Running Wild

Donning wet suit a humblling experience

There are no secrets when you don a wet suit.
There’s nowhere to hide, nowhere to run, every inch of your body is on display.
That little love handle you’ve become adept at hiding in your regular clothes, seems to jut out like a marshmallow on an ice cream cone.
This is what I learned last night when trying on wet suits.
I had been warned that getting a wetsuit on is half the battle and while I didn’t struggle as much as I thought, as I pulled each leg on and yanked it up little by little sweat beads started to form on my forehead.
I guess I’ve figured out why triathletes are the best athletes on the planet. Forget doing three sports, it’s getting into the wet suit that I give them credit for.
Once I got it on I immediately worried about how it was going to come off.
As I walked towards the mirror feeling like a giant bratwurst sausage, I didn’t feel particularly athletic as my legs didn’t have the same mobility because they were constricted by the suit.
I felt like the suit was choking me around my neck, which according to the lovely lady at the store who was helping me, is exactly how I’m supposed to feel.
“It will feel different in the water,” she promised.
I should certainly hope so.
Having the feeling of a boa constrictor squeeze you wasn’t what I was looking for on race day.
Thank goodness I didn’t get one with sleeves or I would have to plan an escape route should I hit the water and not have mobility in all four of my limbs.
Why endure this humbling experience?
Well I initially thought I wouldn’t worry about it for my first race, but then someone mentioned they make you more buoyant in the water.
Believe me it was hard to picture as I stood there in the mirror wondering how this heavy, dark suit that made me feel one with a seal, would help me float better.
I am still a little concerned about how you get this thing off fast after your soaked in race, but I’ll burn that bridge when I get to it.
This weekend is the test for the wetsuit.
Hopefully it’s as good as everyone promises.
In the meantime happy trails.

Making transition not as easy as it looks

On the bike.
Off the bike.
Take off helmet and bike gloves.
Put on baseball cap.
Start running.
This was the routine over and over again Saturday morning as we learned transitions.
Learning how to get in and out of a transition area seems simple from the outside, but the myriad of rules and trying to do it gracefully is a different story.
Not to mention being heckled by one of training mates, Pete, as I reached the pylons with an anguished expression.
“42.2! It’s easy right?” he said smiling, camera in hand to capture these  moments forever.
The transition area is where you get ready for your next sport.
For example, you get off your bike head into the transition and change into your running gear to do the last leg of the race.
In the blazing heat of a Saturday afternoon, an Aurora parking lot made it seem all the hotter.
I got on my bike, ran it between two pylons, got on the bike and rode off around the area. Before re-entering the pylons I hopped off the bike reaching my transition area and attempted to get my bike gloves off.
There was nothing graceful about that at all.
And then it was through two more Pylons, running and returning back to the bike.
Over and over again.
Until it supposedly was supposed to be natural.
If Saturday’s exploits weren’t enough to tire me out, Sunday brought pouring rain and another 18k hilly bike ride.
As rain pelted down on me, into my helmet, all over my bike and riding gloves, I started to see the irrationality of my decision to do this triathlon thing.
I blamed the rain for the ride feeling hard.
I got back to the store, put my bike back on the rack and went running.
There was no Simon Whitfield or Lance Armstrong on this day.
Any thoughts of kicking back and relaxing this week were dissipated with Bev’s announcement we are going to do an open water swim in Barrie this weekend.
For the first time, we will do all our events in succession.
I’m pretty excited about swimming in the lake as I’ve been training in the pool for the last month.
But now I’m on the hunt for a wetsuit.
I’m sure you’ll be hearing from me after that adventure.
Until next week happy trails.

These hills give you the gears

This weekend, I felt a little like Lance Armstrong and Simon Whitfield mixed together this weekend.
For those unfamiliar, Mr. Armstrong is the multi-winner of the Tour de France and Mr. Whitfield was the surprise gold medal winner in the triathlon at the 2000 Olympic games in Sydney.
I’m sure I didn’t look anything like them, but in my own mind I felt as free as the wind.
I learned how to bike hills for my training and, believe me, with rain drizzling on us for the first part of the ride, I was nervous.
Hill training is always grueling whether it’s on foot or with the help of two tires.
I’d actually venture a guess it’s harder for me with the two tires.
On the flip side, I believe anything worth doing isn’t easy.
Nerves set in as soon as our bike instructor, Doug, informed us that our breaks don’t work as well in the rain.
I don’t know why this was news to me, but it was something of which I hadn’t thought.
Off we went north on Leslie, me testing my breaks furiously just to make sure they were working and squeaking all the way until we got to St. John’s Sideroad.
As soon as we made a right onto St. John’s, I came face-to-face with a fairly steep hill.
So, I’m halfway up changing my gears around and it’s not getting any easier. So, I hop off and walk up it.
This was not a good start to my first 18-K hilly ride.
I continued to fiddle around with my gears and realized I have to arrange them before I get to the hill.
For the next few hills, I got the hang of it and I actually enjoyed flying down the hills.
The wind was so loud in my ears, it seemed as if I was alone out there conquering a stage in the Tour de France.
You are nothing without knowing how to use your gears on a bike.
I learned this up that first hill, the hard way.
We continued to bike until Kennedy Road and then turned around and tackled everyone of those hills again. I loved it.
When we got back to our starting point, there was more to do as I learned the first lesson in what is called bricking.
Bricking is training in two sports on the same workout with little or no interruption between.
It mimics what will happen in a race.
Doug likes to describe it as when you start to run after biking and it feels like the legs you’ve got are not the ones you came with.
I agree.
After arriving back at my car, I hoisted my bike onto the rack and set off to run. It was only a short distance, but as I ran around the Aurora Running Room parking lot and behind the Wal-Mart, I wasn’t in Aurora anymore. I was Mr. Whitfield and I was in Sydney making a run for the gold medal.
It felt awesome.
The addiction that I wasn’t so sure about is happening.
I’m starting to love this tri-sport thing.

Not all runs about getting a time

OK, so I’ve been missing in action for a bit.
I was on vacation, but I’m back now and ran a really nice 5k race over the weekend.
The Rebecca Run is in its sixth year and takes place around scenic Fairy Lake in Newmarket. Proceeds help families who have kids with Spinal Muscular Atrophy, a motor neuron disease affecting voluntary muscles that are used for crawling, walking, head and neck control and swallowing.
About one in six babies are affected and about one in 40 are genetic carriers.
In the last six years, the Rebecca run, has raised more than $1 million for Families of SMA Canada.
One hundred per cent of the proceeds from the race go to help FSMAC.
It was started by Newmarket native Louise Smith, whose niece was afflicted with the disease.
This isn’t one of those races you do to get a time, but because you want to support a worthy cause.
This is my second year running it and other than blistering hot temperatures, it was great.
There is a very emotional section on the route where pictures of children who had SMA and have passed away are kept, so that runners never lose sight of why they are running.
I always say I don’t want to look and then find myself looking and getting misty as I run by.
Every year there is a race honouree and this year it was Max Yorke Vallender who was born July 16, 2006 but only lived for six weeks because of complications from the disease.
The more money raised, the more help children like Max receive.
Louise is hopeful a cure will be found for SMA and I hope she’s right.
Click here to read Max’s story and see a picture of him. If you live around here, make sure to put this race on your list next year.
Until then happy trails.