Category: Sports & Activities

sunrise swim course

2014 Mission Bay Triathlon Race Report

I completed my first triathlon, the Solana Beach Triathlon, 4 months ago. With that under my belt, the raving reviews about the Mission Bay Triathlon, the proximity of the race date, the motivation to keep working out, and a coupon code, I signed up for the race. Solana Beach was in July and Mission Bay was the first week in October. That gave me about 2 months to train for this next race. Everyone was talking about how great the swim was for Mission Bay, it was point-to-point, and with the current. It was supposed to be easy! But then…they ended up changing the swim course! No more point-to-point. So with the slight high of finishing the last triathlon and hopes of improving in the next, I went for it.

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ACTIVEx

2014 ACTIVEx Solana Beach Triathlon

3 months ago, I signed up for the ACTIVEx Solana Beach Triathlon through my work via Charity Challenge to raise money for Kids in the Game.  It’s kind of crazy how fast the 3 months went by.  In hindsight, I should have documented more here about the training and experience.  I did put a lot of notes in my Endomondo on each workout, so if you’re interested, add me as a friend.  I started writing and realized there was a whole lot I wanted to write about my training, so I moved it to a separate post if you’re interested on how I trained for the triathlon and all the things I learned. Continue Reading

Training for My First Triathlon – Solana Beach

Endomondo Stats

Training stats for the past few months.

Swimming

Going into this, I knew I wanted to focus heavily on swimming.  I had swimming lessons as a kid and periodically played or hung out in the pool.  I’ve gone boogie boarding and tried surfing, once.  I wouldn’t have drowned if I fell in the pool but the whole idea of swimming laps and swimming for endurance was foreign to me.  I do remember one time I tried to swim laps post-college with Jenn and LeighAnn.  They wanted to use that as fitness.  It was incredibly difficult.  That was my experience “swimming laps”.  The length of the pool was one of those apartment pools so not even very far.  They didn’t seem to have a problem though.  Anyway, that was terrible.  I’ve always disliked swimming and being in water so this was the most challenging part for me. Continue Reading

ACTIVEx Triathlon CAxMP 2014

A little shy of 3 months ago, I signed up for my first triathlon.  I can’t believe how quickly time flies.  The triathlon is in ONE week!

For the past 6 years, ACTIVEx has put on a triathlon camp aka CAxMP which typically occurs a weekend or two before the actual triathlon.  CAxMP has been at Warner Springs for a few years and at Highland Springs Resort for a few including this year.  We basically spend the weekend participating in several training sessions and just hanging out with ACTIVEx people, family, and friends. Continue Reading

First Beach Workout with ACTIVEx

I’m going to try to blog about my triathlon training so I can come back and read it some day.  It’s still a little weird to think I am going to be doing a triathlon in 3 months…less than 3 months.  They haven’t sent out the training schedule yet and I’m eager to see it.  I have so much going on in the next few months during weekends that I’m afraid I will miss the big workouts.

I’m also not sure how much training needs to be done as well as when and where I will be training.  Writing about this just makes me think of so many more things I need to do like get my bike tuned up, get a swim cap, uh..swim, go bike riding, run? Gah.

Anyway, I kind of went off on a tangent there.

Had our first group workout today at La Jolla Shores.  It was really nice out today.  Super hot but since we had to go in the water, it wasn’t too bad.  I was one of the first to arrive and spent some time talking to the guy in charge and his wife.  We had maybe about 10-12 people come out to the training.  Most of these people are all veterans.  I think only one other girl hadn’t done a triathlon before but she seemed to be training for a marathon.  Everyone besides me was in really good shape…haha.

Our first workout was called the pit of despair.  We basically paired up across from our partner all lined up and starting digging.  We had to dig about 8-10 inches down and make a pit about 6 feet wide.  It was really tiring digging into the sand.  It was to work on the pulling motion.  Man, you’d know why it is called the pit of despair about 5 minutes in.  It took a long while to do that.

Oh, I forgot to mention we had a warm-up jog.  We were located just south of the south bathrooms on the beach and had to jog to the main lifeguard tower.  Anyway, after the pit of despair we went into the water about waist deep and headed parallel until we got to the next lifeguard tower.  Then we went up to the sand and did burpee broad jumps all the way to the next tower.  Wow, I don’t think I’ve ever done so many burpees and for that long.  You basically do a burpee with the push up and then you jump with two feet forward.  It took forever!  The lifeguard towers aren’t very close together and they feel really far apart when you are basically jumping across.  Man, I was so tired and it was so hot!  Dripping sweat.

Then we went back into the water and moved parallel but backwards to the next tower.  Then we got out and ran to the pier and back.  I think it was about a mile long.  I haven’t run a full mile in like 2 years lol.  I did that 1 mile mostly w/o stopping the other week.  These people run fast!  I just went my own pace and came in last.   They waited for me which was nice.  My knee hurt a little bit but I was trying not to think about it.  I think running on the sand helped with less impact.

Then back into the water to side shuffle one way, then the next, all the way back to our tent.  People kept saying they saw sting ray and to be careful.  I was really scared of getting stung even though I didn’t see any.  I did see this huge halibut which was really cool!  I also walked through a school of fish – it was warm in that area.  I thought they might bite me.  They didn’t.  People kept saying there was a leopard shark but I didn’t see it.  I probably would have freaked out even though they’re supposed to be harmless.

When we got back to the sand, we had to fill the pit of despair back up.  This time using the pushing motion.  That was super tiring too.  I think my arms are going to be sore tomorrow.  All these people kept stopping to watch what we were doing.  I probably would too.  Why are these 10 people digging a giant shallow hole in the ground?  It was probably 15-20ft long and 6 ft wide.

And that was the workout.  Overall, it wasn’t too bad.  We didn’t do any real swimming which is what I was afraid of.  People were pretty nice.  My shoulder was hurting a little bit before and it hurts now too.  I either hurt it from football or basketball.  It was nice to workout, made me feel much more energized.

The end.

I Just Signed Up for My First Triathlon

2014 ACTIVEx Charity Challenge: The Stir from ACTIVEx on Vimeo.

Every year, my office participates and puts on this this huge event called ACTIVEx Charity Challenge.  It’s basically a fundraiser for an organization paired up with getting us people in the office active through a triathlon (though you can sign up for a duathlon or 5K).  Last year, I was injured so it was easy to say no.  Haha.  This year, I had a lot of back and forth thoughts on whether or not to participate.  Reasons to participate: this is probably the best group and best opportunity of people to participate with, these folks do this day in and day out, it’ll get me back into being active, it’s for the kids, I’ll use my bike, and I’ll run again.  Reasons to not participate:  I don’t know how well my body will hold up, it’s healing but not 100%, I’m SCARED, scared of swimming, swimming the distance, swimming in open water, finding time to train, wondering if I am physically able to even do a whole triathlon, etc.

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Dark Clouds Loom Over Sochi

For me, the Olympics is something very grand.  It is a time where the best athletes come together from around the world to compete AND unite in sport.  The Olympics are cool because athletes can experience different cultures and meet different people from both the hosting country and the athletes they are competing against.  So while, yes, athletes are training to win, the shared moments with teammates and coaches, and being at the Olympics itself is an experience.  I would think and hope that win and lose, the athletes still have an enjoyable experience, an experience of a lifetime.

And then there seems to be the reality of the Sochi Olympics…where I haven’t seen anything positive yet reported on it.  In fact, the Sochi Olympics don’t only seem to have a less positive vibe or events leading up to it, they seem to have largely negative and even dangerous happenings associated with it.  Just scanning the news, I’m seeing the following:

-57% of Americans think terror attack likely at Sochi Games
-Journalists report hotel horror stories
-Russians say authorities rounding up, poisoning stray dogs before Olympics
-U.S. official cites “number of specific threats” targeting Sochi Games
-The US Is Warning Airlines About Toothpaste Tube Bombs Ahead Of Sochi
-Hacked Within Minutes: Sochi Visitors Face Internet Minefield

And on and on it goes…

I even read that they told the USA athletes to not wear any clothing that resembles their US uniforms or even red, white, and blue as to be identified as an American since they may be attached.  That there was an escape plan for Americans should any attack occur.

C’mon!  What is going on?!  I’m pretty sure the last thing any athlete wants to think about when going to compete is any of these things.  It shouldn’t even have to be something of a concern.  But no, this is the sad reality of it.

It’s like a real life hunger games.  Who wants to participate in that?

Hopefully, some positive will come out of the games and we’ll be able to escape and get over all these negative things.

Iron Girl 5K Pre-Race

Iron Girl 5K 2013 Success

July 21, 2012 was the last time I ran in a race, in fact, ran at all (a real run). My BLAZING speed of 29 minutes. Haha, blazing compared to today. Continue Reading

It’s Time to Rebuild

Rebuild Me

This is serious business.

I need to rebuild…myself.

I used to be a very active person.  I played in a basketball league every week.  I was running a lot.  I played football.  I could also do almost anything physical at a whim when it came to sports.  About this time last year, I could also do 48 consecutive pushups.

That’s who I used to be.  Who I am today is quite different.   Continue Reading

Potato Chip Rock - Mt. Woodson

Hiking Mt. Woodson’s Potato Chip Rock

My work has this thing where you can take one day off a year to do volunteer work and still get paid and also one day off to do something active and also get paid.  The end of the year is coming up quickly and I needed to think of what to do with my days.  Last year I used it for snowboarding which was nice but we didn’t go this year so I still had it.

In the back of my mind I had always wanted to go see the potato chip rock – well, not really see it but to take that picture that everyone has on it!  I mean, it does look pretty cool.  However, there often isn’t a lot of time to do such a thing.  Since I knew Marisa sometimes has Fridays free, I asked her which one she was free on and asked if she wanted to go check it out with me.  So that’s what we did yesterday.

I really didn’t do much research on it as I usually like to do before embarking on things.  I had no idea how long it was going to take nor did I know where it was.  I heard people say it took several hours so I had that in the back of my mind.  I had also left the house early in the morning to go to the doctor and saw how foggy and misty it was outside so I thought it might be a bit cool so that was good.  But then I thought about it some more and I thought that since it was inland it was probably going to be hot.  Anyway, we both had a bagel to go and both had one nalgene bottle each.  I didn’t want to carry much so I cut down on things and wore shorts with pockets.  We looked around for sunscreen and I couldn’t find mine.  Marisa had some face one which was 15 spf that I used on my face and rubbed the leftovers on my shoulders and off we went. Continue Reading