So I’ve been pretty quiet on my blog for the past month or so…. partially because I’ve been trying to get over my biking fears, partially because my training has been hit or miss and partially because life has gotten in the way and I just didn’t make the time.  Lots of changes since my last post!  First and most important (well, ok, a tie for most important) – I’ve been back on my bike and not full of fear 🙂  I’m feeling stronger and more confident than I did the first time I rode this year….much closer to how I felt last August while riding my bike so hopefully it stays this way!

The second piece of news (which is probably more important than riding the bike) is that I started a ‘new’ job on the 27th back at my former employer.  Things where I was currently working were starting to take a turn for the worst and I was pretty unhappy and stressed since February, so I am so happy to have the opportunity to return to where I used to work.

So….the race recap! I PR’d, I didn’t crash my bike, the end!  If you want to know more read on, but you might have to sit down 🙂

Gear ready to be packed early Fri am before work

Friday evening JMR and I left STL about 6p to head to Lawrence, KS, for my first half Ironman since Redman.  We arrived without any drama but it was 11p and I was tiiired.  Of course my internal clock didn’t know that it was my one opportunity to sleep in and woke me up at 6:50a.  I tossed and turned until 8a when I finally gave up and ate breakfast (I brought hard-boiled eggs and a baked sweet potato).  The original plan was to go to athlete check in on Saturday (race was on Sunday) around 10a, do a 30 min ride to check things out and make sure the bike was ok and do a short 10 min run to shake out the nerves.  However, mother nature had its own plans and when I finally got out of bed at 8a it was storming outside.  Well shoot.  JMR and I hung out in the room watching stupid tv shows until 12p when the skies finally cleared up.  We grabbed lunch at Free State Brewing Company on the campus of KU and then headed to the race site in Clinton Lake park.  We got there just in time for the 1p athlete meeting to review the race course and rules and after I went to the Ironman store to just ‘look’.  I found a pretty cool race t-shirt that had everyone’s name on it doing the race so I just had to get it.  Other than that I was good and had restraint. I will not have that restraint during IMLOU though 🙂

After the meeting I got Lola ready and went for a short ride – boy was it windy…tomorrow was going to be fun!

Getting Lola ready. Compliments of JMR for a rump shot.

Then I was off for a run and we headed home.  When I hopped in the shower to get ready to meet a few club members for dinner I noticed I already had a burn from my two hours in the sun that day. 😦  Oh boy….not a good start.  My poor back and shoulders.  Why am I so pale and burn so easily!!?! Argh.

Later we meet a few people in the tri club for dinner and we had fun chatting it up about our race strategies and the course.  I was in bed by 8:30 but couldn’t sleep until 10 and kept waking up all night…Oh the joys of ‘sleeping’ the night before a race.

Finally I was up at 4a to eat my pre-race breakfast: two hard-boiled eggs and a banana.  I also drank a lot of water…hydrate, hydrate, hydrate :).  We gathered up our bags and headed out of the hotel around 4:50 and were on our way to the race site, which was a one way in, one way out park.  It took us 55 minutes to get into the park that took us 20 minutes from hotel to park the day before.  Oh boy.  I still managed to get to both transitions with time to spare (t2 was up on a hill and t1 was by the water) , but it was still stressful.  If I do this race again I would probably leave the hotel around 4:40.

After I got my tires aired up and t1 ready, I just hung out with JMR and another club member until it was time for us to line up. OMG.  Yipes.  I was pretty darn nervous!  I kept repeating what my coach told me the day before “Just treat this as a training day, focus on nutrition, don’t grind in big gears up the hills” so I tried to focus on that…it wasn’t a race, it was a training day.