Little by Little

Well, I have been meaning to write for the last few days and some how just never made the time to do so. This is my last week here, crazy how time flies. When I first arrived, I was wondering how I was going to make it. I was sick, tired, getting my ass handed to me everywhere I turned and was thinking maybe I’m just not cut our for this at this level. Well, time has a way of revealing the information we need as time goes on. I have learned so much while being here: Trusting my coach, knowing I can handle way more than my mind thinks I can, realizing I have been treating this more like a hobby than a job, that my eating habits are pretty bland (I hate veggies, well I have broadened my horizons this trip but still), going to bed every night before ten and most nights before 9 makes you feel so much better at 5 in the morning, (crazy how your body adapts -when first arrived did 24x200 and ave 33 thought my legs were going to fall off, now ave 31-32 and had room still in the tank), that the simple life is really pretty good with me, I can’t do it alone like I have the past 2 years or so, which leads me to needing to relocate to one of two places for the summer-Nashville or Boulder. Knoxville will always be home. I have some of the best friends in the world there. Since I have been gone, it is crazy to realize how much support is there. I am one blessed individual, THANK YOU! My family is there as well, so I will never really leave. I see myself spending training stints in different places over the next few years and I will be HOME often. I have come to realize that to be the best you must surround yourself with the best. I go to swim squad and look around and there are a couple top 10 at Ironman Hawaii, a couple World Champions and Olympians, and plenty of Ironman Champs. I have really enjoyed getting to know a few of my new mates and look forward to seeing them in the states and back over here next year. Also, I realize how lucky I am to have Hillary Biscay as a roomie. She is a model workhorse, she rarely if ever complains, she is always getting the job done-it’s no wonder the girl can do 9 Ironman Races a year, she truly is an Ironwoman. She has been of such great support and encouragement to me over the last 5 weeks. I have struggled at times, usually I get home sick and no I am not really home sick. I do miss my routine and I am a home body so I feel a little out of my element. But, this walkabout has been one of the most incredible experiences of my life that will hopefully catapult me to the places I need to go. As my mate Huck said earlier, little by little may all your dreams come true, one step at a time. I took a big step 5 weeks ago and followed my dream, and now little by little it will unveil itself to me. Never let anyone tell you, you don’t have what it takes. At the end of the day there is only one who can answer that question. As I sit here and the rain comes down, may it rain some days and shine others but never stop DREAMING BIG!

Noosa week 3

Well another week is down which means 12 swims, 5 runs and 2 bikes are in the books. I am starting to get adjusted and enjoying myself, well I mean not getting crazy or anything but getting in to a routine. This week is a week of some firsts. I had a massage on Sat. after our group ride. Toby is the man around here giving massages to all the athletes, a few get 2-3 a week so he is a pretty busy guy. Anyhow, during my massage, he told me I was super tight and he thought magnesium deprived. Less than 15 minutes after he left, my back started to spasm. I mean, I was on the ground in seconds. The kind where you can’t really catch your breath. I ended up swimming a bit that afternoon, very easy I might add. Then the next day things started to get shaken out after our ocean swim which leads me to my next first. Most of you know how much trouble I had the first year of triathlon and overcoming a lot of fears and anxiety. Well the ocean has been a bit of a fun time for me. If I am not swimming alone in the ocean, I feel pretty good about it. This week before swim, Belinda Granger, one of the best at Ironmans, decided to tell me how the beach was closed earlier in the day because SHARKS were in the area. As I looked around, the usual group of 20 or so was down to 5, funny how they all got the message. All went well and I’m here to tell you no sharks were seen but the anxiety was felt for sure. Then there was the cyclone that was rapidly approaching. Monday on my way home from the pool in the pouring rain, the winds were blowing fiercely. So a cyclone is what they call a hurricane here in the Pacific. This cat 5 was as big as Hurricane Katrina. Luckily, it did not make land fall but the effects of it hanging out at sea are still being felt here tonight, as it is still pouring down rain. The good and the bad of this storm, I will give you the bad first. I had to ride today 3 hours, windy the whole ride, and for half it was a torrential down pour. After my accident last fall, I am really apprehensive in the rain. So, it was a pretty tense day to say the least on the bike. Now the cool part was going down to the ocean to see what all was going on. They spend lots of money here 2-3 times a year to put sand over all the rocks. Now I can understand why, for there is no beach right now, just rocks after the storm had washed away the sand. But the coolest part was watching the surfers. This is a huge surf town and they live for times like this. One of the craziest scenes I have ever witnessed. First, they were everywhere. I guess they know the protocol for not killing one another as they hang ten. What I was witnessing was controlled chaos. Then on top of it, the waves were huge and crashing everywhere. You either have to have a few screws loose or just live for the moment. I was scared just watching. But I know what I want to do when my tri career is over, learn how to surf and move somewhere near water where life is lived waiting on the next big wave. Love the attitudes of the local surfers, they wake up and think I will go catch some waves before school or work, I love it. This week has been a tough week on the body, running on like 22 days of 2-3 workouts a day. The mind fails before the body but had a day yesterday where they both were in the tank, not a good day. But as my coach told me in an email, “nothing wrong with cracking as long as you pick things up and put it back together” and that’s what I did today. We all have days like that and we just have to live in the moment. Sometimes hard to do! Well time to hit the bed. But first, want to send my best to Dr. Krisle, my brother’s future father-in-law who had quadruple bypass surgery on Tuesday. Wish him a speedy recovery. And as always, Dream Big! PS Feel free to ask questions on the post a comment section. Sometimes I just don’t know what I should be writing, don’t want to bore with the mundane stuff. DB!

Week 2 in Noosa

Well as I sit here, it was two weeks ago today that I got on a plane for 34 hours and the journey began. As my best friend Andrew Huck said, this is your walkabout, and you will be changed forever. That has happened. The days all seem to run together and I wake most mornings wondering how will I do it today? Well here is a Wednesday for you: 5:30 was ocean swim, this was lots of fun if only I could have run, did a track workout last night and my calves were shredded. So the running back and forth into the ocean swimming out to buoys and back was a bit more taxing than I thought it was going to be, but none the less it was a great workout and hurt a ton. Then home for a bite to eat before we had squad swim at 9:30. I went into this workout smashed and thought I would be lucky to finish, but I finished and actually had a great swim. One thing I am learning is just when my mind wants to give out my body somehow can keep going. Not sure I understand, but seems we let our minds limit us, one thing I will be working on for the rest of my life. So after swim (I have to ride my bike round trip 10 miles every time I swim) I came home, went to café and had lunch as I tried to just relax and get in some air condition. I sweat all day and night for there is no ac and the weather has been brutally hot here of late. Then, I took a nap and got ready to head back to the pool for my last workout of the day, a 3k swim. Barely could get up and down the pool and finally loosened up as I kept trucking. Well that is my Wednesday, I have roughly 19 workouts throughout the week with the shortest one being a 45 min run twice a week. I don’t tell this to brag but to merely give you insight into my time here in Noosa. My confidence at many times has wavered and my ability to think clearly has done the same. I have questioned myself many times, this has not been easy for me. At times I have wanted to quit and just come home, but there is a voice inside that won’t let me quit for now I realize it takes so much more to get to the next level. I also have many people who believe in me, for then I ask myself, why can I not believe in myself? I am exposing myself in my blog in a way for the first time to share my journey for this is no holiday, and I would guess that there are dreams in each of us that are worth fighting for and hard as hell to work through and keep believing in even when it seems as though you just can go at it anymore. Well, as one of my favorite quotes says “When going through hell, keep going!” Lastly, as I sat and watched We Are Marshall the other night, I realized how hard it is build anything. They had to rise up from the ashes and when starting anything that is what we all have to do. The hard part is building the foundation and just getting started maybe the hardest part of all. But once you get started, you can and will rise up! As I always say don’t ever stop DREAMING and then get after it, RISE UP!

Written by Ironman Wisconsin Champion Hillary Biscay

Last Thursday Coachie sent me over a gift from the States: a brand shiny new . . . training partner! This was very nice of him considering that I was going to have to say goodbye to training partner, etc etc extraordinaire this Tuesday. Yes, Dougie is on his way home to the States now, and Eric Bell is now on swim and track duty.

Eric is a former standout collegiate runner and has won pretty much every short course age group title one can win, including his age group at the world championships last year. He would like to race as a pro and has qualified to do so, but Coach has said that runner boy must get his swimming skills up to scratch before racing the big boys. So he is here in Noosa for 12 swim sessions per week–and a few other workouts–as well as to see if he is cut out for the life of a pro. Thus far he is becoming acquainted with realities like the Friday and Saturday-night 9PM bedtime, and a kitchen stocked with only “bird food.”

So Eric has to suffer a bit of culture shock while I have the benefit of a new training partner (I should add that my other “other half” is also away this week, as Belinda is racing Ironman Malaysia this weekend.). I would feel sorry for him, but we have all been through this essential part of the process.

In Dougie and Belinda’s absence, after last night’s running intervals, I was reflecting on the value of my training partners. Possibly my least favorite type of training session is a track-type running session. Everyone knows how much I love to run; I know it is not pretty or fast, and thus this statement might be perceived as sarcastic, but it is not. I am probably an anomaly: a former swimmer who loves to run. My favorite running-related activity is running at a cruisey pace for many, many miles–five-hour runs, for example. My least favorite is the opposite: short, fast, running with lots of stop-and-go. I don’t even mind running hard on a treadmill for a couple hours at a time; but running even harder for a minute or two, when I have to break my rhythm in between, but yet hardly have time to catch my breath . . . This is one of my least favorite types of training. I am not good at it and it hurts–badly. Of course these are two big reasons that I need to be doing this type of workout!

So although I dread Tuesday night run intervals (especially following the morning’s smashfest brick session), I also look forward to the feeling of satisfaction I derive from putting myself through them every week. If they weren’t such a challenge for me, I couldn’t be so proud of myself afterwards.

Last night I got some payback from Runner Eric for some of our recent swimming excursions when he joined me for the Tuesday night intervals. I should add that we don’t have a track here, so run intervals also involve using a Garmin to measure off an accurate distance–thus giving me another reason to hate them. Luckily, Dougie, Mr. Thorough, gave Eric a lesson with the Garmin, including a walking simulation, before he left. Thus, in order to avoid my head exploding before the session even started, Eric handled course-measurement duties.

Then we ran the same “track” session, although I couldn’t even run the speedster’s pace for one step. It was the massive difference in our speeds, however, that got me to thinking about how much it helps to have someone there to keep these intense sessions at an honest effort. I had my best interval session of the past three months, and it didn’t matter that Eric was miles ahead. When I see someone there pushing himself as hard as he can through the same session, it is impossible to back off.

Tomorrow morning I will have to re-establish my dominance in the water .