Staying Strong and Positive!

My hill workouts

2012-02-01T08:53:00.000-05:00

In preparation for the 2,000+ feet of elevation gain at Wildflower this year... I have promised to do 2 things. Work on my core (for my lower back pain) and run hills. Last year I can honestly say that I don't think I ran even one hill except for Muncie 70.3 and those were baby rollers.

This year... it's game time. Time to stop being a pansy and actually get some good workouts in.

So I have a great area where there are some decent hills.

My favorite area is a 1/2 mile uphill stretch. I used to run this back in high school when I really needed to blow off some steam.

I have not been running as much as I would like (considering that I am not following a training plan this year), but I was mildly surprised at how fresh and great the legs felt for an 8 mile stretch of hill repeats, never stopped once and only had labored breathing on my last hill repeat. I can't describe the area I run in too well, so I decided I would video the 1/2 mile stretch and show you all what I will be calling my bitch for the next few months.

Enjoy.

My overall split was 8:30/mile which was pretty good considering my downhill recovery was much slower than the repeats were. I hate running downhill, it really messes up my back (which is evident this morning) so I need to actually "practice" getting my fat ass down the hills w/out injuring myself.

My hill goes from 659ft to 810ft. So a good 150ft high hill. The pathetic thing is that just running up and down this hill does not equal the elevation gain at wildflower. This honestly blows my mind. I don't really know any better locations near my house to get hills to train on that would better prepare me than this one? Aside from finding a flipping mountain to run up (which I may do) I think this is what I have to work with and just need to compensate the lack of incline with run intensity.

Thanks for reading!

Rainbows and Unicorn Farts...

2012-01-30T10:34:00.000-05:00

First off, you are all evil. I hate these things, they are a pain in the butt let alone being tagged by ALL of you?!?! So here you thought I was just going to choose one of these things and answer them?!?! OH HELL NO! You asked for this, now you sit your butt right there and read every dang word I throw down here a'ight? Capeesh? You follow?

1. Post these rules
2. You must post 11 random things about yourself
3. Answer the questions set for you in their post
4. Create 11 new questions for the people you tag to answer
5. Go to their blog and tell them you’ve tagged them
6. No stuff in the tagging section about you are tagged if you are reading this. You legitimately have to tag 11 people!

11 RANDOMS:

1. I hate spam mail, I check my email about every 5 minutes to clear out the crap. Seriously, I wish I could kick the actual people spamming us in their nuts.

2. There is a fast lane on the highway. GET THE HELL OUT OF IT IF YOU ARE NOT GOING TO GO FAST! If you happen to not believe in the fast lane, stop following my blog and let me know so I can remove you from ever existing in my life.

3. I was the youngest person to become a licensed engineer in Ohio.

4. I will try anything in life 2 times. Why 2? Simple, because I like to make sure that my opinion was accurate the first time... oh and I most likely did not learn my lesson the first time.

5. I don't consider cats as pets. I consider them as a nuisance that people merely put up with in their household.

6. I began working construction w/ my dad when I was 4 years old.

7. Sometimes it takes me a long time to understand something because it is not being presented in a way that I can process it. I will not budge on my position or viewpoint until I can understand it.

8. I have a big mouth. I am a smart ass (my grandma used to call me her "little smart ass") and I know exactly what to say to piss people off. I also have this amazing talent of saying precisely the WRONG thing at the WRONG time. I am quite a pleasure to be around in public settings... honestly, it gets interesting.

9. My friends in high school were mainly nerds/dorks. We played dungeons and dragons among many other stereotypical "nerdisms" haha.

10. I have only been in 2 actual fights in my life (the others were merely skirmishes). One left a kid w/ broken ribs and the other involved me gorilla pressing the kid over my head and then slamming him to the ground.

I can get slightly out of control while intoxicated and do not have a shut off switch... so I guess don't piss me off too much ok?

11. In high school I wrestled, ran cross country, ran track, and played rugby. Wrestling was my A sport while rugby was THE. BEST. SPORT. EVER! I used to call it kill the carrier.

Questions:

1. Twister or Monopoly?

MONOPOLY. I LOVE REAL ESTATE :)

2. Which do you crave more? The chips & salsa, or chocolate?

IS THIS EVEN A QUESTION? CHOCOLATE!!!

3. You're sitting next to a friend(s) in a room. You fart and it's loud enough that you KNOW everyone heard it. Do you acknowledge it or pretend it never happened? (Okay, every situation is different....but you know yourself - in general, your reaction would be?)

I WILL START LAUGHING UNCONTROLLABLY. AND THEN I WOULD PROUDLY RAISE MY HAND AND TAKE CREDIT. IF IT IS LOUD ENOUGH TO BE HEARD BY THE WHOLE ROOM, IT IS NOT SOMETHING THAT YOU DO NOT CLAIM, I TAKE PRIDE IN MY FARTS.

4. Pizza or Hamburger (yes, buffalo burger acceptable)?

BACON CHEESEBURGER ANY DAY. HOWEVER THESE ARE BOTH MUST HAVE'S IN MY DIET.

5. If you could go back to one conversation to change or add to something you said, what would it be?

I HAVE NONE. I AM A BELIEVER THAT YOU ARE WHO YOU ARE TODAY BASED UPON THE PATH YOU ALREADY TOOK. I LOVE WHO I AM AND FEEL THAT EVERY MISTAKE AND MISFORTUNE IN MY LIFE HAS SHAPED ME.

6. Snow skiing or water skiing?

WATER SKIING HANDS DOWN.

7. What is the craziest thing you have done (or advice you listened to) to try to heal an injury faster?

STOP WORKING OUT FOR TWO WEEKS. ALL LIES! HAHA.

8. Are you a cat person or a dog person?

UHHHH IS THERE SUCH A THING AS A CAT PERSON?! SERIOUSLY? I AM A DOG PERSON.

9. Do you wipe front to back, or back to front?

BACK TO FRONT ALL DAY LONG. ALTHOUGH W/ MY NEW DIET, I CAN BECOME A NO WIPER.

10. What's your favorite Charity?

LEUKEMIA AND LYMPHOMA SOCIETY. LOOK AT MY SIDE BAR, CARE TO DONATE?!

11. Favorite rock/country/blues band of all time?

ROCK: SMASHING PUMPKINS
COUNTRY: OLDER TIM McGRAW. NOT HIS NEW STUFF, SOUND LIKES SOMEONE IS STRANGLING A CAT.
BLUES: STEVIE RAY VAUGHN

1. Why and how did you get into triathlons?
BY MISTAKE, SAW AN AD FOR AN INDOOR TRI AT OUR REC CENTER AND TOOK SECOND PLACE... GUESS I FIGURED I MIGHT BE GOOD AT THIS STUFF.

2. Dark or white meat?
ANY TYPE OF MEAT. PREFER DARK THOUGH. ONCE YOU GO BLACK YOU NEVER GO BACK FOLKS.

3. Beer, wine or liquor?
DEPENDS ON MOOD. I USE BEER AS MY RECOVERY DRINK FROM WORKOUTS THOUGH.

4. Where did you grow up?
IN MY PARENT'S HOUSE....? AM I MISSING SOMETHING HERE? NORTH EASTERN OHIO.

5. TT or road bike?
ROADIE ALL DAY LONG.

6. Favorite vacation?
HAWAII.

7. What do you do now that your parents did (and hated) when you were growing up?
NOT FINISH PROJECTS!!! HAHA.

8. Your favorite sport (not including swimming, biking or running)?
TO PLAY: RUGBY. TO WATCH: SOCCER.

9. How many days per week do you spend on Slowtwitch?
WHAT IS SLOWTWITCH? I HAVE THE TWITTER AND FACEBOOK AND BLOGGER, ISN'T THAT ENOUGH?

10. How long ago was it since you've been hammered (drunk)?
UHHHHH DEPENDS WHAT STATE OF DISORIENTATION YOU CALL HAMMERED. PROBABLY THE WORST WAS BEFORE I GOT MARRIED ABOUT 6 OR 7 YEARS AGO. MY BARTENDER (WHOM I KNEW ON FIRST NAME BASIS) CUT ME OFF, ONLY FOR ME TO GET MORE DRINKS FROM THE OTHER BARTENDER... MY PARENTS HAD TO COME PICK ME UP... ONLY TO HAVE 2 OR 3 DRINKS W/ ME BEFORE WE WENT HOME.

11. $20,000. What would you buy with it?
A BUNCH OF STOCKS AND PROBABLY A NEW PURSE FOR HEATHER (GETS ME OUT OF MY YEARLY OBLIGATION TO HER :) ).

1. Where is one place in the world you'd love to travel?

ALASKA AND TO MY FAMILY CASTLE IN SLOVAKIA.

2. What one food could you eat for every meal?

BACON CHEESEBURGERS.

3. If you were a super hero, what power would you possess?

XRAY VISION :) ;) ;)

4. If you won the lottery, would you still work?

YES. ONLY, I WOULD KNOW I DIDN'T HAVE TO WORK WHICH WOULD MENTALLY MAKE LIFE 100% BETTER.

5. You are stranded on a deserted island... what three things do you have with you?

MY NOSE... EYES... ??? OHHHH OBJECTS? SOLAR PANELS, XBOX CONSOLE W/ CONTROLLER AND VIDEO GAME STILL IN THE SYSTEM (THAT ALL COUNTS AS ONE ITEM :) ) AND A TV.

6. If you could bring one person to the island, who would it be?

MY WIFE SILLY, WHO ELSE CAN MAKE FUN OF ME AND FILM ME AND BLACK MAIL ME FOR PLAYING MY VIDEO GAME?

7. What's your favorite holiday?

CHRISTMAS.

8. What movie could you watch over and over and over?

AUSTIN POWERS AND BLAZING SADDLES.

9. How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop?

WELL IF YOU ARE AN OWL, 3. IF YOU ARE MATTY-O... YOU GET DISTRACTED AND ARE ONTO SOMETHING ELSE BEFORE YOU GET TO THE CORE.

10. Would you rather be really hot or really cold?

REALLY HOT. I LOVE ME SOME HEAT.

11. If you could change just one thing about yourself, what would it be?

HAVE A PERFECT BACK THAT WOULD NEVER CAUSE ME ANY BACK PAIN EVER AGAIN. PRETTY PLEASE?

What moment of your life, if captured on video, would go viral?
HONESTLY, ANY INTERACTIONS W/ MY WIFE HAHA, RIGHT BDD? SEE EARLIER COMMENTS ABOUT ME BEING A SMART ASS AND HAVING A BIG MOUTH.

What do you most want to shout out at people?
GET THE FU

How old were you when you lost your virginity?
17.

Related to #3, did you respect yourself the morning after?
NO. IT WAS COMPLICATED AND I WAS OF THE MINDSET I WOULD WAIT UNTIL I GOT MARRIED... EPIC FAIL.

What is your comfort food?
CHOCOLATE.

If you couldn't live in your current country, where would you live? (Assume they would let you in.)
ARE YOU KIDDING ME, I HAVE AN HONORARY OPEN INVITE TO MY FRIEND'S UP NORTH. CANADA ALL THE WAY!!! STILL PROUDLY WEAR MY CANADA HAT EVERY DAY OF MY LIFE :) OHHHHHH CANADA...

What book do you most want to see made into a movie, and who plays the lead roles? Alternatively, what book should never be made into movie?
UGH, PEOPLE STILL READ BOOKS? I HATE READING BOOKS. SO I PASS ON THIS MOVIE. WHAT BOOK SHOULD NEVER BE MADE INTO A MOVIE, ANYTHING WRITTEN ABOUT KIM KARDASHIAN.

What movie should never, ever be remade? Yes, I know it's too late for the Italian Job.
THE BLOB.

Is there anything conceivably better than hot, willing, twin red-heads, with whipped cream and chocolate?
UHHHH YEAH... HOT WILLING TWIN BLONDES w/ WHIPPED CREAM AND CHOCOLATE.

What is one thing that "they say" is bad for you, that you will not give up?
COFFEE.

Would/do you clean your house before the cleaning services comes over? WHY?
UMMMM, CONSIDERING THAT WE ARE THE CLEANING SERVICE... I GUESS? YOU KIND OF HAVE TO STRAIGHTEN UP BEFORE YOU CAN VACUUM AND WIPE THE COUNTERS DOWN RIGHT?

1. What is your favourite ‘weird’ food to eat?
I REFUSE TO EAT WEIRD FOOD. ALL OF MY FOOD IS NORMAL!

2. If you could have any job/career at all, what would it be?
FLIP HOUSES AND REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT.

3. Do you know how I can get my safari address bar back permanently?
HONESTLY... A MAC? FAIL.

4. What is your best race memory?
ANY RACE THAT I GET TO FINISH w/ MY WIFE. REV3 CEDAR POINT WAS AWESOME BECAUSE WE GOT TO CHAT THE WHOLE DAY AND COMPLETE SOMETHING WE STARTED LONG BEFORE THAT DATE.

5. What is your favourite song right now?
UMMM I FIND MYSELF SINGING THIS ALMOST EVERY MORNING WHEN I WAKE UP, SO SUBCONSCIOUSLY THIS SONG:

6. What is your favourite training/racing gadget?
MY GARMIN 310XT.

7. Do you prefer to train with a team, or alone? Why?
GREAT QUESTION. ALONE. I LIKE TRAINING w/ HEATHER BUT THAT IS IT. I HATE NOT BEING ABLE TO DO MY OWN THING, IF I FEEL LIKE SURGING I WANT TO SURGE, I DON'T WANT TO DEAL w/ ANYONE ELSE. I ALSO DESPISE THE ANNOYING CHIT CHATTER THAT ALWAYS HAPPENS IN GROUPS. WHEN I WORKOUT, I SHOW UP TO WORK, NOT TO SOCIALIZE. DON'T WANT TO SOUND LIKE AN A-HOLE, BUT I TAKE MY WORKOUTS SERIOUS BECAUSE I WANT TO GET THE MOST OUT OF THEM.

8. What is in your fridge right now?
PUMPKIN ALE :) FRESH BROWN EGGS FROM MY 3 CHICKENS. ASPARAGUS, OTHER VEGGIES AND ORGANIC SKIM MILK.

9. Favourite TV show? (if you watch TV)
HOLMES ON HOMES... HANDS DOWN.

10. Favourite book?
DID ANYONE ELSE REALIZE THAT THE CANADIAN I GOT THESE QUESTIONS FROM HAS SPELLED FAVORITE WRONG? OH... BOOK? CRAP. I DON'T REALLY READ. ONLY TIME I READ IS IF IT IS SOMETHING I CAN GAIN KNOWLEDGE FROM, I REALLY ENJOY READING STOCK ANALYSIS BOOKS AND REAL ESTATE INVESTING BOOKS.

11. Do you have any pets? If so what, name, age.
YES, FRANKIE AND SOPHIE, BOTH GOING TO BE 5 THIS YEAR!!! SO SAD.
WE HAD 3 FERRETS, ALL PASSED AWAY.
3 CHICKENS, MO, STELLA, AND PUFF (THE RETARD)

I refuse to tag 11 people. This needs to stop. However, Heather luckily skipped this bullet and it is only fair that she follow suit and answer these questions. So, Heather, you have the option of answering EVERY question I have in my post here, or you can state 11 random facts about you and answer the 11 new questions I am posting below... up to you.

1. What would you currently be doing to stay in shape if you never got involved in triathlons?

2. What was/is your favorite pet of all time and why?

3. If you could live anywhere in the world, where and why?

4. You won 250 million dollars in the lottery. What is the FIRST thing you do (like tell people, sleep in the next day, etc (after you have collected the money)) and what is the first thing you buy?

5. Out of every race you have done in your life, what is your favorite and why?

6. Do you honestly get annoyed when your husband talks non stop on every run we do together?

7. Camping or run down motel room?

8. Favorite song of all time. Favorite actor of all time. Favorite movie of all time.

9. Favorite subject in college and why. Most hated subject in college and why.

10. What is your dream career?

11. Would you do another 140.6? If so, when, where, and why?

Thanks for reading!

Gluten Free Pizza

2012-01-26T09:20:00.000-05:00

So this whole gluten free things has been eye opening. I don't necessarily feel any different (was hoping for some super human powers or at least X-Ray vision) but running wise and just daily bowel movement wise, it has been WONDERFUL! So I am sticking to it as best I can. I make an exception for beer... but I have cut back, WAY BACK from my normal intake over the winter (truly sad).

So one of the biggest staples of my diet has been pizza. I simply love pizza. We have made 3 gluten free breads so far and have gotten close to getting it to taste "normal" however, I have serious doubts on the pizza dough... which makes me about as sad as the whole cutting back on my recovery drink (beer) aka nectar of the gods.

Now, being the domestic house husband that I am... read: Heather wanted to get a swim and run in... and I didn't. I stayed home and made two sets of dough. One for my pizza that I needed to eat that second because I was on borderline Big Green Hulk mode MATT ANGRY! MATT HUNGRY!!! and one for Heather so that it was ready upon her return to decorate w/ her toppings of choice.

In my dough I put in a bit more spices than I did in Heather's dough, this was a mistake. I will get into the whole process if anyone is interested.

Simple ingredients. I will put the recipe at the bottom of

the post.

Dump it all together in a bowl.

Then mix it all up until it starts sticking together... it was

pretty clumpy for awhile.

Throw down some wax paper and set your rolling pin

right next to the blob on the wax paper. Do not put the rolling

pin on the wax paper and do not put the rolling pin above the

wax paper... it has to be right next to the wax paper.

Put another piece of wax paper on the blob and grab

that rolling pin and go to town on it. I rolled it out to about 1/4"

thick (I don't want ANY penis comments w/ reference to this

dimension... GOT IT? We all know I am pushing 1/2").

Here it is on our pizza pan.

Here it is after I pre-cooked the dough and put my toppings

on.

And magically the cheese is melted on my tomatoes :) YUM!

This is Heather's dough I made for her (Husband of the YEAR

award right here folks! I even rolled it out for her).

She was still tooling around at the store trying to top my

pizza by buying better ingredients... so I pre-cooked her

dough for her (I am telling you, this is like two entries for

best husband EVA!)

Here is her pizza. Notice how slim and sleek mine was? H

comes in and piles the toppings over a mile high! I was actually

afraid I would have to move the racks in the oven to fit this

monster!

All cooked.

This is what I had w/ my pizza. It says:

"My Humping Pumpkin Ale. A Spiced Ale.

Yep, its made with bits of real pumpkin, so

you know it's good." ~Geek Brewing

I got the beer from one of Heather's co workers who we give tons of eggs too. In my professional opinion, he got screwed on that deal haha. A few dozen eggs for a dozen home brewed beers? WINNING!

So my thoughts on the pizza. Well the two doughs actually tasted completely different... weird I know. I liked my pizza, but REALLY liked Heather's pizza. I used what we had in the house... she cheated.

The dough was a joke to make, honestly it took less than 3 minutes to have it in a ball and ready to be rolled out. All in all 25 minutes I have a fresh home made pizza, faster than I can get it delivered!

Would I eat this type of pizza for the rest of my life? Hell no. It was not "pizza" as I know it. I will forever remember what I am truly missing. So the quest continues to try and figure out how to make my own pizza dough that is gluten free and that is completely satiating.

The recipe is a variant from Elana's Pantry. A good friend of ours first turned us on to her website before I decided to try this whole gluten free thing. After I committed to it, I have learned a TON from her site. Pretty much the big thing is how to create a similar base to cooking w/ ingredients other than flour and yeast.

1 1/2 cups blanched almond flour

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp baking soda

1 tbsp grape seed oil

1 large egg

I added:

1/4 tsp thyme

1/4 tsp basil

1/4 tsp oregano

That is pretty much it... you preheat the oven to 350F and cook the dough for 10-12 min. Then you put all your toppings on and cook it for another 8-10min or until your toppings are cooked to your liking.

My toppings were mozzarella and cheddar cheese w/ 1 tomatoe. H's were 1 tomato, handful of mushrooms, handful of spinach, handful of fresh broccoli, handful of pepperonis (small hand full of these), and freshly grated mozzarella. I damn near threw my back out picking this beast up.

Not sure on the calories or anything, Heather is in charge of all that work. I keep telling her to get in the kitchen and bake me a pie... but I keep finding myself in there doing the woman work. This has to change already!!! At least I am not barefoot and pregnant to boot.

It was actually pretty tasty and was a typical "thin crust" style pizza dough. I will not make this again though, I want to change it and I know what I want the pizza dough to taste like, I just have to figure out how to do that now.

Thanks for reading!

Hills for dinner?

2012-01-24T09:43:00.000-05:00

Well, not really. We have a lot of great hills to run by our house. We live right on top of a valley, which means to get in and out there are awesome hills. However, it's dark when we get home and the roads don't have a nice berm to them so it is NOT smart to run them in the dark.

So what is a fat guy to do to get his desired punishment in, during winter, at night?

H and I went to the cardio area to get our run on. So on the treadmill, that little incline button kept taunting me and talking shit to me. So I said alright, time to finally man up and keep up with this hill training. I kept a respectable pace ( in my opinion ) for these hills, starting at 10 min miles and after each minute making it faster and steeper.

I wish I had my HR monitor on, I was honestly red lining after 10 minutes. Seriously, I thought I was going to pass out. There is no forgiveness on the treadmill... well unless you puss out and decrease the speed, but then you have to live w/ the fact that you completely took the pathetic way out and gave up. So I ended up at 7 min miles at a 10% incline... at that point I quickly shut it down haha. I couldn't breathe, I was dizzy and I was just POURING sweat.

That little machine worked me over. However, H still had some running to do and I had completely just kicked my own butt w/ this evil little incline button. I put 2.25 miles in and after looking at the elevation gain, I about puked... no where near what wildflower long course is... like just a mere percentage of the total gain... and this was only a few miles. This is a huge wake up call for me. I don't fail at anything in life and I will be damned if this race will be the first failure I experience.

So I was going to do the stair climber but some old dude looked like he was molesting this machine or humping it or something... so even if he finished up, I don't know that there is enough disinfectant in Ohio to ever make me feel comfortable on this thing.

So I went old school. I ran the stairwells. It was 3 flights of steps totaling 47 steps. Each step is typically ~7-8" per code so I am guessing total elevation of each rep was 31.33 feet. I did 15 reps running up the stairs. So I added another 470 feet of elevation gain. I have not run stairs since wrestling in high school. It was a total mental throwback for me. Was actually really weird, because I felt that I was back in high school again. I had my determination and focus and drive that I had from back then... it really was weird. I am concerned that if I had that drive today... I would probably be seriously injured in less than a week haha.

Well, this is all I got. Aside from trying to work from home so I am guaranteed to get hill runs in during the day, this is all I can do. If you have any ideas on how to simulate hills aside from the treadmill punching me in the nuts or running stairs, PLEASE SHARE! I refuse to go into this race unprepared.

H created a masterpiece last night. It needs just some minor fine tuning but the taste was fabulous. Apple cinnamon cranberry gluten free bread. YUM!

The recipe she was deviating from called for a good amount of liquids... which is why the center didn't firm up as well as the rest of the loaf. However, taste alone, ranks this beauty at the top of our breads to date :)

So for breakfast I had those 2 slices pictured right ^^^^^^^ up there toasted and then a SMALL (apparently I abuse peanut butter and almond butter servings) amount of almond butter on it. It was wonderful.

I love our bread maker. So far gluten free is still going strong. There may be a flub here or there but I feel that 95% of my diet is perfect and my stomach has been living proof of the benefits lately.

Blue Balls and Glass Cutters 5k Race Report 2012

2012-01-23T11:04:00.002-05:00

It's up. Visit the event site for the post.

http://blueballsandglasscutters.blogspot.com/

20

2012-01-20T09:53:00.000-05:00

20. Simple round number right? Well, to me it is kind of a milestone. I can gain and lose weight fast. Works for and against me. When I wrestled in high school my wrestling coach would be baffled that I would lose over 6lbs in practice on average (probably mostly water weight) since we had to weigh in before and after each practice.

So what is 20? 20 lbs lost since Jan 1st. I started the year at 220 lbs, I had been lifting for about 2 months and put some muscle on... but I had been eating crappy too. Well it came off almost in record time this year. Why? Well I learned a lot about proper nutrition and proper training in the past two years.

Gluten Free Dieting. I attribute a lot of my weight loss to this. Don't worry, I don't believe that GLUTEN = WEIGHT haha. It's the fact that I am watching what I eat and monitoring my diet. Making smart choices and healthy snacks does A LOT for my weight.

So really in a matter of 3 weeks I have literally turned my life around. Running is coming along, swimming is at a comfy spot and biking has actually improved the most. I am very comfortable biking 19mph for an hour... meaning it does not feel like much of an exertion (this makes me happy). I have been incorporating a lot of shorter intervals and high cadence work in my sets lately. I bike every day for a minimum of one hour and this has paid off huge. My calves are already getting the definition back and my quads are shaping up nicely too.

My main motivation this year is fear. I am deathly afraid of Wildflower's long course. I have never run this much elevation gain in my life in one run. I need to lose weight and continue to completely utterly molest hills in my running workouts. You may not like my choice of words but honestly... am I going to "caress" hills? HELL NO. I want to completely violate them and make them my bitch (did I go too far?). Being a bigger guy, hills are brutal, they hurt and they drain our energy supplies faster than you ~~normal,~~ ~~skinny, scrawny, feeble,~~ ~~weak,~~ fast people. I am on a mission to finish all my races this year feeling good, NOT defeated and pathetic and beaten.

Saturday is the Blue Balls and Glass Cutters 5k. We are getting 4-6 inches of snow tonight haha. It should be PERFECT for the race and chili cook off that is going on after the race. I am super excited, should be a decent turn out which makes me feel better about all of the prizes we paid for out of our pocket (as long as I at least break even, I am content). It's a lot of work to put into getting something going like this. Because of the weather and potential food allergies, we are doing waivers for the race... which hopefully covers our asses a little bit... who knows. If it's mostly people we know then there are no issues in my opinion. But who knows anymore.

So there you have it. 20lbs down, gluten free is working well with my running, no stomach issues at all and it has ended up indirectly causing me to clean up my diet in general. Good stuff.

Thanks for reading!

Running INTO the wind...

2012-01-18T09:04:00.000-05:00

I run all the time, all kinds of weather. I prefer spring and summer rainy days to run in over any other day. However, yesterday was interesting. Usually the temps are steady in the low teens here around this time of year, but yesterday it was 55 degrees. INSANE.

But, with warm temps in the winter come strong fronts that push through, which means HIGH winds.

I went running yesterday and had some firsts happen to me... I have been running since I was 15 yrs old (competitively)... so this was interesting.

1. I tripped myself numerous times since I have big feet, the wind grabbed them and through them under my body haha.
2. I was stopped DEAD IN MY TRACKS... honestly I ran 3 steps and did not move forward AT ALL. This happened twice. This was probably one of the coolest experiences to date haha.
3. A branch fell and just missed my head... instead, it hit the back of my neck and my shoulders... I guess that is the one time that I am thankful for my poor running posture :)
4. I know I say this a lot as a joke, but honestly... DO NOT SPIT IN THE WIND. I am an idiot sometimes.

All in all a great run, felt awesome and I am glad I got out and ran. I bailed on my swim though. This having no schedule thing turns workout ideas into non-realities haha. That's alright, its still early in the season.

Back to 20 some degrees this morning and snow. Only in Cleveland does weather suck this much!

Thanks for reading!

Beard and Chicken Pot Pie picture dump

2012-01-17T08:25:00.000-05:00

soooo I forgot to post a pic of our first ever chicken pot pie... I did not have arrowroot powder which apparently causes the chicken stock to congeal a bit (firm up (GET YOUR MIND OUT OF THE GUTTER!)) so it was more like a chicken pot pie soup... lessons learned though and out of everything we have made to date, I think this one wins hands down!

YUM!

So I took a bunch of beard pics... however, I have noticed that I feel I look entirely different in each picture. Ending up with me looking like a fat ass in the last picture... must have been the angle or something because I swear to you I am only about 8lbs heavier than when I raced 140.6 last summer haha.

I also wanted to mention that having a beard is kind of a responsibility. You don't smile or laugh when you have a beard... you are all business and ready to kick ass at any given moment.

So there you have it... just under 3 weeks of male awesomeness right there. I might shave it off prior to the Blue Balls and Glass Cutters 5k ... still undecided. It is totally awesome not having to shave every dang morning, however, that shave time is now spent as beard drying time. I am shocked that my beard can retain water! haha.

Heather hates it, she thinks I look "old". I told her she is just made that I look distinguished and sophisticated now ;)

Thanks for reading!

Just because you eat healthy...

2012-01-16T11:28:00.000-05:00

So a lesson learned this weekend. We got a few cook books on gluten free and sugar free cooking (natural sugars are OK in my mind).

So we were off and running. However these books don't really give you any nutritional data. Being engineers, my wife and I are obsessed about numbers... however, we proceeded through about a week of fun clean eating assuming that we were ok w/ portions and calories. Heck, I lost 7lbs last week.

However, we had some down time and we were up for a good laugh. We put our gluten free sugar free recipe's in to figure out how many calories per serving for my banana bread and the orange zest chocolate chip cookies and .... WA-LA! Approx. 260 calories per serving for each recipe. We both felt that was a lot for these items :( Heather posted the info up on her recipe page on her blog: CLICK HERE!

Now, break it down blah blah blah, there were a bunch of fats, but they are "good healthy fats" in them (since most of the substitutes are nut based). I am still happy we are eating clean, however, we still need to properly portion our servings to make sure we don't go too crazy on our calories. It is so easy to just "assume" since we are eating healthy that we can eat whatever we want.

So, I have been asked by a bunch of people if there has been any change in feeling or what not. Not really. I feel about the same as before (we didn't eat horribly before), however, I have not had any poo emergencies after only 1 mile of running (yes, it happens that quick for me). All of my bowel movements have been wonderful... (just what you wanted to read right? :) ), like to the point where you are certain you just pulled off a no wiper (yes, I DID just go there).

The real test will be in about a month when I start mixing a bit of speed work in. This will be the ultimate test to whether or not gluten free has had a large impact on my running.

So all in all, this is not hard at all for us, so far it has been fun. The only thing I don't like is that I am so used to wheat bread from the store w/ my eggs in the morning, that it will take a bit of time to make this adjustment.

I am really curious if I have an "issue" or not and cannot wait to devour some gluten laden food in a week and see if I have stomachular homicide!!!

Thanks for reading!

Work and Bread Maker Picture Dump

2012-01-11T08:52:00.000-05:00

So I mentioned some work stuff yesterday, had to actually go out to that shoring job and look at a few things that need to be designed so I was able to snap some pictures... I designed a soldier pile-tie back wall and a soil nail wall.

Soil nail wall. They drill steel tendons into the earth, and then

shoot shotcrete (concrete) on the face of the earth and cover

wire mesh and rebar reinforcing tying everything together.

Yes, that is a large excavator on top of a 15ft high pile of

soil... meaning huge surcharge on my wall design.

The soldier pile wall w/ tiebacks. The tendons sticking out

are the tiebacks. The wood inside is the lagging that holds the

earth back while the steel members hold the lagging.

Some bracing required to support the existing caissons at

the connection point to the existing building.

All this work is for the Cleveland Clinic... meaning the building we are connecting to and all my shoring is holding up is one of their surgery centers... aweseome, like I said, no pressure right?

So aside from shoring work, I design a lot of commercial stuff, industrial machine foundations to isolate vibrations to the machines and from the machines, and high end residential houses... 14,000 sq.ft. is very common anymore and had a record 20,000+ sq. ft. house last summer to design. I must be doing something wrong that there are so many people building these monstrosities!

Now, onto something that actually excites me. A good runner friend of ours from Colorado had to go gluten free a few years ago. She pretty much was our inspiration to give it a try and see if our stomachs stop getting sick when we run anymore.

She loves this site here: http://www.elanaspantry.com/ Which is where I typically have been going lately for recipe ideas. I used her banana bread recipe and substituted apple sauce for the shortening... because I didn't have any shortening and at 9:30 pm I was not about to go to the store and get some. Why was I making bread at 9:30 pm last night? well, the bread maker was our "family" xmas present (we always get something for both of us every year) and I finally got it yesterday. I told H I would wait for her to get back from her travel to use it.

But... but... but.... this damn thing kept staring at me.

Every time I went in the kitchen, there it was:

In all it's glory.

Isn't this like those little russian dolls?

I kept opening boxes!

BOOYAH! My newest obsession.

So there it sat. I went for a run, came home and HELLO! there it was again. I made dinner and walked past it about 10 times and I said NO MATT! LEAVE IT ALONE!

Finally I caved. My goodness is this thing SUPER EASY :) :) :)

Here are the ingredients:

Almond flour, eggs, honey, vanilla extract, salt, baking soda,

bananas, apple sauce. SIMPLE!

Put the wet ingredients in the bottom,

put the dry on top. Put it in the machine and push a button

for gluten free bread (the kneading process and cook

time is different than normal bread).

I woke up to this :)

Just turn it over and dump out the loaf.

HECK YEAH BABY! YUMMY :) :) :)

So this was my experiment... no lie, I expected it to taste like a nasty chewy hunk of rubbish. To my surprise it was actually VERY good. I had two slices before I got on the trainer this morning and took two more slices to work w/ me as a snack for today.

The breadmaker has a pasta option too (will make the dough, you have to roll it out and shape it).

Now, some things I will change in the future... I will definitely make fruit breads w/ raisins in them or cranberries. I like that taste and will not have to put any spread (nutella or any kind of nut butter) on it. I actually think the apple sauce substitute was a good call, the bread is moist, but not "wet". There are 3 bananas in it, so that kind of explains why it is moist in my opinion. One thing I did not do was remove it from the pan when it was done and let it cool on a cooling rack, which would reduce some of the moisture... next time I will do this and see if there is much of a difference.

Our whole goal was to limit some things that may be causing us issues on the run.

It is super cheap to make your own bread, however adding in the cost of the machine, I think we will take a few years to break even on this one haha.

So... if you have ever had any thought in buying one of these, honestly, it is EASIER than making pancakes or cookies. And it is truly a set it and forget it thing. Which fits our busy workout filled lifestyle AMAZING!

I will get H's opinion on the bread when she gets home tomorrow, but in all honesty, I am VERY HAPPY w/ my results.

Feel free to email w/ questions or comments if you want any more details. We also got 3 gluten free/sugar free cook books I will be going through to pick out some more tasty delights.

Thanks for reading!

Recovery, Engineering, and Hammurabi.

2012-01-10T08:43:00.000-05:00

Since I completed 140.6 miles in one day my body has been jacked up. I feel that I do not recover like I used to. I took a whole month off of doing practically nothing w/ a little bit of lifting (so I didn't balloon up like fat albert).

Since hitting the training again this year, I feel off. There is still lack of motivation and honestly after long workouts or tempo pace workouts my body feels like complete utter shit. I have cleaned up my diet, putting good foods in and taking protein to help aid in recovery. It's just weird that over the past two years I haven't felt this crappy.

It's alright, I get it. I took the "required recovery time" and now it's just a matter of sucking it up and NOT listening to my body because my body is obviously late to the party here. When I gave it time off, IT SHOULD HAVE RECOVERED THEN! ... not NOW!

Mind you, I have been feeling really good during the workouts. The runs cardio wise I am dead on. My legs need some fine tuning though, they feel weak. Swimming, I feel like I picked up right where I left off last year. Biking... well, I am an average biker. I don't think I will excel at this, but my goal is to continue my hill climbing this spring so our races don't punish us that much this year.

Every race we have on our list is hilly. My goal is to really hammer the swimming again, I want to feel fresh out of the water.

It doesn't help that we have been busy 24/7 again. I feel I never have time to just veg (although I am sure I have plenty... it just isn't enough I guess). Work has been stressful w/ a lot of projects that are pretty scary for me, designing shoring that is supporting a very busy road while hundreds of workers are working in the pit for a few months. Working w/ shoring and soils is interesting in the sense that... soils are never the same. You can get average properties or "assumed" properties for the soils but when you design stuff w/ them, everything is "engineering judgement". One false assumption and people die. That is a lot of burden to carry while designing stuff and to top it off, I can see it from my office window haha.

There are a lot of factors that go into shoring... and it's one of those things that ... well, you can't just go and do it, you have to have experience w/ installation so you can spot anything out of the ordinary that would compromise the design. Which, we have met our fair share of shoring installers that suck in this area, so it's always nerve racking when you are the designer and you are NOT in charge of hiring the installer so that you have some sort of control over your project.

On top of that, it's always sad when I have to go out to houses in the middle of a renovation where a contractor has bent the homeowners over and took their money and done a shit job. It's really sad that engineers have a pride/honor in their work and have a code they follow (ethical code) to not screw people over and not overcharge for services... whereas typically contractors are jackasses who feel that they are better than everyone and they know everything. So sad. Well, met a couple yesterday probably my age or a touch younger w/ a new born baby. Getting a renovation for the baby's room and a play room and kitchen. Yeah... so sad. The quality of work from the previous contractor was ridiculous as well, honestly, a 5 year old paraplegic could have done a better job. (I apologize to any paraplegics that I have offended by categorizing them w/ this d-bag).

"Engineering is the art of modelling materials we do not wholly understand, into shapes we cannot precisely analyse so as to withstand forces we cannot properly assess, in such a way that the public has no reason to suspect the extent of our ignorance."

"If a builder builds a house for someone, and does not construct it properly and the house falls in and kills its owner, then that builder shall be put to death. If it ruins goods, he shall make compensation for them, and shall re-erect the house at his own expense" ~ Hammurabi.

So, tonight, I get to run. I am looking forward to this. Which is good, because lately I hate running haha.

I am a vegetarian!

2012-01-05T14:15:00.000-05:00

Yes, you read that right.

Well, it's only temporary though... and totally by accident at that.

I am certain that I could probably live life ok like this... but my goodness is it boring and bland. I actually feel like I have been cheating on meat. Yup, I feel like I am sneaking around by not devouring every morsel of steak or pork or bacon that I see or smell.

Don't worry, this will end soon... very soon. The truth of the matter is I have been too lazy to make any meat meals. So I have had sweet potatoes and green bean casserole and oatmeal, etc. Let me go off on a tangent here... I think vegetarian people have the worst smelling farts in the world. I know this because I know a few vegetarian people but I proved it myself last night... I actually had to leave a room I was in, for fear of asphyxiation and imminent death.

So you wonder where I am going with this post? ehhh so am I.

Herbie died last week, I bought him a new tail, resurrected him... and proceeded to decapitate him this time. If you don't know Herbie, reference THIS POST . Now the whole cab sheared off. Aye yae yae... you would think these lil things were a touch more MattyO proof? no?

I like riding my bike again. It has been too long since I have gotten quality riding in and have definitely felt pretty good on my rides lately.

I like playing video games while I am on the trainer. I beat one game on the trainer last weekend, and all week I have been putting in some more serious gaming time. However I get pretty pissed when I am in the middle of a harder set and miss a sniper shot from clear across the map because I had to wipe sweat out of my eyes or some other stupid reason.

As evidence of how much gaming I have been playing lately, for Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3, my multiplayer level is already at 55. I signed up for multiplayer only 4 days ago. Granted I am average at the game... but aye yae yae. I am addicted to the game though, the gaming experience in general is phenomenal. I am thoroughly impressed w/ how far gaming has improved over the years... if anything I am kind of pissed that our kids' generation will have THAT MUCH better gaming than we had. I mean, pong growing up and NES... to live gaming w/ people all over the world? Insane. The other cool thing is that you have to be pretty dang good to hang w/ all these people.

One last evolution in my ever changing mind. While sitting on the throne this morning, I had an epiphany. I don't want to follow any schedules this year. Each day I will do whatever it is I want to do. I know what paces and distances I need to train from the past two years for my races this year... I think this will be a fun experiment. Either I will do alright and feel good that I was not pinned down by a sheet of paper controlling my life... or it will be an epic, miserable fail. I am kind of hoping for the epic miserable fail just for the story that will develop along the way haha.

Got a fun swim and run tonight on schedule. My butt hurts already from my saddle. I thought I was over these damn saddle pains... guess not.

Think that is all I got so far. I have a ton of video and pictures I need to post, all GREAT content. One of which is me demonstrating the "proper" etiquette of opening a champagne bottle... seriously classic footage. One of these days I will get to uploading them all.

Hope everyone has been enjoying their training lately!!!

Vibram Five Fingers Review...

2011-12-30T08:30:00.000-05:00

So I am not late to the minimalist shoe running scene. I am cheap remember? H was able to get a frickin ridiculously cheap offer for them and free shipping before Xmas so we went for it.

I have had tons of achilles issues all last year and even more IT Band issues. All of this points directly at my stabilizer muscles sucking hard core. My first year as a comeback to training I did a lot of Plyometrics (jump training) to build my core and stabilizer muscles. No injuries what so ever. Last year, nothing in the form of plyometrics... laden w/ injuries... I am not THAT slow to figure out my issues.

So, back to the Vibrams. These will help me build up my calves and force me to use a lot more of my stabilizer muscles as I walk. In the summer I am barefoot all the time when I am at home, even when I garden, barefoot (I told you all I was a hillbilly haha). In the spring, fall, winter, shoes 24/7. So at work every day I have been wearing my Vibrams.

Now, I have absolutely no intentions on running in these. Last year I tried forcing my body from being a natural heavy pronater to a neutral runner, this caused a lot of issues. I can't force this... I don't think my body will ever change... I can accept that.

So I will wear these all day to get used to them. Now I was going to take pictures of my feet bare foot... but I will spare you the direct image and describe my issues. I have some nasty hammer toes on each foot. I have a wide foot and my entire life always bought "normal" shoes because the companies that made wide shoes never lasted and always ended up giving me shin splints. So over a lot of years my toes are all jacked up.

The first 3 days of wearing the vibrams just around the house... my toes were KILLING ME!

My "hobbit feet" as H likes to call them.

[You will notice the headset in the background... reference

THIS POST FROM H if you have yet to see me in all

my glory sporting the headset while sniping 10 year olds

from across the game map ;) ]

As you can see in the picture there are individual toe slots that have the molded rubber sole on each one of them... forcing them to be STRAIGHT and normal. My outer two toes on each foot are the most jacked up toes, it actually took me about five minutes to get my toes to go into the toe slots.

That was over a week ago. Today, it takes about 10 seconds to make sure my outer two toes line up. There is absolutely no pain anymore. I absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE these things. They feel so natural and light, I honestly forget that I have anything on my feet most of the day.

I assume it will take much more time to get my toes to be "normal" and not jacked up from wearing these but so far there have been huge improvements. For about an hour after wearing the Vibrams my toes are straight and normal. They gradually go back to being jacked up throughout the evening I find though (weird).

So far I am honestly super impressed with these. Like I said, I have no intention of doing any runs in these. I am wearing them to walk around to help build my stabilizer muscles in my feet and ankles and hoping that this helps minimize my achilles issues this season (having done a few runs that my achilles has seized up on me already this month prior to the vibrams).

H was planning on doing a few runs in them (obviously very short to start out with) so hopefully she can shed some more light on this if anyone is interested. My main use for these shoes will be for office use, plyometrics, and yoga. The soles give GREAT grip for yoga and again you forget you are even wearing them (I have done one yoga session w/ them already).

Now for the negative aspect... if you want to call it that.

I walk funny. Naturally when I wear these I do not heel strike... uhhhh I kid you not, I am walking on the balls of my feet naturally all day now. This means I look a tad goofy when I walk (yes, goofier than I normally look).

I wore them out to eat one night and EVERYONE stared at me the entire time we were waiting for a seat. I honestly don't care, I have pretty high self esteem and don't care what anyone ever has to say about me... but if you are a bit self concious... you may want to figure this aspect out.

People at work... ahhh yes, my harshest critics... I have explained to everyone in the office why I am wearing these... yet, they still get referred to as "footies" "funny shoes" "those things" haha.

Final Thoughts:

I love these. They took about three days of on and off wearing them to condition my feet to accept them w/out any pain since my toes were so jacked up. I have absolutely no blisters from them at all (one concern from the way the heel fabric sits on my foot).

Wearing regular shoes after wearing these feels absolutely wrong and constricting... not what I would have envisioned when I first started wearing (because these felt so wrong).

I firmly recommend these to everyone. However, running in them... that is up to you, and if you do, make sure you build SUPER slowly and cautiously because there is a high injury rate from people going out and running 3 or 5 miles right from the get go.

I actually wish Heather would have bought me two pairs at that rate she got them at... but we were cautious as to if we would like them or not.

Thanks for reading!!!

What I find interesting about training

2011-12-28T11:37:00.000-05:00

So running is the fastest thing to lose when you don't train. Biking is second for me and swimming last.

The only thing is, having not swum since the beginning of September, I have lost practically zero swim fitness. It blows my mind. Speeds are the same and I am not tired at all in the pool.

I went against my better judgement last night and got 5.25 miles in. It was supposed to be sit at home and play video games (since I broke my helicopter) but then I said... crap, H ran earlier today... I can't let her get too far ahead of me in the training or I will be left in the dust... so I went for 3 miles, that seemed reasonable in my head, and apparently tricked myself into adding on a 2 mile loop before heading back home.

Well, it was a clipper snow system (we have cool weather terms we use to describe "snow" in Cleveland I guess) which meant huge fat heavy snow flakes that feel like someone is throwing spit wads at your face. So I did what made sense, opened my mouth and tried catching as many as I could as I ran. Somehow, I managed to get more snow flakes in my eyes and nose than my mouth. I am sure I was a sight to see as well... running down the main road jumping up and down as I tracked a ginormous snow flake about 20 feet above me all the way to my mouth and having to jump to make sure I connected. Oh well, it appears I was much better at this as a kid. Interesting side note, it made the run go by fast haha.

After that I had an hour trainer ride. I was not looking forward to this but did it anyways... what the heck, I have to have a bit of a base in order to start "official" training next week. It went by super fast and I averaged much faster than I thought I was pedaling. This is good news. Things are coming back rather quickly (minus the run).

We have 3 plans in place right now. A marathon plan, a 70.3 plan and substituted swim workouts... we need to condense everything and adjust it a bit to give us an easy day for recovery every week (which there are none of right now :( ). So hopefully by the end of the week we can get that all organized.

I think my training this year is going to be just time based. If I feel good, I will go harder, if I don't feel good I will go heart rate. I found myself having to push pretty hard last night on the run to get my HR actually up to where it belongs... which made me feel like I was totally dogging it haha.

Well, I guess this is me getting my but back in gear and getting back on the training train. I took some time off to heal up and rest... let's hope this year treats me better than last year injury wise.

Thanks for reading!

The aftermath of Christmas

2011-12-27T08:34:00.000-05:00

Well, I will say this about Christmas 2011... by far one of the best Christmas' ever.

Everything went well. Gifts were exchanged, family was fed and my STOMACH ACHE finally went away. It was a record 5 days long. I got little sleep and did not train much from the pain. Honestly, I think it was because of the cashews I ate haha. Damn... I loved those things too :( We went out to a pub my parents used to take me too all the time growing up for dinner on Xmas eve. The greasy disgusting food is what I attribute my stomach ache cure too :)

So I have tons of hilarious pictures to share... but honestly it will take me forever to email those and the videos through my phone, so you get a few... that's all.

So my family always gifted the "family gifts" on Xmas eve and then Santa would come for Xmas day. Heather never opened gifts until Xmas day. This drives me nuts... I have ZERO patience in life and we compromised to gift 1 gift each to open on Xmas eve. I gave her the only gift that she knew I got her :) haha. She gave me a gift she thought I would be enthralled with... let me pause it here and explain a bit more about myself... I am not a good gift giver or receiver... at all. Gifts really don't mean much to me (don't worry, H knows this, everything was sorted out after our first year of marriage haha). So sometimes my reactions to gifts are... "assholish".

So H actually got me ridiculously awesome gifts this year, she is an awesome gift thinker and buyer haha. But, she knows me better than I know myself I think... She picks up on things that I am excited about and makes mental notes (I think women make a lot of mental notes... pretty much the majority of things are things that they can throw back at you when they are mad at you though ;) haha). And she got me this beauty:

A radio controlled helicopter!!!

When I opened it... I honestly was like... ehhh, this will be fun for a minute and then I will hate it.

Well, after about a dozen flights later, I LOVED IT! haha. However... Herby the Helicopter had a short life here on earth... he only lived for under 24 hrs. I am in search of replacement parts now :( The tail rotor and the main cab have been completely severed from his body haha. Apparently I suck at flying.

On Xmas morning I hovered Herby right outside our bedroom door until she woke up :)

Herby crash landed into our chandelier. Herby pissed off Frankie and Sophie. Herby requested a fly by and buzzed over baby Jesus and the nativity scene. You see, Herby became a part of our family in a very short amount of time... until he turned left on one of his solo flights. Herby didn't realize that there was a hand railing and spindels that he could not maneuver through. Down he went, and he still lay broken and disheveled. So tragic.

But you see, the point of the story is... I would have never in a million years bought myself an RC Chopper. Now... I NEED TO FIX IT!!! haha. That is just one of the many levels that my wife is the best person alive to compliment me.

Going off on that tangent, she also puts up with my endless supply of "awesome" ideas. These are too countless to list... but my latest one was to build a shooting stand for my rifle. They sell them for like a hundred bucks... but w/ a little ingenuity and an hour of your time, you can have one for under $10 :)

I got the idea from this guy:

Varmint Al

Alright, I get it, you are labeling me already... No I am not a democrat or a liberal haha. Don't judge me! However, this dude is a riot and I pretty much trolled through his whole site in awe that a hill jack is as intelligent as he is.

Regardless (focus Matt) I built my own yesterday. H helped as usual... she makes everything look nice when I am through w/ it haha.

This story is best told in pictures:

The two legs w/ the pivot hole drilled and the anchor hole.

The anchor holes. I glued magnets in here to keep the

legs together while traveling.

The pivot holes, I thread a 1/4" carriage bolt through

here w/ a wingnut and two washers (one inbetween

the legs and one at the wing nut).

Frankie and Sophie loving the 50 degree and sunny weather.

Still sitting there waiting for the clear coat to dry on my

shooting sticks.

Finished product. Very simple, yet a necessity

to get a kill shot at 200yds.

Another view.

Close up of the connection point. I used

imitation leather strips to prevent marking

up my rifle and to help absorb a bit of the

recoil from the shot.

Another perspective. (Frankie and Sophie have

given up waiting on me to finish this project).

Close up of the anchor point and the nails. I cut the heads

off of the nails and epoxied them in the stick legs. The nails

will help create a solid anchor point in the field.

Another close up of the cradle point.

End view of the nails.

End view of the top in closed position.

Overall view.

So that was all I really wanted to do all Christmas haha, just build my shooting sticks. The other point that I did not demonstrate in my pictures is that you can fully open the sticks so it is about 6ft long and use them as a monopole to shoot from standing. The whole point is to steady the rifle for a guaranteed kill shot. I am not a huge hunter by any means but I do not want the animal to suffer, so a clean kill is my intent.

Now, why do I have all this crap? We live w/in a half mile of the Metroparks, a national park system. We have a lot of coyotes and raccoon in our backyard. My biggest concern is a coyote attacking one of my dogs. My second concern is the damn raccoon eating my chickens! haha. So, the way I see it, if something is going to kill my chickens, that means than animal will die that night... and horrible death at that. So why not turn the tide a bit and kill a nuisance animal and make it a clean kill? Ehhh that makes sense in my head at least.

The last item I got for Xmas was a night vision scope... and honestly... OH... MY... GOSH... !!!

Ummmm can I just say that technology blows my mind anymore? I can see crystal clear now at night.

Thank you for reading!

One more week of "normal" life and then back at it 100% training wise.

Did someone kick me in my stomach?

2011-12-21T10:19:00.000-05:00

So we are back at it. Easy paces running and biking, but had a 2hr run/bike brick session last night.

Every time I run anymore, my stomach hurts like a son of a gun. It feels like someone is just karate kicking my gut over and over again. I actually cut the run a bit short last night from the pain.

The only thing is... these kids are babies...

I took this pain for an hour straight!

All I can think of is diet. I have been eating A TON of sugars lately and honestly... whatever the heck else I could find and shove down my gullet.

In January H and I are going gluten free and cleaning up our acts again... big time. Gluten free = no beer. FML!

In 2010 I lost well over 50lbs and joined the Previous Fat Guys Triathlon Club. We had a great diet, and we felt AMAZING, well we let that go after we got awesome results and now our results are so so... but what you put in is what you get out... Gluten free = no beer... meaning, if I put shit in I get shit out (well not literally... well, I guess literally, but, ehhh you get the point).

H wants to PR at 26.2 this spring. She has goals, I just want to survive another year of training haha. I had a great year this year, PR'd at 13.1 distance and 140.6 distance (haha, just finishing = PR !!! BOOYAH!). I just want to have fun this year w/ no pressure of trying to beat what I have previously done. Gluten free = no beer. However, mark my words, come March or April it's going to be ON LIKE DONKEY KONG! I just wake up every day and try to stay calm and not obsess about training. I am a head case when it comes to racing, if I am not going to show up and give 500% then I feel like I wasted my day and my training... I think you all get it out there, you just don't want to admit you are as screwed up in the head as me ;)

So my goal is to get my base miles in over the winter. Gluten free = no beer. I promise to run hills this winter. I pray that my left achilles was just screwing with me last night and playing a really bad joke on me and that it is not going to dick around with me all winter/spring like last year.

Thanks for reading! Gluten free = no beer.

Sometimes you just gotta do it.

2011-12-20T08:06:00.000-05:00

I don't want to train, my head is not in the right spot. However, when I do train, my joints hurt like a son of a .....

So, H and I decided 20 weeks out from our first race of the year would be perfect to start training again and get this machine running again.

First order of business is to get re-fit for my shoes. I have been a Brooks junkie for years... well, since college. I am a loyal merchant to companies, I like to keep things simple.

Well, my IT Bands and glutes (the connection point of the IT Bands) have been throttled no matter what I do anymore. So that tells me that my shoes are F-ed up and NOT for me. Starting over. My gait or form could have changed over the years causing the issues, so I am going at it w/ a fresh mind and willing to fix this w/out going back to ART.

So, H and I are just going out and doing the workouts... neither of us appear to be super stoked to train... I know why I don't care any more... I have hit the peak, I did an Ironman... what else is there to do? The thrill and joy and fear of something new and unattainable is removed from my mind. After completing that distance I truly believe that ANYTHING is attainable in life, if you want it, you have to train for it, and you will achieve it. Things are this simple in my mind. The only problem right now is that I don't want anything else... I thought I wanted to BQ... but there is no fire there, no motivation. I don't care to do that anymore haha. (I have the attention span of a gnat!)

So, I will proceed to just go through the motions again. When there is a workout, I WILL get my checkmark on my calendar.

I have to compile my video from the hockey game Friday night... I would like to thank everyone that donated to help me suffer. I threw the white flag in at 10 hot dogs... we had our work party starting at 2pm ... tons of beer and pizza PRIOR to attempting this feat... I should have planned better.

And LASTLY... to anyone doing any DIY home projects over the holiday... or to anyone who may be experiencing this proble, it took me 3 tries, but I finally learned my lesson. We have an all tile shower and a tile surround on our tub. When you have any corners where tile meets... DO NOT GROUT THEM! They will always crack over time. Water is your enemy and you need to maintain the corners well so you don't get mold growth.

Well, I have chipped out the grout twice now and re-grouted quite a bit of our seems. Finally I was determined to never have to grout this crap again, it takes about an entire day to chip the grout out, remove whatever beads of sillicone caulk I have on there and re-grout... so it really pisses me off to have wasted time already!

They sell a silicone sanded grout caulk tube you can buy. USE THIS! It looks identical to our grout and since it is a silicone base it will be flexible and will not crack anymore. Trust me, do it right and do it once.

I am a firm believer that in life there is a right and a wrong way to do everything, w/ a little research and a few $$$ you can always do things the right way, and only do them once!

Granted the silicone grout was about $6.50/tube, I will gladly pay that so that I do not waste another day of my life dealing w/ this crap.

Next post should be a recap of the Hot Dog Eating Fundraiser :)

Thanks for reading!

1+1+1 = 3...

2011-12-16T13:29:00.000-05:00

Ahhh yes, this whole triathlon thing. It has been awhile yes.

Running fitness is gone. Biking fitness hahahaha what biking fitness? Swim fitness... let's just call me Michael Phelps.

I have run a few times in the past month. Biked, well one time since September 11 of this year and swimming haha, well again one time since September 11.

Of the three sports, the one that took the longest to build endurance and speed, swimming, I felt that I did not lose a thing. My form felt spot on, my stroke count (haha, sorry that sounded funny) is still at 13 strokes per 25 yards and my endurance felt spot on.

This makes me happy. We spent a lot of time in the pool and I can honestly say it was not wasted. However, all the miles biked and ran, well that was thrown out the window.

No worries though, my goal was to bulk up and put on some weight, mission accomplished!

Planning out next year a bit, I honestly don't know what I want to do. I wanted to try and BQ, but my heart is not in it, I don't have the mental push needed to do the workouts and hit the paces required I don't think. I don't mind biking or swimming right now, but running is not where my head is right now.

So, I signed up with Team in Training for Wildflower Triathlon "long course" ... since I have not received a cease and desist order from WTC yet, I will refer to it as a half ironman. It's hilly. It's camping w/ a bunch of the team mates I have grown to know over the past two years. It's beers, beers and more beers, then doing a 70.3 the next day. Gotta love this right?

So I am raising money for Leukemia and Lymphoma again. Donate $70.30 and I will dedicate a hill to you. I promise that I will run up the entire length of the hill and not stop once. What do you get out of this? Heck, you get to know that when I am pooped and want to quit that you are making me fight harder than I probably normally would. I am a big dude, over 210lbs again, I have to get my fat ass up those hills folks, this ain't easy for us big boned people, trust me!

Now, another thing I am doing is for only today until 7:30 pm eastern, if you donate $5, I will eat a hot dog at the dollar dog night at the Lake Erie Monsters hockey game tonight. (As of this posting time, I have to eat 10 hot dogs).

So you have some options, both will make me suffer because I have a group run first thing in the morning tomorrow and I am almost guranteed to throw up 3 times during the run.

DONATE, help me suffer, make me puke, give me something to blog about for Monday!!!

Here is the link... remember, I can't do this without all of your support over the past two years. Help me make this an epic year once again by helping raise money for cancer research!

http://pages.teamintraining.org/noh/wildtri12/moravec#home

Ashland Half Marathon Race Report 2011

2011-12-05T08:33:00.000-05:00

Well Team Oravec showed up in rare form for this race... meaning it was one of the few races where we decided to take the smart road and bow out of the full distance and do the relay!

I ate stuffed cabbages the night before the race and to be honest, I was a little nervous of the potential havoc that may have been about to ensue the morning of the race. Luckily there were no ill side affects from that dinner.

We got down to Ashland High School which is about 1.25 hrs from our house in plenty of time before the race. Picked up our packets and did a bit of stretching. We got up to the start line and kissed good bye as Heather had to drive over to the relay point after the race started.

A bit of a segway (I think that is the word I want to use) here. After my last 70.3 at Muncie... I have not had any race jitters, at all. No butterflies, no nervousness, it's like an enhanced calm that brings me to the start lines lately... it's really weird. It is almost anti climatic anymore... wonder what happened?

Anyways, got to the line, and was dressed for the 30 degree weather. Tights, underarmor top and a T-shirt w/ our Team Oravec Racing 140.6 runners coats we got w/ our tri kits. Well they said go and the hundreds of runners made a mass exodus.

In typical MattyO form, first split was right a 6 minute pace, when the gun goes off, no matter the distance, it is like a free for all for me and I just bolt!

Mile 2 is where I reign in the horns and pull it together.

It was a dang hilly course... Heather posted the details on her blog regarding the elevation and our times (and some sneaky evil video of me GRRRR). Even though her leg was pretty much all up hill... mine had hills, mine was almost a mile longer, and I weigh a good 75lbs more than her! I have been lifting a bunch and got my weight back up to 210lbs (this is my comfy weight) and I will tell you what, boy did I feel it on the run. My upper body was very tight and my lower back was killing me from all the down hill jarring and stomping.

All in all it was uneventful. Only got passed by three guys. Hung on to some girl for my leg of the race (I couldn't get beat by a girl!!! haha, I AM JOKING!!!, well, not really, but kinda HA!) (a college from Iowa brought their entire team to use this race as a qualifying race for something... uhhhhh look at H's profile chart and tell me YOU want to qualify for ANYTHING on this course except a sufferfest qualification!).

Well after the race I took some video of H as she was coming in... pretty much just screwing around but it was funny, when I watched the video again, the guy that passed her appeared to be like WTF dude! Some people take this sport a touch too serious, luckily my wife appreciates my light hearted attitude to pretty much all of life :)

This is me "interviewing" Heather as she finishes...

Even her finish was all uphill haha.

And here is H finishing on the High School Track!

I was very happy with our results. Also VERY happy that we did not sign up for the half marathon again. I honestly forgot how damn hilly the course was.

After that there is an awesome store right at the freeway exit we bought all our guns from. So we stocked up on ammo (apparently a lot of ammo? Seemed about the right amount to me haha).

We also bought something that H has been bugging me about for YEARS, pretty much since we started dating. We bought a double pie iron that you cook sandwiches and pies in the campfire. Well, we were both recovering from being sick all week and I still had a head cold or something bugging me, so we tried to lay low all weekend and not get anyone else sick, since we are certain we got this crap from other people going to stuff when they were already sick (inconsiderate people!!!).

Sunday morning we had our first Cleveland Marathon training run with Team in Training. Heather and I are coaching the 10k team, so we were there to run with everyone. Was a huge turnout and a gorgeous morning. 30 minutes of MORE HILLS ugh.

When we got home, I decided to "season" the camp pie maker... this is a process that conditions the cast iron so that it will not rust. You put it in the fire for 15 minutes, heating it up, and then you rub oil all over it. You do this 3 times.

Well, what seemed simple and seemless, ended up being a pain in my ass. It was windy as heck and my typical gas bomb fire starting technique failed 3 times ( I have never ever failed at this!!! ). So I finally got the fire started after 45 min of farting around and then proceeded to burn my fingers numerous times trying to work the oil into the grooves and crevices of this thing (who wants rust on their pies and sandwiches?).

Well it worked out in the end. When I was done with this thing, H had all the fixings worked up for some turkey and cheese sandwiches and some peach pies!!!

Well, I have put on some muscle and if you see me you can tell. My shirts fit "normal" now and are not loose on my like they were during triathlon training. I feel "normal" again. H was saying how funny my body is. She did not realize how skinny I was until she sees how I "used" to look now.

All I have is a head shot... but you can see it in my face that I am no longer a scrawny Ethiopian!

I look like an MMA fighter!

A beer, sandwiches, pies, my wife and pups, made the day perfect. It was mid 50's in December, in northern Ohio... unbelievable.

Thanks for reading!

Where you at?

2011-12-01T09:34:00.000-05:00

It's been awhile. My bad haha. OH WAIT, I am supposed to post regularly??? I knew this blogging thing seemed easy lately.

What have we been up to? TONS!

Did a turkey trot on Thanksgiving... it punished me, badly. I started lifting a few weeks ago and ended up pulling my groin Monday evening of race week. Didn't run after I pulled it until race morning and boy oh boy did it hurt like a mofo! I made it through the first mile at 5:42 and felt GREAT. It was a 4 mile race so I treated it like a 5k. Well mile 1.5 is when I backed off (not pulling a meat head move on Turkey Day).

Finished the 4 miles in 26:46 (6:41 pace). Ummmmm, this race hurt me worse than any half marathon or full marathon I have done... ever. My calves and hammies were throttled for days and my groin hurt for days after this. Not sure if my groin is back in check or not... I have still been lifting but we have a half marathon this weekend. Well, not necessarily a half marathon. We pulled the smart move and signed up Team Oravec for the RELAY option :) haha. It's a hilly course and we wanted to not get injured, so we played the smart move. I promise, I will NOT be going out at sub 6min pace this weekend ( I hope ).

The 4 mile race was awesome because it was a "local" race... meaning the start line was chalk on the pavement. I was mad about the kids and double wide stroller that were lined up in the front of the hundreds of people. But I made light work of them as I darted out. Will definitely do this race again next year!!!

Back to the lifting comment I made... I have NEVER put muscle on this fast in my life... EVER! I feel awesome, full body awesome. Muscles are back to P90X days pretty much. I went from puny triathlete to MattyO that we all know and love (or hate). My routine takes 10 minutes tops and I have jello arms afterwards (which in my opinion is the real pay off).

I have only been running up to 4 miles at a time so my cardio is dropping off pretty fast, but it's alright, my body needs a change. In two weeks time my pants fit great again and I look "normal" in my opinion (no more Ethiopian looking on Sally Struther's commercials).

So we have been super busy around the house getting ready for winter... got the Xmas lights up, caulked all our windows (used the wrong caulk last year :( ) built a compost bin... well, I guess my idea of composting and most people's ideas are pretty far off. It is about 5 foot wide and 9 feet long... (the COMPOST BIN!!! Minds out of the gutter guys!!!) and then built the chickens a heater for their water can so they will have drinkable water this winter.

I will post on the chickens soon. They are doing great and still popping out eggs like it's nobodies business! (They must have heard I was researching on how to humanely kill chickens).

Last night we went out for H's birthday. There is a place that is nationally known. It's called Melt. A guy at work swears by this place and who doesn't like a good ole fashioned grilled cheese sandwich?

Well, I didn't realize what H and I were getting ourselves into when we walked in. Ummm, let's let the pictures do the talking alright?

This my friends is the Westside Monte Cristo.

This my friends is a member of the CLEAN PLATE CLUB!!!

Minus the pickles... I promise, I am working on the pickle thing.

H must be normal and only finished half her sandwich!

WIMP!!!

The details:

Westside Monte Cristo
honey ham, smoked turkey, swiss, american, beer battered, mixed berry preserves–$10.00

The Parmageddon
2 potato & cheese pierogi, fresh napa vodka kraut, grilled onions, sharp cheddar–$10.00

Ummmm what I did not know is that "beer battered" means, ITS A FREAKING GIANT ELEPHANT EAR SANDWICH!!! BOOOOOOOOYAH! This thing was honestly OFF THE HOOK!

I stepped up to the plate and took this thing for all it had and washed it down with 2 craft brews. (we also got chicken papperkash soup). I think I really missed my calling in life... I should have been a competitive eater / Triathlete haha.

H got the Parmageddon, I was going to get that one but at a new place you have to divide and conquer!

Calorie estimate? Last night alone for dinner, easily 3-4,000. Jason... ummmm, you really DON'T HAVE TO COMMENT on this post ok? I get it, I am part of the cause not the solution on the obesity epidemic... but seriously, I am going back there and getting this thing again.

Here is their Menu :)

Thanks for reading everyone!

Calling all bike nerds!

2011-11-21T11:01:00.000-05:00

So, its not easy to spend your own money at times (at least for me that is). BUT, when you have a chance to spend someone else's money... it is SUPER fun right? So let's help MattyO spend plowing money before I even have any!!!

So here is the deal. Heather and I have been kind of forced to only do races nearby because we don't have a bike box to ship our bikes. Well, we want to do races that are far away now... and we plan on doing races together so we need either 2 bike boxes or a double.

DOES ANYONE HAVE EXPERIENCE with this? ANYONE?

They are super expensive and I want to know what to look for, do all bikes fit in these? How much tear down and construction time is there?

HELP :)

Also, if anyone knows of any awesome black friday deals that may be going on w/ regards to these... please let me know.

Thanks for reading (and helping) !!!

Race Director: Heather and Matty O

2011-11-16T14:14:00.000-05:00

Wow, that has a really great sound to it doesn't it?

WOAH WOAH!!! Easy there folks, let's not get too scared of what this may entail.

It means that Heather and I have gone 100% head first into promoting our race this year.

Blue Balls and Glass Cutters 5k

(Last year's race report: HERE )

What does this mean? It means that I will go over the top to make this an outstanding and completely ridiculous event remembered by all.

One word to describe this race will be... EPIC :)

Do you have what it takes to race this?

Let's just ride this one out...

2011-11-14T09:47:00.000-05:00

It's no surprise to any of my blog readers that I am purely motivated to workout so that I am not a fat ass.

Simple.

I made sure that I took plenty of time off this year to help let the body fix itself and hopefully aid me in having a nice, calm, healthy build this winter.

So... I am just riding this out. I have been active, hiking at least once a week and doing all of the landscaping crap, but I still eat like I am training for an ironman. I am enjoying my alcoholic beverages and I am enjoying our leftover halloween candy!

Where am I going with this? Ehhhh, my pants are shrinking again (surely I am not getting fatter).

So it's time to creat some sort of structured plan for 2012. I want my A race early, I am making it the Glass City Marathon. My goal is NOT to BQ, however... that would be enjoyable and nice, it is to beat my current PR of 3:19:57. This will reduce the pressure I put on myself this past winter and hopefully prevent another meltdown and whining fest.

This winter, December 1st I will begin simple easy cardio. Jan 1st I will begin a full round of P90X and my marathon training plan simultaneously again, the same way I did it in 2010.

I have had success in my life when I focus on a BHAG (Big Hairy Ass Goal). That means I am 500% in. I will go over and above the call of duty. I will be dieting, cutting out all alcohol (this appears to be a great motivator for me to succeed), training regularly, putting my job on the back burner again, and fully committing to one day, one event, one success.

I had planned on buying another house and flipping it... that is still in the works... but a couple of unforeseen circumstances came up and kind of derailed my time schedule with bumping careers.

So why not start today you ask? I am currently working on my "motivation" to train right now. I need to hit 210lbs for me to mentally check in again and show up for a 4 month ass kicking. I will only bike and swim as forms of cross training... I will be out running in the shitty weather and slush filled streets and I will continue to blog through the Mr. Plow months of my life.

Until then... someone please pass the cake and ice cream!

In need of gift ideas???

2011-11-10T09:40:00.000-05:00

Well you can see on top of my blog that I have a caricature that Heather had created for me. Well, I am excited to tell everyone that the company we got the toon made from has just released a new site with A LOT more options for everyone!

As you can see from my toon it is high quality and I personally love it. Whenever I meet people for the first time they tell me they knew who I was because I look just like my toon haha.

So Christmas is coming up, and if you are looking for a unique gift idea this is what you NEED to do. Go to this site:

Caricature Toons

As a special promo...

Use the code: SMILE in order to get 10% off your order!!!

They are very easy to make, and their service was outstanding for Heather to create my caricature toon! They send you a proof to approve or you have the option to revise it and change it before final approval. At the very least you have to go and see all of the products that you can get your toon printed on! Heather went ahead and printed my toon on my Birthday cake last year!!!

I have no affiliation with this company except that I had a great experience and fully support them! Do it TODAY!

Thanks for reading!!!

Ironman Florida 2011 Volunteering Report - IMFL

2011-11-09T07:55:00.000-05:00

So Heather and I were down in Panama City Beach, Florida for a week to volunteer for IMFL!

We had some pretty high expectations going into this race. We have done Rev3 Full Cedar Point and have done a bunch of WTC 70.3's so we had a good idea how we thought things would go.

We arrived Tuesday afternoon of race week and we were scheduled to work the volunteer shift Thursday all day for all of the athletes registering and getting their packets.

Our overall goals and missions were as follows:

1) Volunteer
2) Meet up with Mandy, Colleen, Kristin, KC
3) Have fun
4) Get completely shit faced while watching the race and seeing the Pros competing LIVE in front of me!!!
5) Sign up for IMFL 2012

Let's go through these one at a time now.

1) Volunteering, well, they had about 20+ ancient human beings that Heather and I coined the "Geriatric Crew" that were doing all of the paper work and giving people their packets... ummm, awesome job busing them in from the senior centers but heard a few complaints about things not going well in line due to the volunteers not knowing what they were doing. Geriatric Crew, THANK YOU for donating your time and helping ensure a great race experience for the athletes! We cannot do this without you, WTC, please sit them down ahead of time and explain things a little bit better.

Packet pickup day on Thursday yielded about 7 or so EXTRA volunteers. This meant that we were given breaks, allowed to go to the bathroom etc. WTC, GREAT JOB on planning here, things went very well. The line got backed up a bit but in typical WTC fashion they are a corporate machine, no messing around, they pumped people through the lines like it was no bodies business!

Ironman village was pretty cool because it was all outside. They had some pretty cool vendors there and their merchandise for IMFL was seriously INSANE! I have never seen that much M Dot branded crap in one place. Prices weren't horrible for some stuff. Heather and I raided the $1 table and got wine glasses, beer mugs and frisbees for Frank all for a dollar each!!! Score one for the good guys ;)

Our legs were pretty tired from standing up all day and we were tired from being in the sun all day but it was a good experience and we answered a bunch of questions before athletes got to the tables which helped speed things through.

Volunteering = Success!

2) Meet up with the girls. Awesome, pure awesome. What a great group of people and honestly NEVER a dull moment with all of us hahaha. Mandy may be "pint sized" but holy moly does she pack a punch ;) haha. Great energy ALL WEEKEND!

Meetup = Success!

3) Have fun... simply put, Heather and I had an AWESOME time down there. We were a bit bummed that since it was off season for the beach a bunch of places had funky hours or were shut down til March but we changed our schedule a bit and adapted. Colleen gave us some really good tips on what to do and where to go down there. Heather and I took our pups with us (more on this on another post) and ultimately, they have A TON to do with your dogs down there. Nearby there is a dog park, tons of hiking trails, a pet friendly beach, etc.

Have Fun = Was this even a question???

4) Getting wasted. Yes, there was MUCH potential for this. The house we rented was ON the run course and we would see runners FOUR times (double loop course out and back :) ). I even bought myself a mini-keg and tapped it for the race.

So we were on our way to just loving life when I started talking to the volunteer directing traffic outside our house at an intersection, he told us he was not supposed to be there, he was stationed down the road and saw an athlete almost get hit so he stopped to direct traffic. Our street paralleled the main street. Well the main street was backed up so ALL of the cars said... AHAH! I will cut through on the back road and get by faster!!!! YES! THIS IS A GREAT IDEA!!!!!!!

...
...
...

WRONG! This just led to huge backups, which inherently led to pissed off drivers. I started helping the volunteer direct traffic at 1:30pm. This went on until 10pm at night. I felt totally wrong drinking my beer while directing traffic... let alone completely guilty if anything happened under my direction while I was intoxicated, so I manned up and said take one for the team.

A cop finally came in the evening which is good because there are no lights at that intersection either. After talking with Colleen and the cop they both told me that NO ONE has ever been there to direct traffic in the past... this blew my mind. All I could think of was that WTC said at the swim start that there were over 1,000 Ironman VIRGINS on the course today. Having had an amazing experience myself at my first IM, I felt completely obligated to make sure that all these athletes had a great experience and had a SMOOTH race. So I stayed there and directed traffic all day. I got screamed at, honked at, etc. Oh well.

All of the athletes were VERY appreciative of Heather and I directing traffic and helping them continue moving and not have to stop or dodge cars. That made it all worth while. Besides, since we are triathletes ourselves, screw the "normal people" in their cars, this is one day a year that Panama City Beach is the triathlete's city!

I think the only complaints I have about this experience were that WTC officials drove by in their truck and completely ignored the fact that Heather and I wanted someone to relieve us or even help so we could use the bathroom and not have asshole car drivers darting through the athletes. After seeing how these people drive down there and how half of the geriatric crew themselves apparently still drive down there... you would have totally understood why Heather and I did what we did. I guess I also thought that they would have at least put a generator light at our intersection too because it was PITCH BLACK there. 500ft away they had street lights ... AND a generator haha. Only a handful of the athletes had glow sticks or reflective clothing or head lamps (typically if they had any of these they had all three haha). So add mad drivers to not being able to see the athletes and you are getting why I was a bit upset with WTC and their lack of caring about this intersection haha.

Only the athletes ever thank the volunteers or seem to even acknowledge them. I get this, as an athlete, I thank EVERY volunteer I see because that is a LONG day for them. But, after volunteering myself twice at this event, never once did any of the WTC people seem to acknowledge the fact that this race would be an epic fail without their volunteers... Seemed to just reassure the idea that WTC only cares about the money involved in their business.

We did not want to volunteer on race day... but we are glad we did. We felt that we made a much better experience for the athletes and especially those who were on their first ever 140.6 journey. Nothing against WTC here except what we felt was poor planning and a continued overlooking of a safety factor for the athletes. I plan on writing them to tell them that they should put a cop at that intersection as well.

Shit Faced = EPIC FAIL!!!

Watch the Pros race = PURE AWESOME!!!

5) Sign up for IMFL 2012.

Well, we did NOT. Was it because of our traffic experience? No. I just want to put that out there. I was not happy that it seems WTC is ignorant to this intersection every year (according to the Sheriff we befriended as the night went on), but seriously, I would not ditch an opportunity to race an event because of hatred over something this minute haha. However the windy day they raced on and the cool temps in the morning and evening scared us a little bit haha. If I wanted to race in cooler temps I would stay home ;) (again, not the actual reason for not signing up though).

It was a huge culmination of events and life happenings that all occurred as of late. We had talked a lot about this race, Heather was dead set on doing it... I didn't care to race but fully supported her and told her I would even train with her if she wanted.

We had a lot of time to talk after traffic duty was over and we both agreed that the current timing of mandatory sign up is not ideal as there are 3 or 4 things that still loom over our heads and are currently having a huge factor on what next year holds for us.

So in the end, I didn't want to spend $600 on myself. Heather has a lot of things that are still up in the air and will have a huge impact on next year for us.

Sign up for IMFL 2012 = Unfortunate FAIL!!!

Overall we had an awesome time. Finally meeting KC and Mandy was AWESOME! These people are seriously 100% positive energy and good vibes. Unfortunately they live at other ends of the US so I can't tap into their positive mojo while training haha! I also got to see a twitter friend of mine qualify for Kona. He actually stopped on the run, shook my hand and started chatting with me on his first loop. I laughed and yelled at him to get going and stop trying to NOT Kona qualify haha.

So there you have it, our volunteering experience at IMFL 2011. Overall an awesome time. A couple things that I wanted to bring to WTC's attention but in their typical fashion, this race was run like a well oiled machine. They do an amazing job on their races and definitely have this down to a science. However, there is still room for improvement. Will they continue to strive to be a better company now? Or are they complacent with what they do and just take people's money with open hands? I am curious to find out.

Thanks for reading!!!