Going Up!

Worlds Greatest Rides...

This is Haleakala, a sleeping volcano on the island of Maui.

What is it with tall stuff?  Why do we look at tall stuff and say "Wonder what it's like on top..."  As luck would have it, there is a road to the top.  It's a 36 mile trip from sea level to 10,000 feet.  And a good time was had by all.

Let me quickly say that I wasn't packing the internal fortitude to tackle the entire climb.  I was, after all, supposed to be on vacation, rewinding after a stretch of grade A crazy in the day gig. But I still had to take a bite.  

This is Maui Cyclery...

Also the home of Go Cycling Maui, a magical little enterprise that makes really cool things possible.  Donnie and his crew will rent you a nice Litespeed, spin your pedals onto the cranks, turn you over to a local who knows the island, and let you create some of the most incredible rides on the planet.  They'll even load the Suburban up with goodies and SAG the ride.

For the vacationing flat-lander, there are opportunities to dance with Hale without sacrificially tossing your carcass into the smoking pit.  I jumped on the opportunity to climb some 4000 feet... to a great little coffee house.  Great views, minimal traffic, and the strange looks from the cruisers coasting down from the top after their 4 am "Dramamine Presents" van ride to the summit.

On a regular basis, Donnie sends trips up to the top. Local lore has it that a good number of pros swing in to chew on one of the few 10K foot climbs not requiring a passport.  Donnie, a retired pro rider himself, told me he's not topping Haleakala much anymore.  "It's brutal." 

No matter how far up you go, you then have the opportunity to show off your skeells coming down.  Lots of hairpin turns.  Lots of blind corners.  The locals have a distinct advantage.  Glued to the back wheel of my lead, watching the speedo dance around 40 MPH, there were a half a dozen times where he piled into a corner and my eyes got bigger.  I had to make a decision to trust that he knew something I didn't about the real estate around the next corner.  He did.

Bottom line... any ride on Maui is an incredible thing.  In addition to a breakthrough workout, there are views, there is foliage, and there is the laid back island 'tude that can't be matched. Fly in your own sled or rent from Donnie - if you're on the island, it's a must.

Feelin' Green

It's a shot from half court, but it's an interesting concept.  

Apparently this how far I can go if I were to ingest one gallon of liquid fuel.

39 miles per gallon

Created by The Car Connection

What this doesn't take into account is that same gallon of fuel taking advantage of two wheeled technology. Take this same engine, with the same fuel, and add a crank, a pair of Zipps and a saddle, and I'm thinkin' we double that number, at least...

Blog Season

Greg and Laura...

So now that Kona '08 is morphing into an NBC special, and the 70.3 championship is nothing more than an online donnybrook over drafting, and all the big bucks pros are heading to the other summer, aka Australia, the stateside remnant are now left with the annual winter challenge of.... finding compelling material to blog about.  

This is where months of training will separate the cream from the cow.  The pros will launch collections of high protein recipes, great Computrainer repeat workouts, photos of big name tri friends helping with interior decorating, fantastic winter runs, scoops on new coaching agreements, gear reviews on pre-release goodies, reviews of great sports movies, and photos of the new box turtles - Greg and Laura.  The unfortunate few (who are probably the most inspirational) will post progress reports as the body is coaxed back to some semblance of health.  The regulars will follow along and celebrate each bit of good news.

Then there's those of us who live "on the verge of blogging."  Ours is not a life that lobs up anything approaching daily "wow".  Ours is the more mundane, which is why we vicariously expand our horizons via others blogs, all the while dreaming of the day we'll be forced to narrow down the blog topics choices, picking only one out of our incredibly interesting day.

But there in lies the enticement.  We read other peoples blogs and hold out hope that someday, maybe even soon,... our lives will be that interesting.  And if not, we can always complain about drafting.

Fish, Skate, Breath...

Total Immersion...

Def 1:  Being completely involved in your pursuit.  Focused.  Avoiding distractions.

Def 2:  Laying on your side, slipping quietly underwater, feeling your nasal passage filling gleefully with water, because you haven't quite mastered "balance".  

Flew to Atlanta this weekend to further my journey from cinderblock to swimmer at a TI Freestyle Workshop.  Signed up for Charleston, but with only two of us, we moved it to the coaches home "turf".  In all, a terrific experience.  Bill was a great coach with a clear game plan to move through the weekend.  The underwater video taping alone was worth the trip.  Ever watched yourself swim?  Scary!

Surprise 1:  The pool was filled with salt water.  I'm guessing Saturdays' six hours in the water would have been much harder on the epidermis if we were dealing with chlorine.

Surprise 2:  Dial in the stroke and 25 m becomes so effortless that you can do repeats on just one breath.

Granted, there's a lot to keep track of to achieve that "dialedinness".  That's where muscle memory comes in.  (I'm hoping my muscles have better memory than my brain...)

Not ready for the 10K swim just yet, but then that event is hard to wrap my head around.   Mom always said "Don't go in the water right after eating."  How would she feel about an event where you eat while you're in the water?  

Bottom line - strongly recommended.  

Lost in Translation

Reality checks are important.  CompuTrainer sessions are great.  Love 'em.  I know, not necessarily a universally shared position.  But I love long sessions in a controlled environment with uninterrupted efforts and gobs of feedback.

But, numbers are what they are.

What matters is how it translates to real rides.  The time trial portion of ABD's Fall Fling a short, but very real reality check.  It suggested a number of possibilities.  One is a pure and simple failure to increase power.  We're not totting a watts meter on the bike so we can't fall back to numbers, but there's always the stopwatch.  And the elapsed time was well off the majority of riders in the age group.  

It's also possible we were dealing with a bit of over-training, but if that's the case, that's equally troubling considering the amount of training we've been doing - in comparison to the typical training regime of the 70.3 or IM athlete.

Since it was the last of the season, it signifies the official start of the next winter of training.

IMTV

So the brand is growing, the races are selling out within hours, and the big dance in Kona is buzzing like the Superbowl.  Want to watch?  Here are the options.

Go there.  Great excuse for a vacation, and to check out the course, and to gawk, etc...

Or plop your sedentary backside down in front of a computer for x number of hours and hope the streaming server has enough headroom so as to not kick you out just as Chrissie gets ready to send Norman into an emotional meltdown - by passing him.

I'm already logged in.  Doesn't appear to be anything happening yet......

The Five Disciplines

As the rookie, the newbie, the froshie... It's become clear that a serious triathlete must spend serious amounts of time working in each of the five triathlon disciplines.  They of course are:

1  Swimming

2  Cycling

3  Running

4  Nutrition

5  Blogging

I've been running for a while, I'm getting the cycling to come together, but as for the rest....  well ya gotta start somewhere....