Hello all. I’ve been vacationing in Colorado the past week. Tonight Colleen and I are staying with good friend Shonny V. in Durango and I’ve a little time to write and post some pics. Our trip has been nothing short of spectacular. After 5 days at altitdude I’m starting to adapt and the riding is getting much easier and a lot more fun. The horse gulch trails that I was able to hit up from Shonny’s place near downtown were an absolute blast. Weather has been amazing. Fall foliage has been brilliant. Tent camping has been excellent. Travel has been very scenic. Wildlife looks tasty. Actual eating fare has been delicious. I honestly don’t have much desire to go back home, yet. A little norther cold front coming in overnight might change my mind though. Colleen posted a bunch of pics on my photobucket account somewhere, but I’m too lazy to pull them up. Enjoy these instead. Hope all is well.
Greg

What a week it has been following Labor Day. I have decided sometime in the near future I will be leaving my beloved racing team of over four years. It was a tough decision, but one I felt needed to be made. There have been lots of little pesky items on my mind for a while, but in the end, I truly feel the need for change. I feel as as if the team has done everything it can to develop me as the athlete I am today. Looking back, I have grown from a lowly sport racer to racing among the fastest mountain bikers in the state. A midpack Cat 5 road racer to a strong Cat 3. A fearful force in the Xterra age group. A beginner Cross racer to hanging with some of the best in the state. I’m looking upwards now. Getting a Pro license in MTB, moving up to a Cat 1 or 2 on skinny tires and Cross racing, and a Pro license in Xterra. It is time for me to look beyond grassroots racing and towards associations that can help me achieve these higher goals.  I have no idea what those new associations will be, but I will when the time is right. It has been an absolute honor representing NRC/Pedalmasher (now NRC/Kona) and I wish the team the very best. Colleen will remain on the team, so in reality, I will still be very much a part of the team too.

Racing is not life though, and that news if dwarfed by the talk I had with my architecture firm Thursday. They have decided to disband effective October 1, which means I will sort of be out of work. The news didn’t really come as a surprise. Times really are tough in this profession and they finally caught up with us. I enjoy my work there, but the recent slow pace along with other life happenings (keep reading!) have had me thinking about finding new work anyways. My boss here in Austin has offered to keep me on as part time contract work, and I will probably accept this until I can transition into something new.

Work comes and goes, and that news is further dwarfed by the really big announcement. Colleen and I are engaged!! Yes, despite warnings from my brother and bachelor friends to not do such a silly thing, there comes a time in a caveman’s life when he has to take the leap and throw his woman over his shoulder. My time happened to be Friday night. We’ve been dating since January 2008. She’s been there with me through all the times-good and bad. We go together like peas and carrots, and I’m not sure why peas and carrots go together, but they just do! I love this woman with all my heart and I look forward to our life adventures together. Neither one us knows when or where the wedding will be, so don’t ask. You’ll get an invite if you’re in the “cool” crowd. I’m kidding, but seriously, three days into our engagement and this question is already getting old!

So, the culmination of all these events has led to another pretty big decision. Colleen and I will be moving to Colorado. After visiting Breckenridge this summer for a killer bike race, we both fell in love with what Colorado has to offer. We were initially thinking Breckenridge, but are leaning a little more towards Durango now. We’re taking a 9 day trip at the end of September to visit lots of cities and get a better feel for where we want to be. Don’t be sad that we’re leaving though! We’re full blooded Texans and not so sure we can dish out the cold winters there. Not sure we could fully leave behind all our great Texas friends and family either. Since we both own property in Austin, our goal is to find some land we can build a cabin on, live there in the warmer months, than scoot back down to Texas when the daily high starts to hover around 35 degrees. Hopefully we rent out the cabin to skiers and such so that we’re never really having to pay more than one mortgage at a time. So, what Texas lacks in moderate climate and neverending places to ride mountain bikes, Colorado makes up for. But what Colorado lacks in Texas hospitality and social atmosphere, Austin makes up for. Sounds to me like the best of both worlds. Don’t know how well it will work out with employment and finances and such, but I don’t care. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. It is what our hearts desire and even if we have to take on jobs as loggers and waitstaff, so be it. Life is too damn short to let things hold back your dreams. It is time to quit the rat race, and move on to places where time is measured in sunrise and sunset.

This wraps up my news. If you currently contact me through my work email account, I’d ask that you switch to my personal email at aardvark31@juno.com . You can always keep up to date through the blog as well. One last note, I’m not moving to Colorado tomorrow, so no need for goodbyes at this point. We might not make it there until the spring snow melt, but who knows? Just keep in touch, as I will try my best as well. Thanks for checking in. If you’ve got dreams that are being hampered by fear or uncertainty, quit worrying and start doing! There is plenty to think about, but nothing to worry about.

Cheers,
Greg

You can’t learn if you don’t lose.

In true tri-dork fashion, here is the race recap in stats:

• In the water (which was listed as 1500 meters, but judging by my cartography skills and other seasoned racers’ account, it might have been closer to 1700m): 40:37
• On the 40k bike:  1:05:39 (22.7 mph)
• On the 10k run:  47:01 (a 7:35/mile pace)
• 2:37:58 Finish time
• 248 of 1051 overall
• 24 of about 80 in the Men 25-29 age group
• Number of hours spent training on time trial bike since the Couple’s Tri on July 12: about 1
• Number of hours spent running since the Austin Xterra: also about 1, maybe 2
• Number of hours spent swimming since the Austin Xterra: again, I think maybe 1

And now for a translation. I found out early last week that I was able to secure an entry to the race through a Sponsor (thanks Puresport!). It was not originally on my calendar, therefore I did not prepare for it in any way. Since I had never done an olympic road tri and wasn’t even planning on doing this race, I didn’t really have any goals for it, other than to “finish it as fast as possible”. This lackadaisical attitude was reflected in my lackluster result.

I would like to blame the poor result on the lack of preparation and not enough rest the week before and not having all that fancy bike equipment lots of folks were sporting, but truthfully, I just got it handed to me. Being in the water for so long robbed me of a lot of power on the bike, not to mention I’m just not very accustomed to the machine yet.  I didn’t settle into a good rhythm until maybe the last 10k of the ride. I wanted a top bike split bad, though, so I burnt a lot of matches trying to get it. ( I only ended up with the 101 ranked bike split) This set me up for a pretty painful 10k run, in the escalating late morning heat. I felt a stitch coming on in the right rib cage and tried to belly breath it out, but my diaphram and lungs would have none of it. It was that same asthmatic feeling I encountered at the Arkansas Xterra after exiting 89 degree bath water! Taking lots of little baby breaths was all I can manage, so I pretty much ran the whole 10k this way. I slowed to a walk at all of the water stations so I didn’t choke on the water from breathing so fast, but apparrently I was well hydrated because nature called after the second water stop. Luckily, there was a park restroom right there, so I made a much needed pit stop. This brought a little relief and the pace picked up until about a mile to go. I had hit the 2 1/2 hour mark in the race and this is historically the point at which my muscle energy stores deplete at this level of exercise without replenishment. Sure enough, I felt that emptiness start to settle in. Unlike days of old though, where I’d completely bonk and be forced into a walking pace in a situation like this, I just had to slow it down a little til the finish.

Athletes that I can handily beat at Xterras, XC, or even the local derby or crit races  showed me what this road triathlon thing is all about, handily defeating this first timer on their home turf.  I’m not gonna lie. It hurt, and it really wasn’t that much fun. Just look at the seriouness and determination in the faces of the top racers in the post race photos. You won’t see many smiles except at the finish line. That’s the only time the pain ends.

Despite the lack of fun, there is something about it that makes me want to come back for more. Sure, mankind’s competitive nature will always have him duking it out against his rivals, but unlike team sports or road/MTB racing, the beauty of this sport is that you don’t have to. Sometimes the enemy is yourself. There is this struggle for the next PR (Personal Record), this constant desire to improve your performance, your technique, your sportsmanship, and in the end your health. That’s what any sport should be about.

This effectively ends triathlon season, although I will be going to Comfort this weekend for an offroad Duathlon. Hopefully, the waterless off road terrain will play a bit more to my strengths! Thanks for reading.

Tuesday night lights are back in Del Valle, Tx. This past Tuesday night started the 2009 season of the greatest show on dirt, The Dirt Derby. Gone are the days of the Tuesday nighter, and here to stay is the joy and the pain of short track and cyclocross racing. While we did get a break in the hot weather and 90-95 degree temps somehow felt “cool”, something in my blood told me it wasn’t time to break out Rocinante (the cyclocross bike) so I showed up with The Dark Knight instead for the open MTB race. I was expecting a mediocre performance since I had cranked out a hard 5-6 mile run Monday evening and woke up at 5am Tuesday morning to help feed the homeless. Things got going and I felt alright so I went on up to the front with Rick Wetherald and Payson McElveen. We got a pace going and soon broke away from everyone else. We took turns attacking and beating each other down until Payson went down  in front of me at the start of the last lap. Rick got away as I slowed to dodge Payson, but I kept it going strong. Payson got back up and before I knew it he was right back on my tail. I held him off for 2nd in the field of 23, so all in all I was pleased with the workout.

The hurt is just getting started though. Xterra season is over, but I’m continuing to run in preparation for the Sick and Twisted Du coming up in two weekends. I also learned this week that I was able to gain entry to the sold out Austin Triathlon on Labor Day. It will be my first Olympic distance road tri. Mentally, no big deal since I’ve done the equivalent in an Xterra, and Xterras kick road tri’s butt. It might be a tough one though since I’m racing the Pro/Cat 1 XC race at Camp Eagle Sunday. Wednesday was some interval workouts on the TT bike to get it dialed in. Today I will do a little mock tri workout down at Barton, only Xterra style with my SS on the greenbelt, and the run on the trail as well.  Friday and Saturday will be some nice rest days as I head out to the sacred lands of Camp Eagle. Check back Tuesday for race reports. Happy Labor Day.
Greg