Tugaloo Part Two

Tugaloo Triathlon/ Lake Hartwell - is done >:). YAY. My fourth. Second time I've done this race,- I had a real dogfight with someone on the bike. I cleared a new PR for speed, on the bike. I topped 57 mph on the bike. Son of a bitch passed me while I was just staring at my computer in wonderment. Traded respect at T2.

I probably put together slightly better time than last year but I have decided that this is the year of the marathon I am convinced that if I can fix my stride (I strike left foot hard , so much so that my left leg is actually bigger around than my right - comes also from when I broke the right one when I was younger too but thats another story) - and shed 30 pounds I will have my 10k and I will have my strong time. I have given menu control of every single thing I eat over to the someone who reminds me far too much of the goddess kali. And since she is +under weight+ its actually a fair trade; I made her eat oysters chocolate and peanut butter today. With bread. >:) I had a glass of water. Grrr.

I had the strangest thoughts on the run, I thought about cheating. Which is a real joke, cut through the woods on any Tri, and you will be DQ. I thought about other people who have this self inflated view of themselves as runners. The usual bullshit self talk that gets you nowhere but walking. Sort of like playing "dust in the wind" on your ipod when you're trying to break mile 12 after a long day. Defeatist.

I found someone that was getting hurt worse than me. My first mistake was to assume they weren't and they were just turtle slow like me. Not so. They were hurtin' for certain. TNT people. And so I paced myself with them. Then slowly moved ahead. I wanted to stay with them but finally left them behind.

Then comes the one that can pace close to you. And he and I ran for three miles together. That was fun. I got in front of him. Then we caught his son. Ended up ahead of them by a minute.

The total highlight of this race was the bike, just an epic dogfight, between me and some evil rat bastard on the bike. I must have passed, like, 20 people. I loved it the whole time. SOB passed me in the second to last mile feeding into a no-pass zone after a 57 mph downhill. I think I probably averaged 23 mph. I can't wait to see the results there.

I marked up either arm with two sayings, I actually did more time on the left side than the right. Just read the markings on my arms. It was cool. I breathe naturally on the right. It made the whole thing pretty fun and I usually know I am good out of the swim when I can barely walk out of the thing.

I am a good runner, put down a 4:30 something in high school on the mile. Someone at the tri yesterday told me I have to just run one so hard you puke your guts out at the end, and then you'll be over it. I am so psyched against the whole thing. Running sucks. I have always hated it in the tri, hated it so much. Oh you probably thought it was love. Seriously sometimes I wish I was on drugs. And of course the business is loving its new unprovisioned T1 circuit that my lame Telco put a new order on after they did an administrative shutoff of the last one. A brand new order. Two weeks of downtime. And I have to move every damn site out to offsite. Thrills. I didn't say cheap.

I could use a running partner. Or a coach. Or a pastoral counselor. :)