The warmest day of December in Dallas probably happend 12/23.  A cold front was predicted to blow in during the afternoon.  Confounding the weatherman – as weather often does – it was sunny and 70 F.

I was planning to go skating but I got a call from a recruiter and I really need a job.  It wasn’t really an interview, I was just supposed to take a written technical test.  It was scheduled at 2 p.m..  I was hoping for 30 minutes and then jet over to the skating trail.  Instead the recruiter took a long time to get to me and the test took over an hour.

It was almost 4:00 before I got down to my vehicle.  The only thing on my mind was “How fast can I get started skating?”.  Instead, the side window had been broken out of my vehicle and about $1200 of stuff had been stolen!  They took all my skating clothes which normally live in a suitcase behind my seat.  But they left my skates!  The door wasn’t even unlocked.  The thief just reached in and grabbed everything they could, and the skates were too far back to reach (and probably about zero pawn-shop value, as beat up as they are).  I spent the next hour talking to the police and the building management.  Because there were still things of value I couldn’t even skate then with my window broken out.

No fun!

It’s 22 and snowing tonight.  In 50 more miles I’ll have 1000 for the year.  I’m praying for a warm day, but if I don’t get one I’ll go to a rink and skate for 4 or 5 hours!

Welcome to my whine tasting post. Cut some cheese and grab your crackers, I need to bust loose… 

That grown men shouldn't compete with children seemed obvious in hindsight.

Our Sunday indoor practice sessions are pretty grueling. To start the session, we line up fast to fastest and we’re supposed to set a pace we can keep steady for 100 laps, with the pull rotation on each 5th lap. What usually ends up happening is that the pace starts gradually building until the elites rotate through the lead, usually somewhere around the 30th lap, then we try to maintain that pace, whatever they set, through the rest of the 100 laps. (For background – our elites are the coach – a speed skating Olympian – and two nationally ranked girls, aged 12 & 13.) If you can’t hang with the line, you either drop to the middle of the rink or clear to the outside and keep skating till the line is done with the drill. Sounds simple, right? 

Before I fell and hurt my rib, I was hanging with the elite pack for the full 100 laps. Near death when it was over, but I was hanging. And it was fun, because at 2 laps to go, it turns into a race. The biggest thrill I had was after having busted my butt for 99 laps, I was able to come in on the heels of our coach after sprinting it out. If I could have hawked I’d have had him. But a week or so later I fell, and I’m still recovering. That and I’ve also changed my set up with some new frames that are heavier and have a higher center of gravity, so I’m just getting used to them too. Working hard, not quitting, not whining too loud at practice…till Sunday. 

Seems people are always pulling crap in front of me in a pace line. A sure way to cause a pile up.

We got up to elite speed and we were flying. I really felt like I was getting myself back up to pre-fall performance. At about 40 laps to go, it was just the three elites and me. I was feeling great! The coach was even commenting on my form, and it was positive feedback for a change! I finished a pull and got on the back of the pack. And truth be told, that’s something I’ve had to work on too, being able to stay with the pack at speed as I rotate out of the lead. And I did it! I was right back on without missing a stride. But then one of the other skaters, who had bailed on the pack when it started to speed up to take a 10-15 lap breather in the middle of the rink decided she wanted back in. So in she came, and aggressively cut in front of me… 

At first I was taken back by the blatant disregard for my hard-earned position in the line. But then I thought it would be fine because she could take a pull before my next turn. No biggie. What I didn’t expect is that after a lap, 1 freaking lap in 4th position back, she quit again. Right in front of me. There was nowhere to go, and the elites were getting away. 

I was able to get around her and catch the pack, but it took a lap of sprinting to do it, and when I did catch them, they were keeping their same, steady, fast pace. There was to be no rest after all that sprint work. Then they started to get faster. Having spent too much energy catching them, I was struggling to hang on for the next 10 laps. I was cooked and knew I wouldn’t be finishing this one with them. My stride being broken and with nothing left in the bank, I stood up and watched the train leave the station. I was torqued. 

Is it too much to ask the coach to enforce some etiquette out there? If you’re going to drop from the pack, fine, skate at your own pace in the middle. But if you want to get back on the pack after taking a breather, you need to get on the back of the pack, in the tail position, and work your way back to a lead pull. Seems fair enough, don’t you think? I said as much to him and he agreed to lay down some rules. 

This is why practice is great, because you learn some important lessons. For me here, I should have pulled a quick leap frog after she got in front of me. Because when you’re going that fast, a quick burst is going to be a lot easier to recover from than a lap worth of sprinting. Good experience, despite my inner cry baby. WAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH

12/18/09 Training: Day off. The big cookie contest at work. First Loser took first place with a Scandinavian almond cookie cake! No skating, but I’m going to need to – these cookies have 2 cans of almond paste and 2 1/2 sticks of butter in them. YUMMMM

I skate so I can eat things like this. THAT'S motivation.

12/19/09 Training: Indoor practice. Wasn’t really into it. Some laps I felt really strong, others I was wondering why I was out there at all. Slight burn out day I guess. On a high note, my daughter is coming out of her shell and starting to be very competitive with David’s daughter. It was fun watching the two of them duke it out in a 200m race! 

12/20/09 Training: Full indoor practice – 100 laps, plyos, lap the pack. Rib is feeling much better and I’m more confident in the new set up. 

12/21/09 Training: 14 miles outdoors on 110’s with John. This was my first time on 110’s. Lot’s to talk about with that experience, post to come. 

12/22/09 Training: Snow is coming so I did a quick 10 miles outdoors solo on the 110’s in the wind. Light indoor practice, lots of work on staying low. Quad burning drills and wall sits when I got home. I’m going to feel this tomorrow…

There’s nothing quite like trail skating in Colorado in the winter. This is life inside a Hallmark card. Join me… 

The snow lies in cool, pillowy blankets to either side of the trail. White, clean & neat. There’s hardly a soul out here; we own this trail. 48 degrees, sunny and no wind. A gourmet recipe for outdoor winter skating. 

Poudre River in winter. This is God's country.

The mallards gathered in a hole in the ice, their bright green heads made more luminous in the reflection off the water and snowy backdrop. Christmas is next week, and this feels like an early present.  

Whew…I needed that. 

I love skating. 

12/17/09 Training: 10 miles on the Loveland Recreation Trail. Absolutely perfect.

I was reading the Old Farmer’s Almanac today and, there’s really no kind, old-fashioned way to put this –  it said I’m screwed. It’s going to be a long cold winter here in Colorado this year. The snow that comes early usually melts pretty quickly. We don’t shovel here on the northern Front Range, we sweep. Not this year though.   

"There's an 80% chance you're pooched till March, Buddy. Take up ice skating, there's more of a future there."

Temperatures here have been frigid, but they’re warming up. It was in the 30’s today. With the sun at high noon, it’s really not that bad to be out and active in. I was going to try to hit the rec path at lunch but that just wasn’t in the cards.

SIDE RANT: I do not refer to the Recreation Path as the Bike Path for obvious reasons. Skater’s Rule, Cyclists Drool. Up yours – I’m faster than you anyway, Lance. ON YOUR LEFT!

I digress…We’re fortunate here in the Loveland / Fort Collins area in that we’ve got something like 40+ miles of paved rec path, and during the winter months the Parks & Rec folks do a darn good job of keeping the paths clear. They’ve got the mini-me of snowplows and they use them! So other than the occasional spot of ice under one of the overpasses, we’re free and clear to skate year-round if we can brave the cold. I’m hoping to get out at Boyd Lake with my buddy John before Friday. We’ll see. 

In the meantime, there’s the slideboard. You know, the skater’s version of a dry-hump. It’s almost as good as the real thing, and it leaves you just as spent and wet in the end. A masterblader’s dream, it’s truly a wonderful invention. I put in an hour on it this evening, and I’m happy to claim a little progress: I’m finally able to do it like Derek  does in this clip:  

down in the heel, belly on thigh, with a tight arm swing. It wasn’t this easy last year. And hey – no (severe) back pain. I guess that’s another benefit of all the indoor training. I’ll take it! 

Or there’s always ice skating. What with that little party up in Canada in a few months, everyone is talking about it. But Speedy Weezy and I tried it, and we both decided it’s not for us. But I really bailed because he didn’t like it. Maybe we could get all geared up like hockey players, but do ice speed skating instead. Or, better yet, Roller Derby On Ice! Really high-speed, super sharp blades, and really cool armor. 

A few years from now, post-apocalyptic Canadians will come to know the Toecutter of ice.

OK – I took the inspiration for that one from a blog I read earlier. The writer said her son likes to skate for the gear. In his case it’s hockey. He can wear a chest protector, shin guards, elbow pads, gloves, and helmet when they go grocery shopping. He does this because “it makes me look like a Transformer.” Should have thought of something like that for Speedy Weezy. 

Man, time to go take a shower, I smell like Mad Max’s leather after a month in the Outback – crikey! 

12/15/09 Training: Did about 150 laps indoor with John & David. John has been working hard on indoor form and is really coming along quickly. He doesn’t see the speed like we do. He’s improved a lot in just a month back inside. Still, we’d both rather be outdoors, and hopefully we can do that before Friday. 

12/16/09 Training: 1 hour on the slideboard. Worked on staying low by keeping my belly on my thigh. It’s easier to do that when you’ve been eating cookies all freaking day.

Did’ja ever have one of those “Ah-Ha!” moments when a universal truth dumbs itself down just long enough for you to get it? The afterglow is refreshing, like the feeling you get making your own warm spot in a cold pool. I had one of those moments last week…   

Chop goes the weasel.

I tried to cut my own hair. It was one of those “bucket list” things. And I was doing so well. As you can see from the top and sides, I was able to blend a #4 & #5 with relative success. I left the back alone, because 2010 is the year the mullet is making it’s well-deserved comeback. (Long live Joe Elliott!) I’d done pretty well trimming the side-burns and over & behind my right ear. It was the passing behind the ear on the left that did me in. I always go wide…   

The starburst pattern calls attention to the perfectly formed lobe. The chicks DIG this.

Now consider, this was last Wednesday morning before work. My schedule that day called for a pow-wow with my right and left hands, and some quality face-2-face with my boss. Oh yeah, the big company Christmas meeting, where 300 of my coworkers would converge to make merry. That too. Brilliant. So I started to think of excuses…   

10. It’s a small tribute to Mr. T’s comeback.    

9. Did it on purpose, for the team.   

8. It goes with the straps on my experimental, custom helmet.    

7. Allows for more sanitary storage of chewing gum during indoor practice.   

6. Lost a bet with a vindictive stylist.   

5. The kids did it when I was sleeping.   

4. A piece of gum fell in my helmet and I didn’t notice till it was too late.   

3. !#$%^&*@ SUPERCUTS!   

2. I work hard to look like an a$$hol3, how do YOU do it?   

1. (After applying bandage with ketchup stain for blood) – emergency brain surgery.    

I actually thought for a minute or two that I could get away with it. I’d just laugh it off. Certainly, walking around like this would make me more approachable, wouldn’t it? Yeah, right. Think fast…   

Hoodie to the rescue. I'll shrug it off.

Fast feet, fast feet…I’m thinking, I’m thinking…Well hey, it’s only one more week till Christmas vacation. I’ll alternate between the hoodie and my wool turtle neck. Maybe even go polo collar-up for a couple of days. Call out sick one day in between…I can do this.   

Well, the hoodie barely covered it if I shrugged, the turtle neck didn’t reach, and the collar-up Gay 80’s ain’t never coming back. I’m screwed…   

The high-collar look updated with mantyhose. HUGE in France.

I could have tried to fix it myself. I was tempted. But having trimmed down to expose the roots of my stupidity, I decided to cut my losses. It was Shawna at Wal-Mart Smart Style to the rescue.

I was outside the salon at 8:45 waiting for her to open at 9. Sitting there in my hoodie and sunglasses, I looked like Aqualung and felt like a schmuck. $20.00 later, I’m happily sporting a high fade cut that works well for your average 14 year old.  

His parents should be shot. Seriously.

It could have been worse. So I’m looking at the bright side. This haircut is going to require me to keep my winter workout schedule up, at least until it grows back, because I start to look like the man with no neck when I gain weight with really short hair. And wow – your head is no place to try and save $15.

Now, how can I trim my nose...

12/9/09 Training: Elliptical late in the afternoon. 45 minutes, but no less sweat with shorter hair.   

12/10/09 Training: Day off.   

12/11/09 Training: 1 hour on the elliptical, level 7, 6.5 miles.   

12/12/09 Training: 1.5 hours at indoor practice. 100 laps split in two. Still getting used to the new frames and recovering from the rib injury. This is going to take a while.   

12/13/09 Training: 2 hours indoor practice. 100 laps, plyos and lap the pack. Also spent an hour in the new laser maze at Rollerland. Think Caterine Zeta-Jones / Entrapment. THAT kind of laser maze. Too freaking cool. Did the easy level in 16 seconds! (Speedy Weezy did it in 14.8!)   

Our lasers are green.

Knowledge of the metric system came in handy when I started to skate.

Dude…I scored some new frames from a friend of mine this week, and they’re heavy, man. Actually, just a little heavier than I’m used to, but the difference is very noticable. I’ve gone from a 3×100, 1×90 set up to straight 4×100. Add up the extra 2 + oz. per skate from the new frame & larger wheel and the higher deck height and it’s changed everything. Or so it seems. Granted I’m still recovering from a bruised rib, but Dude, 100 laps at speed on Sunday and again last night was, like, gnarley. Oh wow man, talk about a lung-buster… 

I’ve always skated 4×100 outdoors, since I started skating, and that set-up is heavier than this new one. The extra weight isn’t a big deal outdoors. But for the last 7 months I’ve been on the modified set-up indoors, and it’s lower and lighter. Skating low, fast & to the left is a lot different than straight-away skating, and weight really matters indoors. Or so I’ve come to learn. This new set-up, while it feels good, also feels like a small stride backward in terms of speed on the indoor track. It’s really the first time I’ve noticed the effect of skate weight on form and performance. As my legs started to burn, I had to fight lazy recovery, and almost tripped a couple of times which was scary. It’s a good thing it’s early in the winter training season, it’ll give me time to build my strength to get my foot speed back to where it was a few weeks ago. I like this new set-up, and think I’ll do well with it once I get back to speed. I’ll have to work for it though, with the zeal and humorless fanaticism of a jihadi on a suicide mission. I’ll be puffin’ in the pace line man. And that’s OK, cause it’s better than sitting on the sideline with my bong and my bud, watching life pass me by. On the left, Dude. 

12/4/09 Training: Back on skates but took it slowly. Did about 50 laps at 1/2 speed. Was good to be sweating for fitness, not from sloth again! 

12/5/09 Training: Full practice on the new set-up was difficult. Keeping up with 12 & 13 year old elites was pure torture. I think we did 100 laps, but that could have been anywhere from 10 to 20 laps short. I was just glad it was over. Also did full plyo set, lap the pack 2x and right/left drill. Rib felt OK after. 

12/6/09 Training: 45 minutes on the elliptical for 5 miles at level 7. Had some reading to do. Will get back to level 9 later this week. 

12/7/09 Training: Indoor practice, 100 laps at speed. Getting easier but I’ve got some work ahead of me. So does Speedy Weezy, his times for 100m were not what they were mid-summer. But who’s are? At least it bothers him and he wants to beat his personal best record!

I’ve been off my skates since last…Saturday I think. I really had to think about that. As I get fatter my mind gets slower, in direct proportion. While my skates may collect dust, my passion for skating doesn’t. I’m always thinking ahead to the next practice, and now even more so because I can’t skate. I really want to go Saturday, even if it’s just to loop around the rink on this inside track…I hate being sidelined!   

Off skates one week, Chelvis ballooned like a...camel?

I read a great blog this morning. Here’s a quote from it:   

As you get ready to lavish your gratitude and gifts on those in your life, remember that sometimes the most special gift is the one that comes out of your own life, not the Hallmark aisle at the grocery store.   

The gist of her post is that commercialization and consumerism undermine our humanity. I totally agree. While HorseyPants and I have done a lot over the last 10 years to beach ourselves from the Sea of Consumerism, I constantly struggle to be free of the undertow. It’s a battle I acknowledge, because I want my kids to know that I’m human. I’m not immune to marketing, or the blind desire to just want cool stuff. It’s not wrong to have these desires. It’s not even criminal to give in now and then, but I refuse to keep up with the Jones’, because it’s hard to sustain without acquiring a toe-tag from the Bank of Massive Consumer Debt, NA.   

You may ask, “How is this related to inline skating you blowhard?”   

Here’s how:  

My daughter's mini Luigino Victory

The kids & I made salt dough skate ornaments for our Christmas tree this year. It was  last Sunday when HorseyPants laid down the law regarding my need to rest and let my rib heal. As I was bemoaning the fact that I couldn’t skate, we started our custom boot making session. It was while we were working on them that we had a great discussion on sports, arts & crafts, and how important they are to us as a family, and to our culture. But we really got off on talking about arts & crafts, and how much fun they are, especially when we do them together as a family.  

It’s really appalling when you stop to think about what we lose at the altar of cheaper, faster and more convenient. Arts & crafts are a great example of this. Flipping through a book of traditional holiday craft ideas published in the early 80’s, HorseyPants commented that all of the craft projects featured in the book are now things you’d just go buy at Michael’s, Hobby Lobby, JoAnne’s or any other chain “craft” type store. But she wasn’t talking about buying the raw materials to make these things, which you could get at all of these stores, she was talking the finished items which they also sell. And it seems that the stores are devoting ever more shelf space to cheap, imported finished craft goods, and American’s continue to buy them up at an alarming rate – even in a recession!  

What do you lose by buying something that you could otherwise take time to make yourself? Particularly crafty things you could give as gifts, or use to spread holiday cheer. We came up with a short but very important list: deeper connections, physical and mental skills, creative impulse, togetherness.   

To me, one way relationships are strengthened is by quality time spent together actively engaged in creative pursuit. When you buy your crafts what are you really doing except freeing up more time to spend in front of the television or the internet, where “crafty” marketers can work their magic on you to get you to want more and buy more, feeding the machine and robbing your evolutionary relatives of generations future of the motivation, skill and natural instinct to make themselves better by using their minds and hands to create works of their own.      

My daughter, she’s 9, she really got it. She wants to start a magazine called “Kids For Real.” In every issue, she wants to feature craft projects for the whole family, as a way to bring everyone together and keep people engaged in creative arts.  

In the spirit of keeping it real, we thought it would be cool to share our Christmas Skate project with everyone.  

First Loser's Luigino Attitude

Here’s how we did it…  

What You’ll Need:  

• 500 mL (2 cups) flour
• 250 mL (1 cup) water
• 250 mL (1 cup) salt
• Approx. 30 mL (2 tbsp) vegetable oil

 What To Do:  

• Combine the flour & salt in a bowl.
• Slowly add water & oil.
• Mix until smooth. 
• Flour your work area. A cutting board is ideal.
• Form frame and wheels by pressing a 1 inch ball of clay flat and make outline of 4 bottom half wheels across the bottom with a knife. Make top straight.
• Take 1 1/2 ball of clay and form boot in your hand.
• Blend frame/wheels.
• Bake 45 min. to 1 hour at 250 degrees.
• Allow to cool.
• Be sure to have the skate you want to miniaturize with you for detail.
• Paint as desired.

These make great gifts for your skater friends. Heck, if it’s as cold where you are as it is here, you may even want to get together at someone’s house and make a party of it. Just think of me when you hear Elvis sing “Blue Christmas.” Thankyouveruhmush.  

Heat molding!

12/1/09 Training: Still letting the rib heal.  

12/2/09 Training: I hour on the elliptical. Not that rewarding and a little difficult. No pain though!  

12/3/09 Training: Nada – want to be sure I can go skating Saturday.

It was a restless night in bed. Tossing and turning,couldn’t sleep. I kept having this idea rolling around inside my head.Calling me.Finally I rise up out of the rack in the wee hours of the morning and started to put ideas to a design.

Voila……….Evolutionbrand was born. It is for the eXtreme sport/life enthusiast. Whether it is the skateboarder,surfer, mountain/snowboarder or the middle aged guy that has to wear a suit to work 5 days a week. The guy that after the long week of the 9-5 grind is having his eXtreme inner child dying to escape. Join the Revolution. Go with Evolution!!!

Join the rEvolution

Ever have a bruised rib? It hurts. I mean, cry like a baby wearing a soggy diapy, who’s hungry and has a stray hair wrapped tightly around his pecker kinda cry.

No skating for 2 weeks?!?! WAAAHHHHH

I fell at indoor practice a couple of Sundays ago. At the time it didn’t seem that bad and I was skating again by Tuesday. I was actually feeling a lot better later in the week. My knee and shoulder were healing well, and the pain in my side was decreasing.

Didn’t skate again till Friday, and even then I just did an easy 8 miles with Speedy Weazy & some of the other Speed Weasels. Didn’t push it – wouldn’t by prudent. Not gonna do it. My rib was getting better. I was able to take deeper breaths without too much discomfort and the skating was smooth.

Went to indoor practice on Saturday morning and was able to hit near top speed. Didn’t want to over do it though, because it still hurt as soon as I started breathing heavy. But I felt OK after and didn’t push it too far. Still, I was sore so I asked the coach and some other guys what I should do for it. They all said the same thing – tape it and drink heavily for the next few days…

Ho! Ho! Ho! Drinkin' & Rinkin' don't mix.

What did me in was getting down the Christmas decorations Saturday afternoon, then putting up the lights outside. The artificial tree and boxes of decorations were all stored overhead on the high shelf in our garage, and the box with the tree is oddly shaped and flippin’ heavy. Actually, a lot heavier when you’re favoring your weak left on a ladder. Big mistake taking that down by myself. I immediately knew I’d blundered when I found myself scrambling down the ladder with this massive box hoping to get to the ground before it did – didn’t want anyone to see this…I’d reinjured myself and dropped the Christmas tree.

I’ve been wincing ever since. Every breath, every twist, every lift of the right arm, every cough (oh my God, kill me now!!!) and forget about rolling over in bed. Pain baby, pure pain. Lord – imagine if I’d broken something. I’m such a wuss…

HorseyPants had had enough of the man-baby schtick by Sunday morning. She went online and dispelled the coaches advice in 2 clicks. Turns out, taping a rib isn’t recommended anymore. It can shrink your lungs and promote shallow breathing. Doing so would hurt recovery in the long run and undo all I’ve done to actually increase the depth of the breaths I take while skating long distances. And the prescription calls for ibuprofen & ice. Oh, and rest – no excercise.

With that, it was straight to the couch for an ice pack and some quality time with Sherlock Holmes (my daughter made a comfy spot for me with a blanket, pillow and book.) Sunday was to be a no-skate day. So with all of my new-found free-time, the kids and I got creative and made some custom boots…

Custom Luiginos - Mini Challenge, Victory & Attitude. (click image to enlarge)

Both of my kids and I skate Luigino indoor (Rollerblade outdoor.) Luigino makes a great skate – and they’re very stylish. You don’t realize exactly how stylish until you try to paint them in miniature. Trust me, they pay attention to detail! I’m going to get the custom Luigino/Rollerblade next year…I think.

Rollerblade / Luigino 2009 Racemachine LE

My bud Titanium Tone is going to let me try out a set of Pilot frames sometime soon, and I bet they’d look and feel great together. Anyway, it’ll be easier to paint in miniature.

Ibuprofen & ice. Every morning, noon, evening and night. And no excercise. Which is killing me. That weight always finds a way to get back on. But my side is starting to feel a lot better thanks to HorseyPants. She’s my hero. That said, I absolutely hate seeing the weight creeping up every morning. I need to so something tomorrow. ANYTHING to get the heart rate up for an hour.

Maybe the elliptical – just a little…

11/27/09 Training: Light 8 miles on the bike path with Speedy Weazy, John, Titanium Tone & Skram. The guys took it easy on us, what with my broke-ass rib and Speedy Weazy just getting back into outdoors. Great skate, beautiful afternoon.

11/28/09 Training: Took it easy at indoor practice and the rest is what it is…

11/29/09 Day Off…11/30/09 Day Off…

I’m thankful for polyurethane, aluminum, carbon fiber, leather, asphalt, concrete, tight-coat, family and friends to skate with and a wife that understands. 

Looks like he's pronating.

Be safe. Eat lots. Skate tomorrow…

11/24/09 Training: Did maybe 75 laps in the rink. Still banged up from the fall on Sunday and getting low and deep breaths were a bit painful.

11/25/09 Training: Fun day with Speedy Weezy - we made puffball Pokemon, marshmallow AK-47’s and a salt-dough exploding volcano. Life is good. As we were prepping our “mad scientist” lab Paul ran upstairs to grab his matching Inline Fitness baseball cap so we could be twins.  

11/26/09 Eating: Lots of it.

It’s that time of the year when my “race weight” goes into its ugly-Elvis phase. I work in a place where it’s hard to avoid caloric overload on a daily basis. I could be broke as a joke but still get 3 hots just by taking a walk around the office at nine, noon and five. No joke. And God-forbid I get sick or sidelined from training, my waist line is wasted.

The New Rollerblade Calorie Machine 5000.

I cringe when I read other skate blogs where they talk about being the “fat kid” at heart, but I have to admit, I’m one too. I could eat crap all day long. I guess it’s incentive to keep skating, so I can eat what I want, when I want, with impunity. But I’m not twelve anymore and eating has consequences beyond the last meal. I wasn’t a “fat kid” but I did balloon when I left home. I definitely got fat before I got thin again, and I don’t want to go back.

This being the week of Thanksgiving, I need to have a plan for avoiding all of the temptation for sweet, baked-goodness. Guess I better put a zip-lock on my lips and keep skating.

11/23/09 Training: Day off. The fall on Sunday banged my stuff up good. I hope to be able to skate later today. Playing it by ear, and locking myself down at my desk so I can’t eat & run in the office.

Inspiration for this post - Frealz! This blog is ROTFLMAO bust-a-gut funny!

Note to self: distractions during drills are dangerous. Even when they’re as benign as a stopwatch. Yesterday at practice, I went down harder than those nasty rumors about Lady GaGa’s true gender identity because I was looking at a stopwatch. Brilliant. I’m glad I didn’t have my iPod strapped to my arm or it would be toast – particularly since I didn’t buy that extended warranty…

She took "skin-suit" a little too literally.

As I was logging on this morning, I ran across a new-to-me blog with a freaking hilarious post on this digital age we live in. This combined with the  USARS ban on electronic devices got me to think about how digital my skating has become:

GPS – Garmin Forerunner: I’m always tracking my skate stats, everything from heart rate, pace, distance and total time to all of the cool stuff I can do with it on-line at Motionbased.com. It’s a part of nearly every training skate outdoors.

 iPod: A must for getting into the speed zone. I don’t think I could have done the big solo-skate without it.

LCD Helmet Light: Yes, I’m a dork. I don’t use it everyday, but it comes in handy when I’m too anxious to wait for first light in the winter months and I want to start rolling before the sun comes up.

Cell-Phone: I never skate without it. When you’re rolling long distance, you never know when you’ll need it. But be warned, you’ll want take it off your elastic waistband before using a Porto-San in your local park.

T-Mobile wouldn't take my phone back after the "incident."

Combine all of the on-board electronics with the web – this blog, other blogs, message boards, Facebook, Twitter and inlinefitness.ning.com and I’d say I’m wired to roll. I’ve got navigation, sound, lights, communications, web-integration and socialization. All I need is a pine-tree air freshener for my skatebag and I’m all set.

11/21/09 Training: Did an hour on the elliptical before heading to the rink for Saturday Morning Speed Club. Wasn’t happy to be tipping the scale with what I’d say is an acceptable post-holiday weight a week BEFORE Thanksgiving. Did 6.6 miles on the elliptical, level 7; 50 laps and left/right drills at the rink. My buddy John came out to Saturday morning indoor. Always good to see and skate with him.

11/22/09 Training: 2 hours indoors. Not the greatest session. Cussed out a twelve year old for throwing a pass during a drill (apologized to her AND her father) and took a spill in the last 30 seconds of practice banging up my brow, jaw, shoulder, elbow, hip, a rib or two and knee. Freaking Brilliant.

Beware the blue-hairs! They’re everywhere around here, and they don’t like to share the road, their tax dollars, or their spot in line at the Wal-Mart Pharmacy. They’re an angry bunch, ready to pipe-off in the opinion column of the local rag about loud Harley pipes, arrogant cyclists, anything Obama, or the local sheriff who lies to the liberal media about Balloon Boy’s family.  And this being the wild west, they don’t hesitate to take matters into their own hands, particularly on the subject of who owns the road.

I was almost taken down by one of them yesterday while road skating near work. It’s a road I skate all the time, and I’m very familiar with it. Maybe too familiar.

These are the long, gradual hills not unlike what we skate on Highway 61 in Duluth.

I was at the top of the hill, and because of the recent snow, the bike lane and shoulder were full of debris. I stayed as far left in the cycle lane as I could so as not to be over the line and in the road as I traversed the hazard, just to be very nearly clipped by a blue-hair in a silver Chevy. She was staying as far right (pun intended) as she could so as to be as close to the bike land line as she could. And when I turned to look, she was looking right at me. And she looked spiteful. Zoinks!

Bloody bladers. Blast 'em.

A lot of cyclists have been injured or died on our local roads this year. More than usual. And it’s situations like this, where the road is wide and the bike lane is dirty, when we who share the shoulder need to be more careful. It would be nice if we could just assume that the person passing in a car would leave a little room between us and them, but it leaves room to be maimed or killed with any such assumption.

So starting tomorrow, I’m going to take a new approach on the road:

A set-up like this would come in so handy on the trail. No more courtesy shouts. “Passing on the left!” turns into a genial “meep, meep.” Like Roadrunner. And if you pretend to not have heard me the first, second and even third time, I can zip right up behind you and trail gate while riding the horn and flashing my high beams with abandon. Wouldn’t need to say a word! With this rig, I’d feel empowered. I wouldn’t need to skate at sunrise to own the trail. Think about how free you’d be to roll in confidence, knowing tha you can give and Lance-wannabe a friendly “toot” as you pass him!

With regard to the road however, when you live here long enough you come to find out that these long-timer’s  are really just ticked-off about all of the local growth that’s turned their once sleepy bedroom and retirement community into a bustling suburbia. But that’s where my empathy stops. You want to take these issues up with your quilting group or your sober friends at The Village Inn, not on the roads. Share the road, leave us some room, or have really, really good insurance.

11/19/09 Training: Skated 14 miles at lunch. It wasn’t as cold as it’s been and I was only about 9 minutes off peak-season training times. I wasn’t trying to get back into peak season shape, but it’s good to know it’s not far off, considering I wasn’t really putting much gusto into my strides. 

P.S. Thanks to Wanderlost for turning me onto Chasers!

News Flash – It’s cold here in Colorado. OK, not such big news, but knowing that winter is pretty well here, it’s getting harder and harder to keep that motivation for outdoor skating up. (See previous blog entries.)

When I was actively losing weight through inline skating, there was nothing that would stop me from skating once the mercury dipped below 32 degrees. But for the past two years now, it’s getting harder and harder mentally to gear up and head out with gloves and a mask on.

I read a great blog this morning that inspired me to jump into the Cult of Snuggie…

Crossovers are cumbersome unless you're wearing a modified Snuggie, as prototyped here.

When they come up with a Snuggie I can use my legs in, I’m all over it. Until then, I think I’ll ask HorseyPants to get me one of the Original Snuggie’s for Christmas. New Years is going to be a lot more fun this year…

11/18/09 Training: Did an hour on the elliptical. The weather at lunch was perfect, but I had an old friend stop by the office for lunch. On the elliptical – Level 9, 6.6 miles. My legs are feeling the familiar burn today. It’s been a while.

A few weeks ago I wrote about Jeff, our LA Thunderbird. After 30 years he’s getting back into skating, but away from Rollerderby and quads and into inline speed skating and blades. Which makes me feel more comfortable skating with him, cause the first time he came at me low and fast I had visions of Rollerball and quickly made a line for the bench!

Rollerderby ain't what it used to be...

What a movie! Blood & Blades on the Rink Floor! With outfits that actually made Rebecca Romijn-Stamos look like a Russian transvestite, LL Cool Jay look like MC Hammer, and Chris Kline look like – um, Charlie Sheen?

Anyway, to help speed his transition we outfitted him with a pair of Rollerblades - rec boots with the hybrid frames that expand. Well, that lasted all of 1 practice. Last night he tried out his first pair of inline speedskates for an hour. Looks like he’s a natural. He’s complaining about all of the right things – right foot wants to dominate, shins are getting tight, quads are burning, left foot doesn’t want to lead on it’s own. All signs that he’s hitting all of the right foundational points.

I can’t wait to see how long it takes till “it happens” – that day when he feels like he’s getting somewhere. The day he says something like “I’m getting the hang of this.” My bet is it won’t be two months before he’s hanging in the pace line on 5 lap drop backs for 100 laps.

11/16/09 Training: Indoor practice. 2 hours of torture. The 100 lap warm up was kept at a brisk pace, which was excellent. However, I made the unfortunate mistake of ramping it up with my 5 laps at 10 to go, not realizing that my former Olympian coach was the one behind me to take the last pull. I dropped at 1 lap to go. The pack pulled away and I lost step. Amazing. 1 mis-stride is all it takes to fall off the train. We also did the tough plyo set, lap the pack and some relays at the end. Great practice.

11/17/09 Training:  Day off sucka!!!

11/18/09 Training: Tuesday night practice, 100 laps and light laps talking to Jeff about his stride and going over some foundation building drills. This guys is going to be fast…

Posted all this hot air the other day about not being ready to hang up my outdoor wheels for the season. That I was going to be on-call for that next outdoor skate no matter what. I was so inspired writing that last post, until I left for work and felt the bone-chill in the air. No one will know if I skip it today…

Yeah, well, so much for that idea. As I’m leisurely walking into the locker room to enjoy a lunchtime in the warmth of the company gym, I see a friend… “Hey man, if you’re gonna be a skate-pro, you’d better go skate this today!” as he’s pointing out the door at the brush weeds blowing over on the west side of our building. “Um, yeah, that’s what I was going to do.” Thus compelled to follow-through on so much hubris from the previous post.

The snow clouds were looming and the temperature just below freezing but clouds had been hanging around all morning and weren’t productive, so I bundled up, geared up and headed out. As I was standing at my tailgate in the parking lot in front of my office, with that day-glow green 2005 NSIM finisher sweatshirt over 3 other layers (I buy a new sweatshirt every year from the cheepster rack at the NSIM Expo) I felt like Ralphie’s little brother Randy from Christmas Story, on skates.

Wait up guys!

Lacing up I notice a few drops of rain hitting the ground, but nothing major. I roll out. The wind was brutal going up the lead hills, but I was just looking forward to a nice push on the way back.

About 6 miles from the office on my usual lunch loop and the rain/snow mixture materialized quickly. And the wind changed direction and intensified. I’m trapped. And the road is getting wetter by the second. I decide it’s not worth it and turn around, short-cutting the loop by 4 miles.

I’m flying back now, wind in my face. The wind seems like it’s coming from everywhere, at once a head, tail and cross wind. Amazing and disorienting. The freezing rain/snow makes it feel like I’m skating into the path of a sandblaster. My glasses are completely wet and I’m getting pelted in the eyes by these micro-needles of rain/snow every time I look over the rim. Seriously, my face is getting numb. And not in a good way.

I’m screaming down the hills I started out on. Literally screaming. I pass my friends Bob & Geoff screaming and they think it’s funny. Peckerheads…

The wind was in my face, and I’m thankful, because I hadn’t counted on the roads being wet coming back. The downhill in this section is a pretty steep grade. The wind is slowing me somewhat, but I’m having a hard time controlling my speed with T-stops. I think I’m actually accelerating when I’m trying to stop. At least there aren’t any cars…whoops, spoke too soon. Luckily, they let me slide in front of them to clear the lot they’re pulling into.

The road flattens just enough for me to gain control as I need to bank into the front parking lot at work. As I roll into the lot wiping my glasses with my gloved finger, I think maybe no one will see me…until I spot the damn NSIM sweatshirt reflection in the window. 

As I return to my tailgate, having cut the skate to a mere 9 miles, I start looking for a pole to stick my tongue to. I feel like I’ve gone through with a double-dog dare, but one only a jackass would have accepted…

I’ll still keep the skates in the trunk, but I put them away wet, so I might have a convenient excuse to stay inside next time and eat some turkey with Bumpas’ dogs.

11/13/09 Training: 8.75 miles in the snow and rain. Forecast for weekend is coming true. (They;re getting better at predicting the snow!)

11/14/09 Training: 1.5 hours in the rink this morning. Did 100 laps, right/left leg pushes and worked on cornering technique. Really ramped up the pace on the 100 laps today. It felt good. Finished in about 20 minutes.

A friend of mine posted this at Facebook about 12 hours ago: “Looks like tomorrow, Saturday and Sunday will all be “yucky” days…” Upon reading her post I was thankful my friend John and I were able to get a great 10 mile lunch skate in out at Boyd Lake St(k)ate Park earlier. And while not  typically a person known to look at a weather forecast (we live in Colorado where we say, ”If you don’t like the weather, wait five minutes it’ll change,”) I took what my friend’s Facebook post said and filed it away in my memory bank. Tomorrow as a sk8 day was a washout.

Sure enough, the usual waking hour rolled around and the eyes popped open. This is typically 2 hours before the sun comes up. In the time between waking and sunrise one can do many things: get juiced on java, poke around on Facebook, catch up or get ahead of a workload, workout, do some reading…lot’s of options. But not today. Today was a day of reflection and near defeat. The thought that the outdoor season might actually be coming to a close has started to become a reality. I hate this time of the year. Perish the thought – damn you, damn you miserable thought. I was ready to call it a season.

Winter training! Months of elliptical hell. Hours of slideboard and Gazelle gliding. The smell of the rink, which recalls thousands of sweaty feet, Lysol, spilled sodas, Teen Spirit and stale popcorn every time you walk through the door. All are poor substitutes for the fresh Colorado outdoors, and dampen my enthusiasm for our beloved sport. Mmmm, somewhat.

I bought my Gazelle Edge for $10. Best excercise equipment I've ever owned.

Similar I imagine to a  child with her blankie or the lord of the crack-house couch, a stubborn refusal to relinquish my outdoor skates takes hold and irrational thoughts of justifiable homicidal rage supplant sanity…

Indoor skates are my Methadone for these.

Hell no. I will not lie down. I will not go quietly into the bleakness of the winter night. I’ll  live for the next outdoor skate, with my eyes and hopes fixed on the heavens above. Pray Lord, keep the damn snow to yourself.

This is the time of year I’m most reminded of how spoiled we are here in Colorado the rest of the year. This is a perfect state for a sk8er. But thanks to my recent trip to Florida, I’m now somewhat resentful of the sunshine state. There are BETTER states to live in if you want to skate outdoors year-round. I guess that’s a discussion I’ll need to have with HorseyPants – where to retire. Until then, I’ll keep my outdoor skates in my trunk, ready to roll, waiting for that next perfect day. Call them my security blanket. Touch them and your toast!

11/12/09 Training: 10 miles outdoors at Boyd Lake with John. John is a runner who skates, and skates really well. He and I skated Duluth to our personal bests two years ago and he would have done the same again this year but he’d suffered through knee problems all season, so he took time off. He’d been skating on a certain brand of skates that have a 10 degree cant, and over long distances they created undue pressure on his knees, causing injuries that just wouldn’t heal. He’s on a pair of Powerslides now and the pain is gone. His skating is strong – he hasn’t missed a stride! But I’m bummed – he’s moving to California in March. Guess I’ll catch up with him in Duluth. If anyone knows of good skating spots around Mt. Shasta, please let me know.

When I see pictures of male inline skaters, like this one of me from my recent trip to Florida, I cringe.

The hardest part of inline skating is telling your family you're gay.

Let’s face it – it’s not a “tough” looking sport. And the buffer you are, the more you look like the “lost” 7th Village People person.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I guess…

Anyway, the best chance we have of looking cool is a good action shot. But it’s really hard to be prepared for those cameras. But when they do catch you, and you’re in good form, it can make all the training worth it. At least it does for me. But man, we’ve all seen or been the subject of some pretty tragic action skating shots. It’s comical. I’d love to start collecting embarrassing skate shots. That would be fun.

11/10/09 Training: At lunch I did a full, extended plyo set; Evening went to the rink for 100 laps.

11/9/09 Training: Day off

Send your bad action shots to: chowley@markination.com! And when I see you in Duluth, maybe we can do the hand motions to YMCA together in a pace line!

updated:

The weather’s been beautiful since last week!  It was a little windy when I skated Saturday, but this morning was perfect.  I did “my usual” – four laps on the Katy Trail.  I skated by myself the first three, but caught a guy on a mountain bike miles 21.5 to 24.5 (he was heavily checking out female runners and seemed a bit annoyed I was following him – though he said it was ok), and another (much more gracious) mountain biker for the last 3.5 miles.

It’s hard to believe it’s November.  Gotta skate while the skatin’s good!  One hundred fifty miles to go (to make 1000 for the year).

I’m about to go over to Friends of the Katy Trail and politely kvetch about the newly-installed pavers at Snyder Union.  They are square pave-stones, almost parallel to the trail with a strong radius on the edges.  The net effect is to force your skate into the groove – a real bear if other people are on the trail.  This kind of thing isn’t unusual on streets designed for cars, but I think its inexcusable on a supposedly-skate-friendly exercise trail. If you’re a Dallas-area skater that uses Katy Trail I encourage you to leave “KT” a note too.  Click the link above, then click “Ask KT”.

850 miles / 1368 km YTD
166.2 lbs  / 75.4 kg

No, I didn’t lose interest in the blog. I’ve been on vacation for the last two weeks. Didn’t really want to engage in anything that looked like work, and that includes blogging. But I’m back. Sitting here watching NSC#1 – the first race, the 500 meter, all 5 skaters went down at turn 1. Mantia went down twice, knocked himself out of the race. Rough man.

Anyway – vacation. Flew the CO coop and spent 7 sun filled days in Naples, Florida. Spectacular weather! We got out of Colorado just ahead of 22 freaking inches of snow!

Not Colorado but an incredible simulation.

Could not have planned any better. Hat’s off to HorseyPants!

Here’s a recap of my sk8 training, which I’m happy to say, I didn’t have to pause at all!

Point 1: Just a friendly word of advice, don’t increase your plyo reps a level 2 days before you travel (particularly if you’ve got a long flight and a lay-over with two young children!)

These benches don't move and the power outlets are few and far between.

That’s a photo of Hartsfield in Atlanta, and those benches were not offering any comfort. I was very stiff and sore, my iPod needed juice and my son needed a nap. Wahhhh. But all things considered, this was the worst part of the trip and it could have been worse.

Sk8 at your own risk.

10/27/09: The Arrival

Pulling into my mother-in-law’s gated community, I was immediately struck by how smooth the streets were. Couldn’t wait to skate through the development, it’s truly top-notch. Over 1,000 acres of beautiful landscaping, lakes and nature preserves. They have several huge, lighted lake fountains located throughout that are quite photogenic.

Migrating birds love these spots.

It was dark when we arrived. I fought the urge to go skate by lamp light. Couldn’t wait to get out and skate in the morning.

Got my gear ready for the morning before going to bed. Went to change the regional settings on my Garmin Forerunner and discovered that there is a time-zone called US – Atlantic, which is not EST, thus it the timezone I needed to use because I couldn’t get the Garmin to give me the right time on EST. Guess it has someting to do with being on the Gulf Coast of FL. I still mean to look into this further…

10/28/09: Training

OK, got up at the crack of dawn, geared up, got out to discover that south-western Florida is moist. It’s wet overnight. Not just from the many, many sprinklers, but if the non-hurrican rain is going to come, it happens overnight. So it was hot, humid and the ground was wet. Better than freezing cold, snowy and icy, eh? So all things considered, it wasn’t that bad, and it was drier toward the middle of the road. That’s where I headed to. But that’s not a safe place to stay, even in the early morning. The speed limit in the development is 30 mph, the bike lanes are very narrow, and the old folks in their Mercedes Benz, Bentley’s, Bimmers and Jags don’t like to drive slow (nasty stereotype) and they REALLY don’t like to wait for skaters in the middle of THEIR private road. (Based on my age and activity, they knew I didn’t belong.) Time to hit the sidewalks…

The sidewalks that were very wet from overnight landscape watering. Also very slick from the run-off from some kind of tree. It was like an oil slick under these trees. This was turning into a bummer. Made a retreat back to my mother-in-law’s court.

Skated 15 miles when it was all said and done. Most of it doing laps in the court, which was really smooth, dry, oil free and capped at both ends by round-abouts. Cool. At least I’ve got a safe place to train, and I’ll be able to keep up with cornering technique training without being in the rink. I can handle this.

10/29/09: Training

17 miles in the court. Worked on corners and integrating Eddie Matzger’s double push technique into my own. It’s not that I’m special, it’s that I’ve studied Chad Hedrick’s double push, and I’ve learned that you really need to develop a certain amount naturally before trying to apply any type of coaching to your double push technique. And you should take input from many sources, find what works for you, and practice the heck out of doing what feels most natural and right for a steady flow - and practice it SLOWLY. Slowly at first, building confidence and comfort, building competence and speed. 

Looked like most of the trip was going to be spent showing off for my mother-in-law’s neighbors in the court – but I’m not complaining…too much, yet.

I would skate the corkscrew, but I wouldn't want to disturb the gators.

10/30/09: Training

24 miles of trail skating. We were out doing family vacation stuff the day before. Actually, went up to the Corkscrew Swamp - the Audubon Society’s Crown Jewel – and on the way back, I noticed that there was a significant amount of trail to be had along Immokalee Road. Well, it wasn’t ideal, as I had to cross over Immokalee Road several times, but the trails were smooth and I was able to get some good point-to-point distance in. Spend a lot of time on the double push technique and just enjoying a Long Slow Skate (LSS). The weather was perfect.

10/31/09: Training

21 miles in the court. It was Halloween so I knew a lot of refined sugar was on the day’s menu, and the night before, HorseyPants & I ate at a great french bistro in downtown Naples called the Bamboo Cafe. I ate, well, I ate well, like I was on vacation! Do yourself a favor – go there and order the specials. (That’s how the locals do it – Tony Bourdain would be proud of how we ordered. Not so much of the restaurant, but the way we handled ourselves – truly No Rez!)

Sk8 time was spent on double push and corners. Listened to the whole Lady GaGa album during the workout and was well, shocked, SHOCKED at some of the things I heard. Oh my…Poker Face indeed.

11/1/09: Training

REVENGE OF THE MORNING PEOPLE! Finally – the day I’ve been waiting for. The clocks rolled back overnight, so there was extra time to, um, sk8!

30 miles at North Collier Regional Park

We spent the previous day at Sun-N-Fun Lagoon Water Park. WHAT A BLAST! And from the top of the water slide tower, I spied what looked like a closed-loop course around a small pond (on the right in the photo below.) Looked like it would be a nice change from the court, so decided I’d come back to skate it the next day.

Lots of black top to roll!

Well, the closed loop was there, but part of it was Trex deck over a swamp and at 6 am, it was wet and very slick. HorseyPants had dropped me off, so I was thinking this was going to be a very boring skate until I figured out that there was a lot more park and lots more black top to roll. The photo above shows the entire complex, from the water park to the soccer and baseball fields. The day before, I didn’t know any of the rest of the park beyond Sun-N-Fun existed.

So…at 6 am, there was no one in the park, a stray jogger here and there. More importantly, no traffic in the entire complex. It was mine, all mine and it wasn’t all wet! For about an hour I owned it. And I was able to maintain some serious speed for a while. Wasn’t worrying about “practice” as much as I was just having fun owning the road and dropping the hammer down. At one point, a bunch of Harley’s showed up, (several 81’s in the crowd,) and took part of the course I was skating for an MDA Bike Rally. I wasn’t about to interfere. I was able to get 28 miles in before skating up to the Publix on 42 to meet HorseyPants. Great sk8ing.

11/2/09: Day Off

Well, it is a vacation! We went to the beach early. Spent the entire morning & early afternoon at the Naples Public Beach down at the Pier.

City Pier Naples, FL. Sunset here must be on your bucket list.

It was time well spent. The kids fell in love with the surf this day. They learned how to ride waves (which is much kinder on the Gulf than it is on the Atlantic!) We built killer sand castles, found really cool shells, watched a family of dolphins in their natural environment, and had a real beach day. I’ll never forget it.

11/3/09: Training

15 miles in the court, worked on double push and corners. Last day in Florida, and it was the first day where the weather was anything less than ideal. Drizzle and overcast. Was thinking it would burn off as the sun came up but it didn’t happen. And that was fine. It had been a great trip. Almost ran over a lizard though, on the last loop of the last skate of the trip. The damn things are everywhere.

Off to the airport – see you next year Naples!

And I’ve been skating just about every day since our return. The snow was gone and CO weather was perfect for the rest of the week:

11/4/09: Training

15 miles in the hood on the new skates thanks to my good friends at Rollerblade.

These skates are sweet - right out of the box. Rollerblade Rocks.

Thanks Rollerblade - being First Loser has it’s benefits after all! You know – a quick plug here – there isn’t anyone doing more to support the sport here in the US than Rollerblade USA. Think about it…and give them the credit they deserve.

11/5/09: Training

Day off – HorseyPants‘ Birthday! I’m in love with AN OLDER woman…

11/6/09: Training

100 laps indoors at Rollerland, 10 miles on the trails in Fort Collins.

11/7/09: Training

17 miles in the hood & first indoor practice in 2 weeks.

11/8/09: Training

30 miles on the trail in Loveland; 2 hours indoors after. 

Sk8, blah, blah, sk8, sk8, sk8

I’m back but took today off. Just watched NSC #1 – Initiation. Who the heck in Justin Stelly (sp?) WOW! Hasn’t been on his inline skates since indoor nationals, has been doing nothing but ice, and completely dominated all of them – Mantia, Horne, Carter, all of them. Wow. Maybe there is something to this ice thing…there is that practice on Wednesday.

Morning: Took a camera with me on a loop around the office I work in. (It’s three floors, about 25,000 sq. feet of office with about 225-250 workers.) If you thought I was kidding about the sweets & treats…

Tell me where Hot Wings fit into the picture at 8:30 in the morning?

This was the jump off point – 3rd floor, NW corner.

This is where my bag of Smarties ended up.

Stop two – remember this is a descending loop I’m running here. NE corner 3rd floor.

So far, I’ve shown you the doughnuts and Smarties I spoke of the other day. Folks – this is two days after that post, and all of the foodstuffs are FRESH!

A brownie plate already clobbered before 9 a.m.

Floor 2, SE corner…

The crepes must have been real flakey good - they were already gone!

The sausages were on the SW corner of the 2nd floor. At this point, I had to get back to my desk. If I had gone to the 1st floor, you would have been in our cafe. Yes, we have a cafe in the building. A full cafe – it’s Loveland’s Favorite Place to Eat Lunch! 

Don't forget the homemade banana bread!

I forget where this one was taken, but it was on the same run through, on the way back to my desk.

I gained 5 lbs. on the walk, so I decided I needed to skate at lunchtime. No, I didn’t eat any of it, I gained weight just by looking at it all!

The weather cooperated, so I went to skate…

Noon: Just a simple 1 hour skate in and around the neighborhood where I work. I do this loop all the time. There are some really good, long, gradual hills. I’ll post pics sometime. Anyway, there was a slight headwind, so being in my fitness boots I got an extra good workout. Which, after having fought off all that temptation earlier, felt extra rewarding! But on the way back my right front nub of a wheel caught a crack and I went down in the street. I was wearing full armor, so my hands, elbows and knees were fine, but I twisted going down and caught a nice case of road rash on my right hip. I was wearing my tights so it wasn’t that bad, but it’s burning this morning. Need to go put more triple-antibiotic (boo-boo stuff) on it.

Where was this boo-boo stuff when I was growing up? I NEVER remember my mother using it on me. I don’t even think I knew it existed before I became a parent. In any event, I keep tubes of it everywhere. Boo-boo stuff is the best!

GOAL ACHIEVED: I work in an office where candy and treats are abundant. You could quite literally go into work having had nothing to eat and find enough free food on any given day to end up quite full, fat & happy.

I’ve been doing a good job of avoiding the sweets lately. It’s definitely an effort. I have a sweet tooth. I was doing fine till Monday, when a friend who works with me brought in a 1 lb. bag of Smarties.

Snorting them has crossed my mind.

Something about the Dextrose fueled goodness of that little tube of sugar drives me wild, to the point where I’ll eat so many in one sitting (open one end, slide the entire pack onto my tongue) that my upper lip will sweat and my tongue will burn. And once the sugar demon is loose, I crave more.

Breakfast of Champions...NOT!

On Tuesday it drove me to seek additional sweets and treats around the office and I found myself having consumed 15 rolls of Smarties, a doughnut and 2 Pennsylvania Dutch, home-made moon pies by 11:30 IN THE MORNING! Out of control. Gained 3 lbs. since Monday.

So yesterday I took the bag of Smarties and gave them to someone else. I set a goal for myself: just for today, I won’t have any sweets or treats. I then went about my day. I walked right on by every candy bowl and open box of Krispy Kreams. I was able to get through the entire day without indulging! But don’t you know it – at 5 pm I was thinking “Great job…maybe you could have just one!” WHACK – back to reality…but I didn’t have it. For me, one is too many and a thousand not enough.

Noon: Went for an hour-long skate in my fitness skates. Kept the cuffs loose so I could get more freedom of movement and it felt great. Nice to get another day to skate outside in CO. And the 3lbs. gain wasn’t permanent, and I’m already feeling better. Whew – dodged a bullet, but its a daily struggle.
One day at a time…let it roll.

FWIW: Chad Hedrick is an official First Loser of 2009 as a result of the 5,000 meters 2010 Olympic time trials last night, second to Shani Davis by two-hundredths of a second. I guess I’m in good company.

Evening: Just finished 25 minutes on the slideboard. It’s hard trying to get back into using this thing regularly. It means that winter training is OFFICIALLY here. I was somehow hoping the weather in CO would hold out longer this year, despite being told over and over that the Old Farmer’s Almanac is calling for a bad winter here.

Anyway – the hour was well spent. Worked on really keeping low in a proper seat, sitting in the heel, strong arm swings and precise recovery. Had to mix it up a bit, my back was getting a little tight. Good workout. Can’t wait to go skating in Florida next week!

For blogging under the name “Running Muslimah,” I sure haven’t been doing a whole lot of running, have I? Well, I ran today! Ms. Bonaparte and I ran until we wanted to die, walked until we didn’t, ran until near fatal heart palpitations, rinse, repeat. It was beautiful.

Earlier this morning, at 8 AM, I finally took the plunge and skated around the university campus. It was insanely fun and 30 minutes later I had done a round of the entire campus and was feeling pretty groovy, albeit quite sweaty. Not the best thing to do right before class, note to self. Two campuses in two days, one pair of skates, what will they conquer next?

Supernatural was already underway when I arrived home, but I will watch the sacrilegious shenanigans of the dynamic demon-decimating duo and their unholy tax accountant…tomorrow, tentatively.

I adore alliteration.

Here is my un edited report on the Sweden Race we did in July.

1069km of Mountain biking, Inline Skating, Kayaking, Trekking, Orienteering, Swimming, Canoeing, White Water Rafting.

Months ago we decided to race in Explore Sweden, the longest Adventure Race in the world.  It was billing itself as ‘The Monster’ so we knew we were in for a tough ride, but that was all months away, plenty of time to train and prepare, it’ll be fine we thought.

As soon as we knew it, it was on us, breathing down our necks, time had come for us to head out to Sundsvall in North Sweden to take on the race Mikael Nordstrom had set.

First we had to get there, with a lot of kit needed for the event we decided to drive a van out from the UK, John Laughlin (JB), Marty Lee and I took on this task, and over 3 days of driving we made it to the race hotel.  It was a long journey, but we were fresh, could rotate the driving and the roads were clear.  Nicola MacLeod, Nick Gracie and Nicola Wiseman flew out to meet us there.  Being a supported race we had 2 able bodies to look after our every whim, neither Marty nor Nicola W had done anything like this, so they were in for a shock.

Many people ask me why I do these events, and at times its hard to explain, but when you are standing on the start line of a huge race like this, with 80 other top athletes, knowing you are about to race for 5 days non stop with little sleep, to fall asleep on your bike, have your team mates shout at you, be in terrible pain, be very cold and hungry, it kind of feels good.  Where else could you get that feeling, to push yourself to the limit, to see what your body is capable of doing, all the while with 3 great friends, I think that’s why I do it, but I often question myself mid race as to why I’m not sat on a sofa playing computer games!

There were the usual pre race kit checks for all teams, this was carried out in the centre of town under a very hot sun, everyone was worried it would be this hot during the race causing us all to struggle.  The pre race briefing was held and the race director told us we were in for the ride of our lives, it was going to be really tough, he had pulled out all the stops on this one.

Friday was another hot day, and with teams stood around for an hour before the start for the parade and introduction, every bit of shade was being sought.  At 10minutes to go we got the maps for the first section, so after a quick check of what we were doing we were off and running to the first control, and the start of the uphill inline skate section.  Sadly it was mandatory for us to wear the skates all the way up the hill, and due to this we were dead last, not really the start we wanted, but the start we expected.  The Scandinavians were flying up the hill in supreme fashion, and we could only look on in awe as they eased into a big lead.

A short orienteering section followed, getting back to town not quite in last place was good, then it was a roof top traverse, with some great views over the city.  A longer orienteering loop followed heading into some technical terrain, followed by a run to the harbour and swim across the mouth and back to the main transition.  My flippers got broken here, and I handed them over to Marty who did an awesome job of mending them for the next section.

Setting off on the first bike section, a 100km loop we were going well, in touch with a number of teams, but then John was sick, too much fluid consumed in the heat and it all came back, followed by some bad cramp, but then we were off, all feeling ok and getting through the section.  We were still way down the leader board, but feeling not too bad about it, we still had almost 900km to go!

The 2^nd inline skate section was a simple mainly downhill road, again we were very slow, with little confidence in our ability, and the knowledge that if we fell we could really hurt ourselves.  With that over it was a short swim across a marsh and river into Mid Adventure, a wee adventure playground type place, with ropes course, water slide, running track and some pumping tunes coming out from the party tent, all in all a pretty cool atmosphere.

With this out of the way it was back onto the bikes for the first Monster Bike 250km on the bike.  The navigation was very easy, and the road surfaces were good, so it was just a case of churning out the distance.  We started the section at midnight, so we had the tiredness feeling of the first nights missed sleep, but we pushed on as hard as we could while it was nice and cool.  We had a few wee rests, 15minutes maximum to get some sleep, but kept the pace going the rest of the time.  Sadly I was having a bad day on the bike, there seemed to be nothing in my legs, I had a hollow feeling and couldn’t seem to put down any power as we rode along.  This was not a good time for this to happen as it made the ride really long.  The ride wasn’t very interesting, we rode past some nice lakes, through a lot of trees, and then at the end we had a lot of climb, it was a tough last few hours, and the transition was at the top of the steepest hill.  It was only when we crested this that we could actually see into the mountains and what lay ahead.

We had been racing for over 24hours at this point, so we quickly put our heads down for 45mins of sleep, slightly refreshed we donned mountain kit and heavy bags and yomped off into the 60km mountain stage, glad to not be sitting down!

The sun was beating down on us, and with no shade it was going to be a tough section.  A wee rest at the Helags Hytte almost saw me stop, they were serving an amazing buffet, and I was very tempted!  But we pushed on up the mountain, not taking the best route sadly as I misinterpreted where the checkpoint had moved to.  We were due to do an ice climb up a gully, but it had been cancelled due to rock falls minutes before Lundhags had been due to ascend, a very close call.

The wee glacier walk we did have was fun, but turned out we didn’t really need our big boots, and as a consequence of everyone else doing it in trainers we were a bit slower, and had to carry them the whole way too.  After the glacier we ran well to the next cp, overtaking a number of teams, this is where our race really got going, sitting in 17^th place we steadily overtook teams for the next few days.

Climbing up to the next ridge was tough going and the mosquitos were incessant, but once up onto the snow it was ok.  The sun had set and the sky was amazing, (light really wasn’t an issue in this race, I think I used my head torch once in 5 days), and as we reached the next cp we were told to rope up for a long ridge line section, it was a tough climb but then the views we were rewarded with were simply stunning, soon after the clouds rolled in, making navigation tricky on a ridge line with many spurs leading off, but when the clouds cleared we were given even more stunning views.

After a number of hours of the ridge, we had to drop back to the valley, this was either to be tip toeing over many rocks, or sitting on bums and sliding down a huge snow bowl and using our ice axe as a brake!

A long trek to transition followed; with the sun still beating down it toasted John, who had to call in the favour of pushing me the day before, so with JB on tow we pushed out of the stage to get to cool water as soon as possible.

The cycle stage from here was really rough, small fist sized gravel made for tricky riding, and drafting, flicking stones up into following faces.  After 10km the gravel turned into brand new tarmac, the smoothest road in the whole race, for a fantastic downhill clocking a speed of 65km/h.

We pushed hard on this stage as we knew we had a sleep card of 8hours coming up at the next transition.  Our superb support crew already had the tents up ready for us, so with the sleep card handed in we grabbed a few hours sleep, thankfully out of the awful midges.  After the rest we jumped into nice and damp wetsuits, body armour and fins, and jumped into a lake. There followed a few kilometres of flat water, during which Nick and myself were towed behind JB and Nicola, a tougher ride for them than they expected.

The rapids we finally hit were awesome fun, zooming down over big waves, the odd crunch on a rock, and fast flowing water.  JB had a huge smile at the end of the section; he’d loved the boating down the river.

It was back onto bikes again, with a transition next to a main road, many drivers got to see more then they bargained for, Marty told us that a previous team had stripped naked and wondered around for a minute or 2, causing a slightly slower queue of traffic!

Another blast along a road, to get to Åre, with simple navigation it was a case of peddling in a nice line and moving as smoothly as we could.  For this ride we were almost wanting to cycle backwards as we knew there was another inline skate section coming up.  The transition was in the centre of Åre, bringing some interest from passers by wondering what all the commotion was about.   This transition was used later, so we saw a few teams coming down off the mountain on their downhill bikes, it looked great fun and we couldn’t wait to get onto them.

The inline skates beckoned first, and with a tricky downhill bumpy start road, Nick had a coming together with the road after clearing most of the obstacles, but he quickly brushed himself off and carried on.  Most of the section was uphill however, so we soon ditched the skates and set off walking, this made even more sense when the heavens opened on us.

Dropping the skates off at the gear zone we carried on running into the hills, this was to be the 2^nd and only other trekking section, it was only short, but had a lot of climb in it.  We took a great route choice missing out the biggest hill and coming yup the valley, slightly off the best line, but we still caught 1 team up, and almost another.  With a final scramble over some snow and a steep climb we arrived at the top of the cable car for the final section of the Åre loop, a downhill mountain bike.  900m of vertical descent separated us from the town, and we were looking forward to getting down the mountain.  As we got our kit ready a huge storm was moving in, stunning lightning and thunder was crashing around us, we wanted off the mountain.  The top section was great fun, some good jumps and berms, but with brakes on the bikes set the Euro way you had to really concentrate (or just not brake!)

Nicola had a wee fall, and struggled to get the bike off her leg, JB was on hand to help.  We had hired full on downhill bikes for this section, to great relief seeing the course, but none of us were used to the weight of them, we gradually warmed to them with JB having the biggest smile I’ve ever seen on his face.  Sadly the storm caught us, and halfway down we hit cloud and couldn’t see a thing, then the rain came, it was like buckets being poured over our heads, and we were totally drenched, then with fast sections down gravel roads we became covered in mud, our eyes stinging with the pain of rain and stones being flung into them.  Keeping together was very tricky, and with the lightning cracking overhead we were briefly lit up, but otherwise it was very dark.  I managed to miss the turn into town, and had a 2km ride added on to get back to the centre.

Once we were all back, soaking wet, but happy we decided we needed to seek some shelter, an open canoe section followed, and we didn’t want to be on a lake in the lightning, so Nicola found an outdoor shop with a porch and balcony, so our super support crew put our tents out, and we crashed for a few hours, waking up to good dry conditions.

We got ready and carried out boats to the lake, I don’t think we took the best route, as we ended up crossing the trainline at the station, but soon we were in the water and away in the fast canoes we had.

It was a beautiful morning, nice and fresh, and perfect for a fast paddle.  We had about 20km to go with a few sections of rapids.  JB was helming our boat, with Nick and Nicola in the other.  Hitting the first set of rapids, just grade 1, we had a great time, JB was doing really well, and we looked forward to the grade 2 section.  As we hurtled down the next rapids, we crunched onto a rock, but it caused no problems, and we were very glad to get through it, passing a team at the side getting changed after an early morning swim!

Marty was on hand with instructions at the end, and was we carried the boats to the transition he filled us in with what lay ahead.  A quick change to bike kit and climbing kit ready for a traverse across the huge waterfall in the river followed, but as we approached the staff they told us the crossing was closed due to the weather, maybe a blessing in disguise as they are tough work, but it looked pretty cool.

We jumped onto the bikes and headed 4km round on the road, and climbed a large hill heading for the white water raft, we didn’t expect too big a climb, but the river turned out to be the steepest runnable river in Sweden, so it was hard work on the bike.  A super fast transition to paddle kit, aided by millions of midges saw us almost catch 2 other teams.  As we ran along the road to the put in, we were reeling them in.  We changed into wetsuits, doing so very quickly in a midge infested forest, a short safety briefing followed, then it was into the water.  We had a guide, but he would only paddle in the white water, and couldn’t help carry the boat.
Once on the river it was welcome relief from bugs, and as we approached the first rapid we were getting excited, the rapids were big, but the river is a spring melt river, so we were about a month too late for perfect conditions.

After an hour of great paddling our guide leapt out of the boat and we were on our own for the final few km, this was a tricky shallow river with lots of rocks to hinder our progress, followed by 2km of a lake.  White water rafts are not designed to for this and it was tough work getting it back to the end of the section.

At this transition we had to wait out our remaining sleep card allocation of 8hours, we had about 2 left, so it was straight to sleep for a bit and recharge out batteries for the longest section of the race, a 270km bike stage to Solefteå.

Jumping on the bikes again was tough, knowing we’d be on them for such a long time, but we started out well, sitting tightly together for most of the first section, and with just 1 wee route error we overtook one very tired looking team and raced on to catch up Team Explore, a very good team having a bad race.  We caught them at a ferry crossing, one of 2 we had to get, a 10 minute crossing to an island, then a timetrial 3km to get to the other side of the island for the next ferry, Nick managed to hang onto the fast Swedes and held the ferry up so we could all get on.  I think it must be one of the fastest bike sections of any expedition race.

Once off the ferries it was a further 160km to the end of the stage, so we chatted to Team Explore for a while, then set up a rolling line so we could take it in turns at the front, this meant we were both a lot faster than we would have been, and it was great to ride with other people, we had some great banter, some interesting singing, with the Swedes putting out their National Anthem in euphoric style.

Frederik from Team Explore was from the area we were riding through, and his mum, dad and cousin were all out at the road side cheering us on, it was brilliant, so good to have support from new friends.

Stopping at a petrol station our hopes for some food were dashed when we discovered it was an automatic petrol only stop!  A kind lady filling her car did give us some chocolates, and we met the local burger bar owner, who had sadly closed for the night.  He told us it would take too long to open up, but he’d pop home, grab us some hot dogs and catch us up.  15 minutes later he pulled up alongside us and handed us some cold ‘hotdog’ sausages, and boy were they tasty.

Riding uphill forever it seemed we reached the only CP on the whole stage, and as we did this we caught a glimpse of the Norwegian team a few hundred metres ahead of us.  Team Explore thought we’d drop them as Rick was suffering with a strained knee, but sadly JB’s brain decided it was time for a break, and shutdown, leaving us with 30km to the end, a lot of fast down hill, and drizzle to contend with while trying to keep him awake.  This is certainly one of the toughest things in a long race, managing your tiredness, we knew we had to rest, but if we’d have stopped here we would all get cold and wet and struggle to get going again.  So for the best part of an hour, Nick, Nicola and myself shouted at the top of our voices and beasted JB to keep him on the road, at times he came close to going off the edge, and at speeds of up to 50km/h this would have been a clear race stopper for us.  To keep him engaged I had him describing all he could see, at one point this was some elephants, giraffes and rhinos, he was lucid enough to say that I probably couldn’t see them however, but it didn’t stop him putting his foot down when I told him they were stampeding!

Nicola and Marty had left us some food and drink at the next gear pick up, where we grabbed our canoe paddles, jumped onto a raft and paddled across the river, pushed our bikes along the far bank, and then paddled back.  JB had woken up again after a can of coke and some single-track riding.  I was starting to get very tired though; 13hours of riding was taking its toll.  The navigation on this section was annoying, and I let it wind me up, getting more and more frustrated as we went, finally getting into town and an hour of mandatory rest, bliss.

Going straight to sleep in a big dry tent was great, but when we woke after what seemed like 30seconds my knees had solidified it felt, and I was feeling very low.  With heavy rain outside, and inline skate section coming up and my knees hurting it was that point I wanted to crawl back into my sleeping bag and forget it all.  Nick JB and Nicola had other ideas, gave me no sympathy and told me to man up, which I did with a couple of strong painkillers and telling from Doc Nic.

The rain was lashing down and we had an uphill inline skate, not what we really fancied doing at 5am on a set Tuesday morning.  As we set out up the hill Team Explore came hurtling down the road, we had lost an hour to them with JB falling asleep and the nav issues after the rafts.

The skates were off again soon after, and we walked to the top of the hill and started the orienteering section, this was some of the trickiest nav in the race, and I was very pleased to hit everything very smoothly.  Getting back into town we put the skates back on and got the final checkpoint before doing a fast transition and heading out on the next orienteering loop.  This included a tough climbing wall that 2 people had to complete.  I went first, knowing I only had 1 chance before my arms gave up and ran up the wall with JB pulling the slack rope in as fast as he could, which meant running back a fair way.  The same technique was applied to get Nick up the wall, and soon we were on our way again.

The navigation was tricky again with across slope controls, but we managed to get them all pretty cleanly, and felt we had pushed well on this section forgetting the issues we’d had the previous night.

Back on the bikes we headed to the sailing.  The trails were tricky to follow on this leg with many teams falling foul of a wrong turn, we somehow missed a left turn and added 10mins onto our time, but we still took time out of Team Explore and overtook the Finns for the first time.

We had ridden hard on this stage, and caught Marty and Nicola out, but within seconds they had the situation in hand again and guided us safely through transition and into our ‘Fisher Price’ sailing boats.  The river we were heading down had some good flow, which was useful as the wind was poor, but it soon picked up and Nicola, our supreme sailor, set about catching up the teams ahead.  By halfway we had taken 50minutes out of Team Explore and things were looking good.  We had a wee portage around a bridge, and when we put back in again the wind had gone.   We were disappointed with this, but Nicola kept managing to find a few wee gusts, but then it became aware we would have to use the paddles.

We had had some good rest and food, but the Finns seemed to be on a mission, and they soon caught us and passed us, and knowing there was an inline skate section ahead we didn’t push too hard as they would destroy us on that section anyway.

The paddle seemed to last a lifetime, and then finally the end came into sight, and that great sight of Nicola and Marty greeted us once again.  Once out of the boat we carried it up the slope to transition, and we were all happy to never see it again, it had done us well, but was incredibly cramped for 4 big people.

A leisurely transition followed, we knew we couldn’t catch the Finns ahead, and that we had a large gap behind us.  It was also an inline skate section, so none of us were rushing to get going on it.  After getting warm dry kit on, and once again leaving Marty and Nicola the job of cleaning up after 4 toddlers, we set off across the bridge then up a big climb.  It was a busy road which wasn’t overly nice to skate on with the control we had, but after the climb was completed it was mainly downhill to the next transition.

We took 2 hours for this section, an hour behind the fastest teams; this is something we really need to work on if we are to race on skates again.  I quite enjoyed it, and intend to practice more to get to a reasonable level on them.

Coming into the penultimate transition we started to feel like we were almost there, we could see the finish hotel up on the hill, and had a short pack raft to take us into town, which was very uneventful, and then a climb on the bikes to the finish.

240m of climb lay ahead, but it was all on tarmac, so a gentle pace was set as we rode to the end of Explore Sweden.  We finished in a time of 121hr 39minutes, about 18hours behind the leaders, but happy in 8^th place after a great race.  We had had a few issues, but nothing too major, we had all had fun and enjoyed everything that the race had thrown at us.

It had been a long race, and we were all pretty shattered, totalling about 10hours of sleep we crawled into the hotel and jumped into a shower before heading into town to grab a well deserved steak for lunch.

The race was epic, so much stuff thrown into one race, some of the longest stages ever in a race, and some of the most fun.  We all really enjoyed it, but none of us would have been able to race if it wasn’t for the fantastic support that we had from Marty Lee and Nicola Wiseman.  They had never done a supported race, but right from the start they were world class, catering to our every whim, always ready for us with a smile, a cup of tea, some lovely food and great banter.  I think they had about as much sleep as we did, and drove a few thousand kilometres packing and unpacking the van umpteen times.

So thank you to you both from the whole team.

We’d also like to thank Helly Hansen for the support, 2Pure, Nuun, Paramo, Salewa, Schwalbe, Willow for the loan of his van,