Who Inspires you

Do you have a pro athlete that inspires you? Do you do what you do for you? Who do you think of when you are laying every possible ounce of energy on the line? For me, it has never been anyone in particular. Actually I did things for me because I wanted to show people I could do it or I was strong enough or fit enough. I never actually looked up to a pro athlete. Wait! I take that back. Back in the day I loved Dwight Evans. Loved!!!! But a pro baseball player I would never be. hahaha! But other than that when I race (and I use the term race loosely) I race for me. I mean I have people in mind like my friend with MS and my nephew, as well as many other people like my son. But have never been inspired by an athlete until the past few weeks. 

I recently have been watching videos of Miranda Carfrae, multiple Ironman World Champion. She is such an amazing athlete and so humble. I know of a few  humble athletes (my own coach) but seriously not many. She is just amazing in everything. I watch her videos and how she reacts and think if I could only be just like her. If I could only strive to be amazing, humble, and be a winner. She made a comment in one of her interviews on what she would say to new triathletes. Her response was to have fun and family comes first so let it. She said if you miss a workout so be it just have fun. I don't know what I am so captured by her but it seems like she is genuine and real an seems to be an amazing all around person and athlete. 

I know I am not the fastest or the strongest but when I am on my game I give it everything I have. I work hard, train hard no matter how hard the workout is. I give it 100%. I must say I continue to  struggle with this. Thinking what am I trying to achieve after IM. I need to get past it. It's funny recently someone said to me "if you can do an IM so can I." Really? you just said that. Well if that doesn't fuel a bitches fire. I can't even..... Do people know the amount of struggle, training, sacrifice one endures to never mind start but to complete such an event. Even a half can be daunting then double that. People will often say Kim did an IM last year. I kind of shrug it off like ya ya ya.... I wonder why do I do that. I should be proud of my accomplishment, what I have achieved but for some reason I don't want the recognition. I should say ya I am so bad ass.. Let me tell you all about it. But I don't. I hope to think it is me being so humble like so many around me. Ya I did and Ironman but it is no different than someone doing their first 5k or their first half marathon, or their first century or metric century ride. It's a race, it was a goal and I made it happen. you can make anything happen if you put the time an energy into it. That is what I take away from Miranda. Have fun with it, train hard, and you will full fill your dreams. :)

What do you do after an Iron Distance Race?

you become lazy and depressed. Holy cow!! Never in my life have I experienced such a huge let down. Don't get me wrong I had a fantastic day. It could not have gone any better well minus the hilly swim. Hahaha! Jesus, talk about almost drowning. It was crazy. What a day! I will give you a brief recap since I haven't as of yet. Ok, so not so brief.

So we left Worcester the Wednesday before the race, September 3rd. I was so nervous and jesus talk about packing shit. So much crap to pack race day clothes, transition items, run clothes, hats, pants, nutrition, fuel belts, the list goes on and on. Oh the bike and shoes. Hahaha! We spent one night in Rochester NY on our way to Sandusky Ohio. When we arrived in Sandusky on Thursday, I was full of excitement, Cedar Point amusement park was pretty, the area not so much but it was decent. The hotel was all decked out for Halloween, my son got a kick out of that. After getting to our room and getting situated I met my friends that came as well to race to go for a bike ride. We did a bit of the bike course since two of the riders had done this before. It was pretty and flat. I was so excited. I was here at Cedar Point and I was about to participate in the biggest race of my life. 

Friday we wake up and take a rest day. Me and a friend drove the bike course and that was great. Lots of corn field. Holy crap! But it was not that bad not many hills some rollers. I thought to myself I got this. And two nights before the race I am seriously cool as a cucumber. I am so relaxed. Not my usual self. If you knew me I am a stress ball. Literally nervous nelly....

Saturday came and it is the day before race day. Decided to go for an early morning swim with friends. As I was putting on my wetsuit I feel a breeze on my ass. My ass was exposed! I ripped my wetsuit!! 

Ok don't panic.. Worst case I swim without one or I rent one from the vendor onsite. My friend pipes in saying she has the same wetsuit and I could use it if I wanted to. OMG! What are the chances she has the same wetsuit in my size. Thank god! So I am back to being calm cool and collective. I eat dinner early and go over to meet up with John and Sean at the amusement park. I decide to go on a ride with Sean it looked like a nice easy ride. OMG!! Not.. it was nuts spinny and I thought I was going to die before I got to my race. Sean was laughing. After that I went back to the room and watched t.v. turning in early. I was still so relaxed no nerves. 

Race Morning!! Look at me slept through the night! OMG. never had such a good night sleep. I eat my pre-race breakfast and get my friend and head out to the swim start. You could feel the nervous energy as we stood by the race start. We decided to get wet before race start and get a feel for the water. Umm.. its a little choppy I think to myself. I don't think much of it. As the announcement is made to please approach the start and go over the start mat to register your chip I am still calm. My girlfriend said to me "hey you, what the hell did you do with Wamback." That is how calm I felt. Well that is all about to change. As we cross over the mat and make our way into the water I am getting nervous. The waves are pretty big. The start is in the water since Lake Erie is really shallow so we have to walk out probably 100 yards from shore. OMG! I am up to my chest and the waves are crashing at my face and I find myself jumping. Panic is setting in and as the whistle blows I start to swim. I really start to panic. I start to think I can't do this, waves are to big, I am going to die, I didn't train for this and can't adapt, and then I start swearing and breast stroking and crying. After 10 minutes in the water I tread water for a bit and I say to myself, "suck it up kim! you didn't train your ass off to drop out in the first quarter mile." I took my time met a guy along the way as we rounded the first mile (it was a two loop) and he tells me just take your time and try and duck the wave on way out and ride wave on way in. He said believe me you are not going to have a good swim so just get through it. He saved my life. We stuck together and come to find out he is a very fast swimmer and was with me! He said he does between a 23-25 minute mile swim and here he is with me. Unfortunately, we were not going to swim date since he was puking. hahaha! Several people were!  Okay I got this... I finished, the swim and I have never been more happy. Not a pretty time 1:40 but I made it before the cut off. And 62 competitors were pulled from the water so I am damn happy. 

Onto Transition 1. Dear god I am in good shape. Most people were vomitting and just looked awful. I felt a little nauseous but took some sips of water while I put my cycling gear on and took a bit of food and off I went. Bike was amazing. So many corn fields I nailed my nutrition, had a great ride. Felt kind of sick around 90 miles but fueled and felt a little better. Such a great ride and even got some woman all scared. I told her the corn field make me think we are in children of the corn and she freaked out and missed her turn. Hahahah! I had to ride to tell her she went the wrong way. She was doing the half and missed the half turn. So I had a little fun. 

Transition 2 I was feeling good. Trying not to think about having to run 26.2 miles but thought I will stay the course and run to every water stop and walk the water stops. No long walking will cramp up! Had to keep telling myself that. I stayed with the plan. Met some awesome people along the way that keep me motivated, strong, and focused. So much to talk about with other runners and shared some stories. One woman had a whole entourage with her they had a radio. Oh I had to stick with her and I did for about 10 miles. I learned so much about this woman. She was amazing, my age. She lost her daughter at the age of three and was doing her first ironman for her. She has done many half irons for her daughter. It was an amazing and inspiring time of the run. She ended up getting a good kick the last two miles and i let her drop me. Another guy who we picked up along the way stayed with me till the finish. We chatted and as we hit the causeway to Cedar Point amusement park we could smell the finish as we encouraged each other for the next two miles. When we hit the causeway he made a joke what a romantic date we were on since there was water on each side, nice big moon, and the amusement park lit up in the distance. hahaha! it was romantic. :) We laughed. 

What an amazing run. I felt great the whole way and now I have yards to go. I see my friends parents and my husband and son. I am crying emotional its over, I did it! My son ran in with me and was yelling at me to run faster. I hit the finish line! Emotions so big it is hard to explain! Roller coaster head is spinning I did it someone call COACH! I did it and I have my husband and son to thank for my success as well as many other friends and family. I finished why do I feel so sad, wait I feel sick. Off to the medical tent I go... 

I finished! Better than I expected I was thinking around 16 hours and I finished in 14:45. Amazing! So happy and proud. What an accomplishment.

So now the real fun. I get back to the hotel room. Shakes all night, freezing, crying uncontrollably, and the shower I screamed bloody murder due to chafing. Then I decide to read Facebook posts because I can't sleep. OMG! Sobbing, just sobbing at all the people who wished me luck, followed me and supported me the whole day. Oh yes good times. Don't you just want to sign up for one now. 

That is not even the worst of it. For the next six months to this day the mental let down and physical fatigue was way more than I could even imaging. I am still not right mentally from it all. Now goals seem so small and I can't wrap my head around not going that distance and being satisfied. I keep thinking there is nothing I can do that will top this, nothing is big enough. I am working hard to get out of this mind set. Now I know how people continue to sign up for them. It is 10x worse than "marathon blues" It is down right awful. That being said, will I ever do it again? HELL YES! I can't wait for the next one. Well that is my story. 

 Thanks to this girl for taking the journey with me!!!

Human Bobber

So I don’t know about this but it has been aggravating me. The last two times I have been to the local YMCA to swim laps they have half the pool open for open swim with no lanes and half the pool open for lap swim with lanes. And kind of ironic the last two times I have been there I have shared a lane with the same woman. So this is my question, if there is a half the pool open for open swim with no kids in the deep end why do people think it is ok to tread water or be a human bobber in the lap lane? Yes the last two times people get in the middle of the lap lane and bob up and down and get angry when you splash or interrupt them. What the hell, move over to the open lanes! The last two times I have been there me and this woman would circle swim around the person, ummm you think they would move. But no, anyway it is annoying and I never have said anything. I understand they have a right to be in the pool to do their work out but there is whole open deep end of the pool that is not being used to do your bobbing.

Ok, so this week I am tired, exhausted and struggling to get through workouts but I have to push. So last night I go to do my swim workout. That is right human bobber in the lap lane but my lady friend wasn’t there this time it was another guy. So I was tired and was kind of aggravated because this person was bobbing in my way so I had to interrupt my stroke to get around them. I got so angry about 10 minutes into my swim that I stopped and said is there a reason you are bobbing in the middle of a lap lane while two people are trying to swim and there is a whole open end to the pool over there. They yelled at me and told me they had a right to swim there. I said whatever and made their life miserable by every time I kicked off at that end I would kick up water to piss him off. I am usually not like this but seriously I had had it! Do you think the life guards would say something? I 

was totally annoyed and probably out of line but I had to.

MOVE YOUR BOBBING ASS OVER! Hahahaha!!!!

Workout got done so it’s all good. 

Has anyone else ever experienced this?

First time getting in a wet suit.. really?

Got up this morning and met my friend at the boat ramp at Comet pond for a nice swim. Little chilly but what a beautiful morning. The pond was like glass and it was just so beautiful. While we were swimming the sun was coming up and it was just perfect.

So I get to the parking lot. Start to put my wetsuit on and get my foot caught. Good lord I almost took a digger while putting on my wet suit. I totally tripped and got my foot caught while putting it in the leg hole. OMG!!! My friend almost had to catch me. hahaha!Can you say tired?

I don't ever think I have experienced this type of exhaustion. Yes I had a baby and you were exhausted lack of sleep wanted to cry but this is different. Muscle fatigue, mental fatigue its just wearing me down. You know it is the end I guess when you are this tired.

I swam 2.4 miles in about 1:25. I am so thrilled with that. That is being totally exhausted and running on fumes. I have to believe I can do this. I do. After tomorrows ride it will be all down hill.

Here is to a 17 hour training week. Yipee!!! Few hard days to go.. I got this.

Felt like Death

So I wake up yesterday morning yep it was Wednesday and I kept thinking it was Thursday. I wake up my body feels like someone beat me in my sleep and my legs hurt, my feet hurt and I have a long swim and a 7 mile run with pick ups to get through. I start to talk to myself. How the hell am I going to do this? The exhaustion alone is killing me never mind trying to put one foot in front of the other to walk or run.

Well I go down stairs get Sean off to day camp. The day goes by and I still can't get out of my own way. I dumped a whole thing of fruit salad on the floor and spilt a half gallon of milk all in one day. Just to give you a mental picture, I was the walking dead. Anyway the workouts are on my plan so I must get them done. I needed to focus one workout at a time. I kept telling myself "Kim are you going to be an ironman! Then suck it up." I emailed a few friends for motivational ass kicking and it worked.

Later that day I lace up the sneakers, put on a cute Lulu running skirt (ya because that is going to make me faster and feel better but damn I will look good! hahaha!) and a tank. I head out the door.

I checked my dam plan three times before leaving and I still couldn't remember how the work out went but I had an idea. It was something like this:
Mile 1 and 2 zone II Heart Rate - which is about a 10:20-10:25 mile
Mile 3 and 4 zone III Heart Rate- which is about a 9:25-9:40 mile
Mile 5 zone IV Heart Rate- which is a 8:15-8:40 mile

The first mile from my house is all down hill. I was like wahoo this feels fantastic. No problem. Well then I hit the flats and slight up hills. I kept thinking in that first two miles how am I ever going to be able to pick up the pace. I would have to dig deep. Well my first two miles were 10:20-10:30 as expected, 3rd and 4th miles were in the 9:30's wahoo and my 5th mile was a 8:33, at which point I stopped put my hand over my head and yelled "fuck yeah." I couldn't believe I just nailed that workout completely exhausted and depleted. I was so happy. The last two miles well were cool down but one was in high 9's and last one was in the 10's.

Later that evening the swim went well too. I had to cut it short since I only had my sitter for a certain amount of time but almost got 2 miles in.

This training is really making me realize how freaking amazing our bodies are. The really are an amazing organ.

What a Weekend!!!! Racing and Friends

Last Saturday I participated in my 5^th half iron distance triathlon. Well it was longer than half distance by a good three miles. It was such a fun weekend. I went up with a good friend from high school and four other friends and we all raced in the event. It was two of my friends first time doing the half distance so the nerves were off the chart.

Friday night we went to pick up numbers and went to take a look at the swim. We get to the water and my god did the swim distance look long. Instant panic set in with my friends. As we were leaving the venue to go to dinner I was making my way over some plastic fencing and got my foot caught and down I went. Seriously, it was hilarious. Only me! So we head to dinner have a nice night and back to the hotel for early bed time. Not that I could sleep, I never sleep well the night before a race never mind in a hotel room too. Before bed we got our gear together and many questions were asked. One of our friends Cheryl lost her number and was panicking! We looked everywhere in the room, our other friend was in the shower and comes flying out thinking there was a mouse in the room because of the commotion going on. Come to find out Gina took Cheryl’s number by accident. Oh boy!! This is the beginning of the fun. Hahaha! Man I love these girls. Like I always say “it takes a village.”

Race Day!!! The three of us get ready and get our pre-race eats and last minute checks that we have everything. It was an early morning and we were all nervous and ready to go. Our other friend staying in another room came down to meet us so we could all drive together. She comes in the room and she is doing a check with us on if she has everything. I ask her if she has her helmet sticker and she says yes and she goes to put it on her helmet. We tell her she has her helmet on backwards and she insists she doesn’t and has been wearing it that way for ever. I told her it is backwards the visor thing you have on the helmet goes in the front. OMG!! We all died laughing. Her new nick name is backwards helmet. She has been wearing it backwards on rides for weeks now. Bahahaha! I almost wet my pants. It was awesome.

future ironmen! I hope

The race was delayed for 50 minutes due to fog on the water. Not good when you are already nervous had your pre-race GU before they announced the delay. But hey it gave me extra time for bathroom runs, so I guess it worked out. We start the swim it was a nice swim. But when you turned your last turn buoy to the finish of the swim there was no sight buoy. I could not see where the heck I was swimming. It was chaos. I had no idea what I was swimming towards so I tried to keep a line with the swimmer in front of me. It worked okay I guess. The swim was long by about .18 according to my watch and I did a fairly good job keeping in a straight line.

Winna winna chicken dinna

Classy Dismount

Off on the bike we go after a quick transition. I had some anxiety the first 10 miles on the bike. No idea why but it was terrible. I could not catch my breath. I had to keep telling myself I was fine I got this, no problem. I finally settled into a comfortable groove. Mile 37 brought on a new challenge. OMG!!! I got the worst saddle sore ever. It hurt to sit and wanted to cry. So sore and I pretty much had to ride the bike out of the last 6-7 miles of the race.  Not to mention the nice climb of 9-10 miles from 37-47 yikes it was a doozy and sitting in the saddle climbing was not fun. So the ride is over and my friend Jess caught me on the bike. She is such a strong cycler. I kept her in my view as we came to the finish of the bike. As we pull into dismount I am flapping my gums to her chatting and I didn’t clip out my left foot first as I dismount the bike. Whoops… down I go. I went down hard. It hurt. But we laughed that I ruined our bike time. Haha! People came over to help to see if I was okay and the announcer gave me a 10 for best dismount of the day. Ugh.. haha!! So classy!

The run was good. I pretty much slowly ran the whole way. I walked a few hills to keep my heart rate down. It was pretty hilly the second half. I felt okay. Left leg was giving me a little hell but it always does. I kept hammering on.

It was such a great day with my friends. We all finished and I was so proud of all of the girls. I didn’t do as well as I had hoped for and it has kind of got in my head a bit but time to shut the brain off and get my workouts in. Focus on the bigger picture and make this happen. I am working out some sore spots on the legs to. Things are starting to creep up now as the volume increases.

The girls with our new friend Kate!

We ended the day with a nice evening with my friend’s parent’s campsite and had a cookout. It was so much fun. My friend’s mom was my Girl Scout troop leader so we had some funny stories as always. It was just a great weekend.