NEW YEAR!

I am ready for 2009! This past year didn't go as well as I would like, but I can appreciate the good things that did happen.

1. I graduated college!

2. My relationship with my dad is getting better day by day.

3. I trained and ran my second marathon, it was no PR, but still a great day and wonderful experience!

4. I signed up for my first ironman and get to race in beloved New Zealand :-) I miss NZ

5. Met some AMAZING people whose stories will stick with me forever.

Now that 2009 is here I have BIG plans, some are dreams, some are realities.

1. I get to go back to New Zealand... AND I get to race my first IM there :-) EEK!

2. I have NO idea where I will be living after New Zealand... I am scared and excited about that!

3. This year WILL be a GREAT year!!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR to you all!!!!

I have too many things to write about...

that I don't know what to say! On Sunday I rode 80 miles followed by a 5 mile run. During those 85 miles I had some great stuff for my blog, but after all that riding in the beautiful sun I forgot about what I was going to write about... Oops :-)

School officially ended December 16th and I just got word that my grades were solid and I AM a College GRAD!!!

Training has been going well - since I work at a running shoe store people ask me about my training on a daily basis. Generally I don't delve into any details about my training, thats not my style, so I just tell them that its hard, but I would NOT change what I am doing for anything!!! I am in the best shape I have ever been in... But with saying that I am NO where near as fit as I will be race day, nor am I as fit as I can be - which is a pretty sweet thought. I love pushing my body further than I ever thought possible and that became apparent on sunday when I had to ride 80 miles and i opted for a nice climb (I rode Bartlett which is a 28 mile out and back down to a lake and then back up) during the ride since I missed Mt. Lemmon on thursday and followed up the ride with a great 5 mile run! Some of you know about what happened with the Mt. Lemmon ride and I am still a bit bitter about it, so I will not be discussing what happened in my blog as I will most likely say something offensive ;-P

Since I have been spending so much time on my bike (my least favorite of the three) I am slowly figuring out what it is about my bike fit, saddle, aero bars that is SO uncomfortable. You see, I am having issues with my bike, I don't think I am maximizing my power because my fit is off. BUT, its not so much my fit as it is my inability to get comfortable on my saddle or on my clip-on aero bars. My saddle is just wrong and now that school is out and once the holidays are over I will have a little more time to play around with some saddles. Heres the deal, I ride a rode bike (which I LOVE). She is my third racing bike in 2.5years. We have been together for almost a year and before her I had a Cervelo P3C that just didn't fit me right and before that I had another road bike that was just a little too big for me. I intend on setting up my bike with full on aero bar headset and changing out my cables. Now that race day is getting closer and closer its time to buckle down and make the changes I can afford - some things will have to be overlooked since I am now a college grad and on my own financially... EEK!

Tonight is Christmas Eve and I went over to my Dad and his GF's for dinner. It was me, Cody, dad, GF (Teri), GF's son (Rand), bro, step-grandma and grandpa. I was REALLY hoping to get Cody some doggy antlers, but when we walked up to Petsmart last night they were out of "big" dog xmas gear :-( There was one glimmer of hope when we found a larger sized Santa suit, but when Cody tried it on he had just a bit too much in the tummy area that the suit wouldn't fasten around. This did not stop us from prancing around the store with the Santa "cape" on :-) HA HA! He had to take it off and leave it at the store, but he did score a peanut butter bone!!! So tonight when we arrived at "grandpa's" we saw that there dog Diddle (a jack russell) had a xmas dress on. We proceeded to tell Grandpa and Teri about our antler hopes and Teri went and found us a treasure!!! They had antlers for both Cody and I to wear!!!!! Cody wore his for short periods of time and I wore mine the entire night :-) We have pictures, but they are on my dads camera and I will post them as soon as he sends em' to me.

Now I am at my mom's house, praying it doesn't rain hard tommorow morning so I can get my ride in and not have to wait until night time and do it on the trainer when i finally get home. I hope everyone has a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!! It's family time and even though I don't necessarily like all of my family I savor the love that is shared this time of year! I don't care about the gifts, the most special thing is my plane flight to New Zealand. And above that I am a college grad and that's the best present EVER!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

XOXO,
E

Rants and Raves

1. I know all you fellow bloggers are out there are enduring MUCH colder weather than we have here in AZ, but it is FREAKIN' cold out! And right now its rainy and dreary and I HATE this weather just as much as I hate our AZ summers!!! I love the sunshine, I don't mind some humidity, but I can't stand the 115 degree heat we endure here during the summer's nor can I stand a cold, wet day. To some degree you could say I am spoiled, but when it comes to racing in the heat my body knows how to regulate itself, its just the cold that my body can't handle. If I wasn't training for an IM I would probably enjoy the day, I can run in the rain, but biking and swimming are a no go for me unless its a summertime welcomed rain shower.

2. Did I mention that I am frozen?!?

3. I have one more final until I am done and in 24hrs I will be living it up as a college grad!! After my final Mike and I are going out to dinner with my dad and his GF at Mastros! I WILL be celebrating :-)

4. I am having issues with one of my classes that I deem a useless, waste of my time this semester (only because the professor could have cared less about the topic) as my TA seems to see a different computer generated gradebook than I do and is telling me that I have two more absenses than I really do or see. We are currently fighting over email about that and the fact that he won't grade my first case study I did, even though it was turned in on time. The computer program ASU uses won't let either one of us open the document I sent in on time. Now I am out 25 points. It's not like I am going to fail this class. I have an A, but if the TA decides not to give me my attendance points I will drop to a B. GRRR!!! Stupid!

5. I have worked at my job for 14 months now and 2 months ago I received a raise and today the managers got a call from Corporate saying that EVERYONE was recieving a paycut. Upper management and corporate are taking a bigger cut than I am, but its sad. Atleast we all have jobs still, but I am finally beginning to see and feel the effects of the economy.

6. I am REALLY cold!!! I DO NOT have clothes for this type of weather!

7. Master's swim better not be cancelled tommorow morning! I will be braving the cold and getting my workout in manana.

8. I don't want to study anymore and it will ALL be over so so so soon. WOOHOOOOOOO!

9. On thursday, Brian and I are going to climb Mt. Lemmon and it is going to be a chilly ride!!! We rode 80 miles yesterday and he didn't have enough clothes on for the cold weather, so I was stuck listening to a whining Brian most of the ride. We had to make two stops for him, at the first stop he bought dishwashing gloves to keep his hands warm and on the second stop he got newspapers to shove in his bibs to keep his core warm. The gloves made for a pretty hilarious ride and everytime he took them off I had to turn them right side out for him. He finally admitted to being a dumbass by the end of the ride.. awh VICTORY!

10. Cody has become VERY noisy. He snores and grunts and sighs, its pretty friggin' cute! We will get into bed and lay down and he just lets out a big ol' sigh and then next thing I know he is snoring away (he is currently snoring on the couch!). HA HA! I love my pup!!!

Updates and more thoughts...

What's been going on...

I have officially finished 3 classes and only have 2 more.. In 2 short hours I will be able to say that I have only 1 class left, BUT I have to wait until tuesday to get it over with, jeez thats a long time!

I applied for a new position at Road Runner Sports, its still local (AZ), but would be a great new experience. I had my first interview a couple weeks ago on the phone and then my second interview yesterday where my boss sat in on the call, yes I was nervous! I was told the decision would be made at the very latest, monday, so when I got the call today telling me what a hard decision it was (my heart sunk as I thought I didn't get it). I was pleasantly surprised to find out I got the position. Now before you get too excited for me let me explain what it is exactly. This is an extra, part-time position to what I already do, which is be the Lead Fit Expert, now I will have another title of Regional Grass Roots Marketing Rep (sounds important, eh?). What I will be doing is work with both the Scottsdale and Tempe store setting up in and out of store events with local corporations, police depts, fire depts, hospitals, gyms, running/triathlon groups, charity organizations, etc... My current schedule will most likely not change for when I am in the store, but now I get to get out of the store and work with all sorts of people!!! I am SUPER excited to have this opportunity as I expect to learn a ton. I will be reporting to a guy (Todd) in San Diego who reports directly to the owner of the company, so exposure will be high :-) WooHOO! Now I just need the opportunity to make the move to San Diego!

Recently in training I have had some ups and downs. Many of them are directly related to whats been happening in life, stress has been high, concerns with post-graduation are looming and well, it just hasn't been easy. This happens to me every now and again. Sometimes I think of myself as a car, I generally have two gears, gear one is go-go-go-go and gear two is sleep. Yep, those are my gears and I must admit I am a REALLY good sleeper ;-) I also am very good at gear one, that is until my engine overheats and I basically blowup, mentally, physically, emotionally. Yes, not fun! This happened last week, I haven't experienced this feeling since this summer when I took 12 credits this summer, had to go to ASU everyday for class, work full-time, try and train, etc. I just broke down, emailed Coach explaining to her about what was going on and we decided to take a day off of training. I needed that! After that day off I got my longer workouts in for the weekend, had a fabulous time and now have an easier week until school is OVER.

Since I got into endurance sports I have had what I like to call, "the bank". This is where I store all the difficult things I endure in life, things I can bring up and use as fuel when I am struggling during a race. The bank doesn't always work in training, most of the time the struggles I go through in training go into the bank for race day. I know that Ironman is going to be one tough event and I know that when I go through the infamous IM lows that I am prepared to combat them with power from my bank :-) So last week when I was hurting (mostly mentally and emotionally) I added that to my bank! My bank is filling up nicely, I add to it everyday with past experiences and new experiences. What is in my bank will probably stick with me and only me, but the IM lows that want to hurt my experience and goals need to know that I am ready to squash em' with power from my bank!

I will write more about my bank as training becomes more and more intense... maybe next time I write I will know how long I have until race day, but for now I just know that on Tuesday, December 16th by 4:30pm I will be finished with my Bachelor's degree!!! I may have to check with Coach to see if I can celebrate by riding Mt. Lemmon on thursday. If she lets me and anyone wants to join me let me know as I may just have to make the trip to Tucson :-)

XOXO,
E

HIDING

Yes that would be what I have been doing for the past week and will probably be doing for the next 11 days... I shouldn't even be posting as I have a study guide to work on! I have time to give a brief overview of what's been happening the past week.

Training for Ironman New Zealand has begun to pick up. Last Sunday I swam, then drove to Awhautukee to meet up with Brian to ride 3hrs and run 30mins. During our ride I got two flats! Yes, yes my tires were paper thin and ready to be replaced. Monday I had a doctors appointment (just a check-up, nothing big) and while I was waiting I found out I didn't have class that night!!! So I went to Landis to check in with Edgar and get some new tires. I went home and began to put them on my wheels before realizing I forgot to buy more tubes, DAMN... With three flats in a couple days I had NO MORE tubes! AHHH.. and I had a 3hr bike to do the next morning. At this point monday night I was wishing something I haven't wished, "why did I end my relationship with my cyclist BF?!?" Ha ha ha! He would have had tons of tubes lying around ;-) My problem solving skills came in handy when I realized my race wheels that haven't been used in over a year may just hold some air, at least enough to get my ride in on my trainer (oh how I hate the trainer AND for 3hrs!!! YUCK - its TOO pretty outside!) Well, my rear race wheel held air and I was able to ride my trainer for 3 friggin' hours! When it comes to training in the "winter" Coach Jen is right, we are spoiled here in AZ - EXCEPT come summer time and its 95 degrees at 4am and your bottles melt and turn into boiling water 45min into your ride.

On the school front I have been working on two group projects and am hoping/crossing my fingers that I am done with my part and can get away with what I have done ;-P OH how I can't wait for school to be over. I can finally read the books that are piling up in a queue just waiting for me to sit back and enjoy! And after the first of the year I will begin my search for a "real" job!

Ok, ok, ok... The guilt of not working on school work is beginning to kick in so I am going to abrutly end my post.