It's all about the bike.

Why the hell did I say I would do this? What did I get myself into? Will I even survive this ordeal? I’m talking, of course, about doing a triathlon. When my friend Courtney signed up for the Ironman Kentucky last fall, I said I would enter her first triathlon with her for moral support (no, I’m not doing an Ironman, I’m not that much of a masochist.

So I agreed to enter a race at Harriman State Park in May. The other day I looked on my calendar, and realized that the race is about ten weeks away. And my training regimen has consisted of a lot of skiing, but not much else. So today I did my first “brick” workout. Bricks are when you train in two of the disciplines in a row to simulate race conditions. Of course, as with everything else in my life, I decided to do it bass ackwards. Instead of riding the bike before going out for a run, I decided to run first, than bike.

Now, the race I’ve entered features a 10 kilometer, or 6.2 mile run. I have never done that distance in my life. So right now my plan is to run 3X a week, adding an extra K each week until I can run a full 10K. I’m not worried about the 29 mile bike section, I can ride 30 miles any time. So I went out for a mile run today. The first half mile, I felt great. Second half mile, not so much. This is going to be a lot harder than I expected. As happens every time I run, I wished I was on my bike. I mean, all of this technology, why resort to the most primitive form of transportation known, right? Plus, the return trip I was running into the wind. Not a nice, tropical breeze either, but a bitter cold, winter in Vermont wind.

Upon arriving home I retreated to the relative safety of my basement, where my trainer was set up. I put in a steady 40 minute effort, no problem (okay, my ass needs to get used to this again, but otherwise…). Now why was 40 minutes on the bike a breeze, but probably not much more tan a ten minute run nearly killed me? The answer is simple.

Running sucks. It's all about the bike.

quick update

Yeah, I know I've sort of been AWOL for awhile. It's been a busy few weeks for me. The second half of the Tahoe trip was pretty hectic, including a 16 hour day involving driving from South ake to Mammoth, shooting all day in a blizzard, and heaing back to South Lake with a detour through Carson City to stop at the In 'N' Out Burger.

The following Monday I was supposed to begin getting my experimental cancer treatements in NYC, but that was delayed until Thursday. Which was the day after the snowstorm, so Manhattan was a total junk show of muddy slush. Than I headed back to VT for a few days, back to NY for another doctor's visit, and finally back to VT, where it is snowing again and hopefully I will ski some pow tomorrow.

Hopefully I can provide a few pics of tomorrow's goodies.

Sorry I haven't checked in for awhile, but I've been too busy skiing in Lake Tahoe California to write anything.

It's been a busy week. Last weekend I drove from my cousin Rachel's in San Francisco to my friend Lindsay in Sacremento.

I skied at Kirkwood for two days, before heading to South Lake Tahoe, where my friend Matt booked a condo for the week.

Monday was spent at Squaw Valley, where I skied with Ingid Backstrom
and Cody Townsend, two of the best freeskiers in the world. Nothing like having a few Warren Miller rockstars giving you the tour of their backyard. Tuesday and Thursday wre spent at Heavenly, on the CA/NV border. Today it was back to Kirkwood, for some real powder skiing!!!!

48 hours- what a difference

This morning, walking around San Francisco's Chinatown, I was thinking about how far I had come, and how much things had changed since Tuesday. The previous 24 hours have certainly happened at a fast pace.

Tuesday was spent being a human lab rat in New York. Bloodwork, a CT scan, and an MRI took up my day. It was cold outside, and the majority of the day was spent hurrying up and waiting. On the culinary front, I got to have some sushi, though, so that was cool.

Yesterday consisted of four airports, two planes, and a long day of travel. I woke up to temperatures in the low teens in Hobart, NY, before heading up to Albany to leave for California. The first leg had me flying to Baltimore, mainly because I think you can't fly anywhere on Southwest without changing planes there. I even think there flight from Long Beach to Oakland requires that you change planes in Baltimore. I had a burrito in Baltimore, because, well, I didn't feel like McDonalds or Chinese food. From Baltimore, it was on to Kansas City, where the airport is literally in the middle of nowhere. I don't know how far away downtown is, but the area surrounding the airport did not resemble that of a city that is home to an NFL and Major League franchise. When almost the entire plane got off in KC, I was worried that somehow I was on the wrong flight. I wasn't, though, and soon took off for Oakland. Upon my arrival in Raider Nation, I got into a cab for San Francisco. Apparently bay area cabs don't have fixed airport fares like they do in NYC, and my cab cost me nearly 2/3 my flight out.

Today I enjoyed the touristy side of San Francisco. I think that being a meteorologist here has got to be an easy gig. High fifties and cloudy is probably your forecast 90% of the time. This place is hilly, too. I wonder how much wear it is on your emergency brake when you are parallel parked on a 25% grade?

So it's been a busy three days, and it's not slowing down anytime soon. Tomorrow I head to Sacramento, the same town as Governor Terminator. Than on Saturday I will make my Sierra skiing debut at Kirkwood. Hopefully Tyrone doesn't misguide me towards Hospital Air.