Races awaiting

My athletes are preparing for upcoming races. Things tend to get a little sketchy for these weeks leading up to competition. Everyone wonders if they are ready and ALWAYS compare themselves to what everyone else has been doing.

Remember, each athlete is different and responds to different ideas, training, physical and mental prep. Each race, event and day are completely different. Just because you ran a X:XX:XX at a race last year doesn't mean you have to beat that time this year.

Remember the motto, "Train and race because you love it". When you lose sight of that is when you should question why you are doing this.

I look forward to the wonderful season to come and and am enjoying watching everyone overcome the hurdles of early training.

Brooks "Inspire Daily" Acceptance

I was accepted for the Brooks ID team today. I am thrilled about that because I've lived in my Brooks for the last several seasons. All is official and acceptance was completed on both ends today.

Class seemed to drag on forever today. Being an instructor for different classes, I'm biased regarding instruction. I take bits and pieces from each person I encounter but today was REALLY rough. Thank goodness for Wayne my lab partner. He had me laughing really hard a few times through the day.

I was able to get a little sun today at lunch and after class so I hope to come home with a decent tan (for Michigan people anyhow). After class I went to RDV again and swam.

I had to stand on the deck for about 25 minutes to wait for a lane. Because of that my goal was to do my 1000 warm up then after that just swim until EVERYONE left the pool. It took a while but I accomplished my goal. I have no clue how much I swam, if I had to guess it would be somewhere between 3500 and 4500. For the most part it felt good and there was a few revenge sets in there. I had to be careful and swim safe.

Well, off to bed here shortly. Have a nice evening.

Really, a Tuesday swim?

I woke up a 445am to swim at 530. I actually was to sore to feel like swiming so early. I slept horribly last night I ditched the swim and moved it to after class.

I stretched my hip as much as possible. Sleept on the floor with a pillow under my back. (We need a sleep number bed badly) When I woke up this morning things felt okay, After a couple pills, by noon I was walking well to and from the pool for a tanning session.

I ran up stairs after class then drove to RDV sportsplex.

The pool was full so I jumped in where I could. Robyn another IM athlete and I shared lane. I had a 1000/1000 NS/700p/500/200 fast/200 cool down

I heared stories about making it to hawaii on a huge roll down, a lottery pick and another about an accepted multithousand dollar ebay purchase. Yikes, I cannot compete with that. I'll kep putting in for the lottery and racing hard.

It was odd but I was the fastest in the pool. I know now how Seth always feels. Maybe there was a reason........... I don't know what it is but Seth is a lucky $^&&%*!

Afterwards at the store I played Mr. Rogers and fancied everyone in the store. I simply smiled and said hello to every face I saw. I got a look from a 14-15 YO girl with her mom (of course mom didn't look) and again was sneered at by any woman my age that I came across. Maybe my mojo has left with my back injury. Maybe Jayne has more work than expected......."she's got's to find me mojo"

Who do you really know?

Obviously from my last post I have had a lot of time to think this last weekend. Out of the many people I have ran into this week, I met very few I really cared to talk to for more than a minute (Vera, Megan and Wayne). I have made every attempt to smile and say hello to as many people as possible. I held the door, picked up dropped items and offered assistance to people even though I could barely walk without pain.

At the grocery store I was rammed into, strategically blocked while people read the nutritional value of King Dons and actually sneared at for smiling and saying "Hello" as if I were a stalker.

It is amazing how rude our society has become. Granted I can be grumpy as everyone else, if not more so at times. Maybe people are just intimidated by my sheer 155lb presence. Does being social mean you have to get blasted with a room full of machismo dudes and has the art of actually knowing each other degraded to surface issues? It really seems like financial status, beauty and popularity has officially made it to adulthood.

My lab partner for these two weeks is from London. We had a nice chat at dinner Saturday. I learned his kids both wear uniforms to school. I'm all for individuality and encourage that in life but with the attitudes I see in kids lately, I'm starting to like the uniform idea.

Early mid-life crisis.....too much time away from home.....nah, just open senses at this point. I'm thankful for the people I have come to know over the last few years. This sport has brought me close to some very wonderful people (including a refound self) and I'm thankful for that. Chances are if you are reading this I'm thankful for you.

FTF

Weekend

I have had a sun filled and quiet weekend. Saturday I did some swimming at the club as well as grabbed some sun to even out the tan lines. 2000 was close to the total but I went over a little doing drills while chatting with the lifeguard/local swim coach Megan.

She gave me some things to work on that I can use for my athletes as well.

Saturday I had dinner with Wayne from Scotland Yard. He's and extremely smart guy with a real person's attitude. This is a trait I RARELY ever find at training courses like this. Some guys are actually walking around with guns and cuffs on their belts. What a joke!!!

Sunday I spend entirely alone. I was in a lot of pain all day, from the second I woke up. It got worse as time went by so I lay in the sun on my stomach and read. I swam a little over 2000 again then lay out at the club in the sun for a while on my back.

I'm getting caught up with email basketball scores and casework.

Hoping and praying for a positive back change.

Saturday is here

Well, week 1 of my training class is done. With a lot of information being thrown at me, I'm looking forward to more hands on next week.

My back has been a little depressing over the last couple weeks. Sitting in a classroom all week in sot helping matters much. I was forced to take Thursday off.

Yesterday I swam another easy 2000. The flip turns stung me once in a while and every once in a while I dot a stinger. mentally I was going nuts so I had to do something. Thanks to RDV Sportsplex for getting me into their facility to train.

I've been in touch with my athletes and it looks like everyone is having a great time. JT has raced a couple times already. Seth races today and the ladies are up in a month. Keep up the fantastic work everyone! I'm proud of you.