sparks.  (I'm an Eagle Scout after all) Tim quickly remembered the cotton ball in the map and directions (after he tried to rip one of the maps and wad it up as ignition) and our rope was the first one off. 

We then headed out on the bikes and were blazing thru the course.  This year was a little more laid out than in years past and unfortunately we were back and forth on the same road a few times, but it's understood as some of the other roads in Webster might not have been the safest to travel on via bike. 

Long story short (too late) Tim and I trotted back in to the cabin for some eats with his 4th and my 2nd consecutive Winter Challenge Adventure Race titles under our belt.  The race was a blast and we had a little difficulty with some of the checkpoints, but ended up finding them no problems.  We waited for the awards and came away with some sweet North Face duffel bags that had the race logo on them and are freaking bomb proof. They are fantastic.  I actually used them at the Cast-a-shadow 6 hour relay the following weekend and it worked great.

All in all, a great race with great friends.  Thanks to Brian M. for letting me borrow a mountain bike named Hambone for the 2nd year now and allowing me to be able to hit up another W with Tim.  Good times.  Cheers.

Winter life recap

There's been a whole lot going on in the wonderful world of "Keep Moving Forward" that have kept me busy and away from a computer long enough to not post any updates.  But alas, as it is a rest week again, I'm back at it, letting the world (or rather my two readers - HI Tim!) know what's been going on.
So, as I shot out in the last post, I was chosen to be a member of the Powerbar Team Elite for the 2012-2013 multisport season.  I'm floored to have been chosen for this team and stoked to represent such a great company (and of course get some delicious product) and I'm not kidding when I say I use it daily.  Below is a shot from a trainer ride a few weekends ago.  That wasn't all I ate...

But on the other front's in my life (and to stray away from all things multisport for a minute, this year has been crazy busy!  Kim and I moved in together a few weeks ago and that's been going really well.  We have gotten settled a bit and are finally figuring out where all the light switches are and in what drawers and cupboards our most used items are located.  All in all, it's been fantastic as I get to see her MUCH more often than I did when we lived separately.

One of the cool things about the new place is that we now have a spare bedroom that has been converted into what we have dubbed as the "training room" and it houses our two bikes which live permanently on the trainers during this time of year and also a bike tree with 2 spare bikes on it (my TANK and her mtn bike) along with a bed and also a flatscreen TV that's mounted waist high.  Why waist high?  Because it's the perfect height when you're tucked down in aero of course!  And if you watch as much TV on your bike as us, then it's absolutely perfect!

In regards to training, I've been staying busy, hitting about 20 hours a week average for this last block and taking the opportunity of the off-season to work on my weakness which is bike durability and bike strength.  I've started a weight lifting routine aimed to increase leg strength to increase the power that I can apply to the pedals.  I did a test earlier in the year that found out that I'm a weak cyclist and the leg strength needs to be increased. (bike strength=bike speed and increased power)

But on the other side of the coin, I've also been running a lot less (think 3x30mins a week) and POUNDING out the bike miles.  I'm feeling stronger and even though we moved apartments the last rest week that I had (thereby negating any rest that I would likely get that week) I'm hoping that after this rest period and next block, I will see some big gains on the bike.  I've done some racing and have a season planned out so far around some big things happening in 2012 (Grand Canyon hiking trip, our wedding, honeymoon in Costa Rica, Great Range traverse) so things are looking up. 

I'll shoot up a race report shortly for the winter adventure race my buddy Tim and I did, but until then friends, feet up and take that recovering seriously!  Cheers.

Great News....

I'm shocked to have been chosen, but still uber proud to announce that I will be representing PowerBar Team elite for 2012 thru 2013 seasons! Can't have been aligned with a better company and product that I use on a daily basis.  So excited!

2011 by the numbers

It's pretty silly, but anyone that truly knows me, understands how overtly anal I am about my training logs and numbers.  I try to throw a post like this up shortly after the new year to document what type of training I've done in the year prior. 

2011 was a little bit different.  I was able to do two Ironman races and countless other races and my season totals might be a tad higher because of such.  But without further adieu, here are the totals for my 2011 multisport year:

2011 totals:
Swimming - 260 miles of swimming for a total of 141 hours
Cycling - 6,852 miles of cycling for a total of 389 hours
Running - 1,571 miles of running for a total of 193 hours
Core (situp and push up routine) for a total of 16 hours
And all that comes together for a grand total of 741 hours of working out and racing in 2011.

Not too shabby if you compare them against my 2010 totals (remember that I didn't race an Ironman event in 2010, but was able to do a lot more running races)

2010 totals:
Swimming – 214 miles of swimming for a total of 113 hours
Cycling – 3,506 miles of cycling for a total of 183 hours
Running – 1,457 miles of running for a total of 172.5 hours
Core (sit-ups and push-ups) 19 hours
And that all comes together for a grand total of 487 hours of working out and racing in 2010

Overall it was kind of stepping to a new level.  I'm getting used to doing at least 700 hours of work a season and it looks like in 2011 an average week was about 14-15 hours of working out.  I maxed out just shy of 27 total hours of working out in a single week and that was pretty exciting.  I feel like year over year if I keep this up, big things are ahead. 

Here's looking toward the future.  Get out there and train friends, now is the time to put in the work.  I know I will be.  Cheers.

2011 Urine Review (Year-In-Review...)

I've tried to do one of these posts at the end of every year just to see if I've learned anything and to sum up what's happened in the past year.  Most folks that remember last years post for 2010, will recall that I had a pretty bang up year in 2010 and I wanted to capitalize on that in 2011.

As far as racing went, I had a very productive year.  The season started off like normal with a few choice snowshoe races in the mix and then I raced as part of a team once more for the uber fun Cast-a-shadow 6 hour snowshoe relay where I was able to pull off the anchor leg in blazing speed and propel us to a 2nd place overall finish (behind the crazy speedsters from Brighton).  January capped off with a dip in the pool to test my meddle in the one hour postal and was able to somehow bury myself to get to 4,800 yards!!! (best time yet! and 1:15/100yd SCY if anyone was wondering)  I missed my goal of hitting top ten in my age group nationally, but I was pretty close at 15th.

Spring time came and I was hitting the roads and trails once more and running well.  First up is the milestone test of the Spring Forward 15k in Mendon.  That is the yearly measuring stick of my base fitness and I had a decent race there (nothing too fast, nothing too pedestrian)  The real kicker of the running year came in spring though when someone put a bug in my ear and told me I might be able to do pretty well in this years Muddy Sneaker 20k trail race in Rochester.  This is a prestigious race in the Rochester Running Community and is so sought after that they hold a lottery every year for the 150 slots to be able to race.  Somehow, the stars aligned and I was able to sneak out a win there, I fell short of my goal time of breaking 1:30 there, but was pretty pleased considering the crazy wet conditions. I'm actually humbled to have the title of 2011 Muddy Sneaker Champion and I'm gonna try to go back in 2012 and see what I can do there again.

We put together a rag tag group of fun folks to do the Seneca 7 relay around Seneca Lake, but as we never do anything the "correct" way, decided to do it all via bikes instead of driving from checkpoint to checkpoint,  which earned us the distinction of "most eco friendly team" and we actually were in contention for too 3 teams, but had a wrong turn in there as well...no worries, we all had a blast and have plent of stories to tell from that one!  The next day I was able to share an experience that I never thought I would get to, I would run a half marathon side-by-side with my sister! Such a great experience and I was elated to share that with her!

June came around and I raced to the podium at the Keuka Lake Triathlon on DEAD legs after a 20+ hour training week for IMLP and also got in some great training up in Placid again while tryign to conquer my fear of the downhill section.  I popped one last little 5k prior to my launch in Placid and that was just to test fitness and see where I was.  Fun, demanding and exhausting...but I was able to see some college buddies who I rarely run into.

July came and I had all of my eggs into one basket.  I was gunning for that great Ironman race that I know I was capable of.  I had some serious training under my belt and was ready to rip it.  I just needed to keep the rubber side down on the downhill.  I had a good race and got REALLY lucky in July.  There were tears of joy in the gym and I was literally in shock.  Not many people know what it's like to have your wildest dreams come to fruition, but I did.  In that moment I saw the piece of paper in the gym, I was floored.

I blogged a lot in the days/weeks/months after that and even put up a race report for IMLP and one for the day after.   I tried to capture everything I was feeling, the difficulties of doing two IM's only 12 weeks apart and get everything down on paper so I could look at it for years to come or give someone else a proverbial "leg up" if they were in the same situation as I was.  I was getting emails from everyone and words of congrats and support from SO many people it was incredible!  My parents even sent an article into the local newspaper on my journey from 2009-2011. 

Then came time for the BIG DANCE.  I had a LOT of help to get there and I cannot convey how much on paper it meant to me.  Everyone that gave me support was in my thoughts and in my heart on the big island and helped to propel me to that most famous finish line.  It took me a while to write THIS, but I finally got it down on paper. Kim and I had a BLAST for the remainder of our trip and took a TON of photos.  It was an incredible experience and I can't believe I'm now in the same club as these folks!

But after the multisport season came the best thing that happened in 2011.  As I've mentioned above, those were all huge things that happened in the year, but none could've trumped what occured in December.  I didn't write a "race report" for this big event in my life, because it can't be quantified as such.  A race report means it's done and over with, completed, finished and this is just beginning.  I asked my best friend and the one that has been behind the scenes and right by my side for the last several years to marry me...(Don't worry, I made her work for it! - sent her on a scavenger hunt all around Rochester :o) hehehe!)....and she said YES!!!!!!!! :o) :o)

So with that, comes the biggest and best part of 2011 - the ability to look foward to an even better 2012 and know that the woman I love will be right by my side.  It's going to be a heck of a year, with MANY more to come :o)  Cheers! Celebrate responsibly my friends and I'll see you all on the roads and trails...happy 2011!

Ironman Hawaii on NBC

For those of you who don't know, the Ironman World Championships are going to be broadcast tomorrow on NBC from 4:30pm-6pm.  You can bet your sweet behind that I'll be watching and trying to mentally relive every swim stroke, pedal revolution and footfall from this past October.
Above is a short little preview clip of the coverage forthcoming tomorrow. Hope everyone is laying down a solid base for 2012 currently.  I know I am...I'm finally getting back into the groove and getting the miles underneath me and it feels good. I had some hiccups in the previous few weeks and I'm hoping they've been smoothed out. 

Get out there and train friends.  Remember:

Cheers.

Vacation photos

This is why the trip to Hawaii didn't suck.  There were SO many more photos, but these were just some of the good shots that were taken from our trip :o) Enjoy!