If I don't finish the race, then MAYBE I'll have something bigger to fess up to than what I'm 'bout to fess up. Maybe.
I bought a bike, and its fantastic. I spent $1600.
How much is that to me? Two months' rent. Somewhere not much less than one month's paycheck. Twice my annual car insurance premium. 53 months of gym membership. 20 pairs of running shoes. Probably the approximate Blue Book value of my 2001 Corolla.
How did I get here? Why am I okay with it? Why do I think its not a total derailment of the "Tri on a Shoestring" philosophy? Tuck in, this entry's gonna be a doozy.
BIKES.
If you're not young and familiar with the cannibalization of competing genres of youth culture, you might not be aware that bikes are a hot, burning topic. I've tried to stay mostly out of the fray, and know enough to not destroy my bike, and to vaguely understand why the bike moves the way it does when I push on the pedals.
My last bike (R.I.P) - which was also my first "adult" bike, i.e. a purposeful purchase, and not a movement machine that happened to drift into the maw of my life - was a 54cm Surly Steamroller flip-flop that I rode single at first, and then fixed. I'm going to go ahead and tell you what all that meant, since it was all bewilderment to me until about 8 months ago. Let's break it down a phrase at a time.
54 cm The size of the frame - the most basic and rude measurement for fitting yourself to a bike. It refers to the seat tube post (that's pretty self explanatory if you're looking at a bike), though from which exact point to which other point varies slightly between manufacturers. I believe, but could be wrong, that from the center of the pedal-gear thing to the top of the tube is the measurement. Anyone?
I was happy on this frame, which was probably ignorance. I'm on a 51 now, and I feel sort of squished, but I can feel my body having an easier time getting up power.
The big throughline of the bike buying experience has been getting a women's vs a men's frame, and I'd like to drop on you a fundamental difference in physiologies that entails the need for frames to be built and sized differently: short torso/long legs (women) vs. long torso/legs (men). See how that combo can mean that, even sex being constant, two people of the same height might need a different size bike? Know this.
Surly Steamroller I'm not going to get into this too much, but this was a BAD ASS bike. Steamroller for ruhlz, that thing could jam through any pothole, crappy surface, get hit by a car, and sustain no damage. Amazing. Steel frame but light. When I first got onto an aluminum Specialized, I was disturbed to describe the sensation of the ride as "hollow" - the lighter frame and better shock absorption meant I wasn't "feeling" the road as much, and this freaked me out. Think Corolla - reliable, sturdy, economical - vs whatever your Mommy drives - smooth, quiet, clearly more expensive. It was like that. God I miss that bike. God I love my new one.
Flip-flop/single/fixed//road/track Explaning this is almost totally unpalatable to me, so strong do opinions run...I'll just try and succinctly relate my experience.
I bought the Surly as flip flop because I wanted to have something I could treat badly and still have be a workhorse, and was afraid to go totally fixed, because I didn't understand it. So I rode single for a few months - that means I had one gear, and could coast - I could glide along without the pedals/my legs moving, or even move them in crazy backwards circles.
People kept explaining fixed gear to me, and I just couldn't wrap my head around it. One night, my friend Bryan flipped the back wheel (with a single gear on one side of the hub, and a fixed gear on the other), and I tried to ride fixed. It was unsettling - if the wheels are moving, so are the pedals. Get me? If that bike's a-rollin, your legs are a-movin' - whether you like it or not. So now I understood, mechanically, the deal, but didn't understand what the intrinsic value might be.
Closest as I can tell you, based on personal experience, is this (and this basically matches what anyone will say...I think...): you get better at pedaling, more evenly, and more appropriately to whatever you are trying to achieve, speed or strengthwise. You get better feedback from the bike on what it wants to be doing, and you adjust more instinctively. Your legs are the gears, so you know how hard you are working; exactly how steep or long the hill is; and how much resistance you really need to stop. I never rode without a brake lever, and after I got hit by a car because I couldn't stop fast enough with one brake, I got a second one put on.
I'll never say that any sort of gear system is better than another, but the weirdo versatility of fixed should be experienced. Mechanical symbiosis and geeky thing-love, where your bike suddenly becomes a beautiful horsey you want to pet and canter with forever, is the best way I can explain it.
All of which is just set-up for the much more massive learning experience of buying the new bike, a 51 cm Specialized Dolce Comp. With a horrible paint job.
And why I head to bed with zero twinge of guilt that I've betrayed my mission or outspent my budget.
That'll have to be tomorrow's post.
Sunday, November 23, 2008
All Systems Go
Arright arright arright.
Yeah yeah yeah.
I haven't blogged in a week. OKAY. But guess why? Becaaaaause....I've been busy...training! I work out twice a day now! Yay! Ugh! Awesome!
Let's start again, with a *little* less vernacular.
I think, for all intents and purposes, its not wrong to say that this week has been my first full week of training. I only had one day I didn't work out, I had two team practices, and I now own - at least some version of - all the equipment I will need.
Quick run down of the week's workouts, should you be curious:
Saturday
Ran in San Francisco. This was supposed to be a 40 minute easy run, which became an hour and a half-long odyssey, punctuated by walking backwards (cross-training!) up hills that were just not happening. I got lost deep in Upper Noe Valley, and spent literally 45 minutes running into & back out of streets that turned out to be dead ends. Whatever happened to "No Outlet" signs, SF? "Not a Thru Street," Gavin Newsom? Hmm?? The extra fun in this was that it was mostly on a hill overlooking the street I wanted to be on, and could have been, if I'd just committed to a sharp, steep tumble.
Sunday
nothing! ha!
Monday
Oh wait, nothing again. I lied before when I said there was only one day off. The curious thing about this rest day was when my body started to hurt. Around noon, I got growing pains. They throbbed gently until I went to bed. Interesting?
Tuesday
Morning - Swim, 45 minutes. LA Fitness Radio has some shockingly bad tunes. It's really stunning. Glad when I swim I only hear it while I'm in the locker room.
Wednesday
Morning - Bike, 1 hour. At the stupid gym again, but I did the recumbent bike this time. I'm not sure if this "counts", but I had sweat on my face and no bruises on my butt, so I think it was the right choice.
Thursday
TEAM SWIM PRACTICE!!!!! I don't really think of myself as an athletic person, but I do consider myself an athletic childhood person; I was ECSTATIC, in my own way, to be in the pool with 40 other people, to be circular swimming (!!!) after years of feeling bad for chasing down grandmas and loquacious Russians at the Y, and to smell grass from the nearby soccer field on the walk from and to the car.
It stuns me, occasionally, to realize how busy I was as a kid - swim practice twice a day, soccer a couple times a week, ballet once or twice a week, piano lessons - and to see how "busy" I feel now, without being as diversely developed as that. Mike (Rizzi, my training buddy) and I have talked about this a few times, but especially on Thursday. I also asked my Mom recently whether having us in activities was partially done so that Mom & Dad could have a little extra work time without having us be abandoned, and she said that was about half of it, the personal development being the other half. Trick! Good parent trick!
Friday
Morning - Run, 40 minutes. Beautiful morning in the neighborhood. Got further up Echo Park Avenue than I've been before. My first workout that felt slightly taxed the entire time; consequently, my first workout where I started to realize I'm pretty proud of myself.
Evening - Swim, 45 minutes. Again, felt a bit tired, but loved it.
Saturday
TEAM RUN!!! The run was haaaaaaaard, I was tiiiiiiired, but it also felt gooooood. At the end, some of us did stem cel donor test kits - 4 cotton swabs in the inside of your cheeks, then S.W.A.K. - for a teammate's friend. They'll keep my results on file until I'm 60. This was something my uncle Randy and his donor, Uncle Boo, went through....what an organization Team in Training is. It's easy to forget.
OMG I bought a bike after practice! It deserves its own long, impassioned post!
Sunday
Swam, 45 minutes. Can feel myself improving, though far and away the best part of the workout was the warm down, when I just splashed around for awhile. Water! So strange! People can't float on land, you know? It's COOL.
I have a lot of thoughts surrounding all this working out - I'm HUNGRY all the time - but for now I think they are the beginnings of larger thoughts developing. The really remarkable thing is the improvement in my mood generally. I don't really know where I stand on the kinesiological-psychological connection - where what my body does plugs into what my brain does, and vice versa, and how much I think they are interdependent - but there is definitely some mental garbage being expunged through movement. That's most of what I'm thinking about right now, how much I'm thinking right now, and more at peace with it being my own quiet process, rather than running at the mouth as much as I am wont to.
Yeah yeah yeah.
I haven't blogged in a week. OKAY. But guess why? Becaaaaause....I've been busy...training! I work out twice a day now! Yay! Ugh! Awesome!
Let's start again, with a *little* less vernacular.
I think, for all intents and purposes, its not wrong to say that this week has been my first full week of training. I only had one day I didn't work out, I had two team practices, and I now own - at least some version of - all the equipment I will need.
Quick run down of the week's workouts, should you be curious:
Saturday
Ran in San Francisco. This was supposed to be a 40 minute easy run, which became an hour and a half-long odyssey, punctuated by walking backwards (cross-training!) up hills that were just not happening. I got lost deep in Upper Noe Valley, and spent literally 45 minutes running into & back out of streets that turned out to be dead ends. Whatever happened to "No Outlet" signs, SF? "Not a Thru Street," Gavin Newsom? Hmm?? The extra fun in this was that it was mostly on a hill overlooking the street I wanted to be on, and could have been, if I'd just committed to a sharp, steep tumble.
Sunday
nothing! ha!
Monday
Oh wait, nothing again. I lied before when I said there was only one day off. The curious thing about this rest day was when my body started to hurt. Around noon, I got growing pains. They throbbed gently until I went to bed. Interesting?
Tuesday
Morning - Swim, 45 minutes. LA Fitness Radio has some shockingly bad tunes. It's really stunning. Glad when I swim I only hear it while I'm in the locker room.
Wednesday
Morning - Bike, 1 hour. At the stupid gym again, but I did the recumbent bike this time. I'm not sure if this "counts", but I had sweat on my face and no bruises on my butt, so I think it was the right choice.
Thursday
TEAM SWIM PRACTICE!!!!! I don't really think of myself as an athletic person, but I do consider myself an athletic childhood person; I was ECSTATIC, in my own way, to be in the pool with 40 other people, to be circular swimming (!!!) after years of feeling bad for chasing down grandmas and loquacious Russians at the Y, and to smell grass from the nearby soccer field on the walk from and to the car.
It stuns me, occasionally, to realize how busy I was as a kid - swim practice twice a day, soccer a couple times a week, ballet once or twice a week, piano lessons - and to see how "busy" I feel now, without being as diversely developed as that. Mike (Rizzi, my training buddy) and I have talked about this a few times, but especially on Thursday. I also asked my Mom recently whether having us in activities was partially done so that Mom & Dad could have a little extra work time without having us be abandoned, and she said that was about half of it, the personal development being the other half. Trick! Good parent trick!
Friday
Morning - Run, 40 minutes. Beautiful morning in the neighborhood. Got further up Echo Park Avenue than I've been before. My first workout that felt slightly taxed the entire time; consequently, my first workout where I started to realize I'm pretty proud of myself.
Evening - Swim, 45 minutes. Again, felt a bit tired, but loved it.
Saturday
TEAM RUN!!! The run was haaaaaaaard, I was tiiiiiiired, but it also felt gooooood. At the end, some of us did stem cel donor test kits - 4 cotton swabs in the inside of your cheeks, then S.W.A.K. - for a teammate's friend. They'll keep my results on file until I'm 60. This was something my uncle Randy and his donor, Uncle Boo, went through....what an organization Team in Training is. It's easy to forget.
OMG I bought a bike after practice! It deserves its own long, impassioned post!
Sunday
Swam, 45 minutes. Can feel myself improving, though far and away the best part of the workout was the warm down, when I just splashed around for awhile. Water! So strange! People can't float on land, you know? It's COOL.
I have a lot of thoughts surrounding all this working out - I'm HUNGRY all the time - but for now I think they are the beginnings of larger thoughts developing. The really remarkable thing is the improvement in my mood generally. I don't really know where I stand on the kinesiological-psychological connection - where what my body does plugs into what my brain does, and vice versa, and how much I think they are interdependent - but there is definitely some mental garbage being expunged through movement. That's most of what I'm thinking about right now, how much I'm thinking right now, and more at peace with it being my own quiet process, rather than running at the mouth as much as I am wont to.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
I Get Knocked Down
Remember yesterday when I was shaking, worried about spending more than $500 on a bike?
Today I went to the gym and did an hour on the stationary bike. That experience gave me no less than six reasons I have not only ZERO objection left to spending that much, but in fact an EAGERNESS to spend at least a good $900 to never have to live through that again. In no particular order, those reasons are:
1. "Tubthumping" - Chumbawumba
2. "1985" - Bowling for Soup, apparently
3. bizarre "I Just Can't Get Enough" remix
4. "American Idiot" - Green Day
5. no one would play racquet ball directly in front of my bike! only two courts over, where I could only see the ball every 10th hit!
6. BRUISES ON BOTH BUTT BONES.
It should be noted, however - as a surprise even to myself - that "Beautiful People" has a much more complex bridge than I had ever realized, and that I like that song. Huh.
Note to everyone ever: barring permanent winter, nuclear winter, being part of a Space Station Crew, or large money being in the bargain, never get on a stationary bike. It will not be worth it.
I made the hour though! Already, the MIND of a triathlete!
Today I went to the gym and did an hour on the stationary bike. That experience gave me no less than six reasons I have not only ZERO objection left to spending that much, but in fact an EAGERNESS to spend at least a good $900 to never have to live through that again. In no particular order, those reasons are:
1. "Tubthumping" - Chumbawumba
2. "1985" - Bowling for Soup, apparently
3. bizarre "I Just Can't Get Enough" remix
4. "American Idiot" - Green Day
5. no one would play racquet ball directly in front of my bike! only two courts over, where I could only see the ball every 10th hit!
6. BRUISES ON BOTH BUTT BONES.
It should be noted, however - as a surprise even to myself - that "Beautiful People" has a much more complex bridge than I had ever realized, and that I like that song. Huh.
Note to everyone ever: barring permanent winter, nuclear winter, being part of a Space Station Crew, or large money being in the bargain, never get on a stationary bike. It will not be worth it.
I made the hour though! Already, the MIND of a triathlete!
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Rest Day = Nail Biting
Here is a thing that rules: I did not work out today.
My coach told me not to.
Here is a thing that does not rule: buying a bike.
I am sure I'm going to spend $800.
And you know what happens when I tell other triathletes I'm gonna spend that much?
"Dude, don't worry, you'll be okay on it!"
:(
I'm trying to do this thought exercise: remembering the 9-month-long anger and agony of being on an entirely unsuitable bike (some sorta mountain-road hybrid), and use that as mortar to build a little brick wall around my weeping impoverished heart.
Itwillbeworthititwillbeworthititwillbeworthit.
If you are reading this, I am totally open to you buying me a bike.
Mom. Dad. momdad momdad mom ad dad anyone anyone anyone Michel Gondry buy buy buy!
My coach told me not to.
Here is a thing that does not rule: buying a bike.
I am sure I'm going to spend $800.
And you know what happens when I tell other triathletes I'm gonna spend that much?
"Dude, don't worry, you'll be okay on it!"
:(
I'm trying to do this thought exercise: remembering the 9-month-long anger and agony of being on an entirely unsuitable bike (some sorta mountain-road hybrid), and use that as mortar to build a little brick wall around my weeping impoverished heart.
Itwillbeworthititwillbeworthititwillbeworthit.
If you are reading this, I am totally open to you buying me a bike.
Mom. Dad. momdad momdad mom ad dad anyone anyone anyone Michel Gondry buy buy buy!
Saturday, November 8, 2008
On Truly Starting
I drank too much coffee!!! I've been sitting at one of Venice's loveliest outdoor cafés for four hours, compiling my fundraising list and belatedly composing my letter, and I drank 3 cups, after having cut coffee from my life for a couple months. As my old roommate Ali would say, I'm "doing" caffeine. TEETH GNASH TEETH GNASH TEETH GNASH
Okay okay okay, what are we writing about here today?
Ah ha!
First use of mileage tracking website (no hidden costs in THIS girl's triathlon) yields $4.78 in fuel to get to & from the first Training meeting, where we talked bikes and LSD (long, slow distance).
That's pry low, since I spent 30 minutes not finding the meeting - it was on Colorado Ave, not Montana, as I thought, which would be fine except I'm from Wyoming. Sorry Mom & Dad!
We almost had an additional mishap though! Bridget Jones 'R' Us!
I feel really elated to be starting this. I have moments where I can actually see myself on mile bajillion of the race, and in those moments I'm terrified. But luckily, never having experienced acute endurance pain like what I am in for, those are fleeting thoughts, and mostly I'm enjoying feeling as determined as I do.
I feel like I have a lot of big ideas that I completely back off from, which is part of why I'm undertaking this; millions of literal footfalls will take me, slowly but surely, towards an incredible goal, and I doubt the physical journey won't reap psychological dividends. That sounded sort of clinical, but I meant it.
I should be able to get my letter out tomorrow...could be today, but I feel like I want Granpa and Robin to read it, just to sort of...sign off on using Randy's name. Is that weird? I just want to make sure I'm honoring the guy I'm honoring.
My training schedule says today is a rest day, but the coffee is making me bonkers! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Okay okay okay, what are we writing about here today?
Ah ha!
First use of mileage tracking website (no hidden costs in THIS girl's triathlon) yields $4.78 in fuel to get to & from the first Training meeting, where we talked bikes and LSD (long, slow distance).
That's pry low, since I spent 30 minutes not finding the meeting - it was on Colorado Ave, not Montana, as I thought, which would be fine except I'm from Wyoming. Sorry Mom & Dad!
We almost had an additional mishap though! Bridget Jones 'R' Us!
I feel really elated to be starting this. I have moments where I can actually see myself on mile bajillion of the race, and in those moments I'm terrified. But luckily, never having experienced acute endurance pain like what I am in for, those are fleeting thoughts, and mostly I'm enjoying feeling as determined as I do.
I feel like I have a lot of big ideas that I completely back off from, which is part of why I'm undertaking this; millions of literal footfalls will take me, slowly but surely, towards an incredible goal, and I doubt the physical journey won't reap psychological dividends. That sounded sort of clinical, but I meant it.
I should be able to get my letter out tomorrow...could be today, but I feel like I want Granpa and Robin to read it, just to sort of...sign off on using Randy's name. Is that weird? I just want to make sure I'm honoring the guy I'm honoring.
My training schedule says today is a rest day, but the coffee is making me bonkers! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Friday, November 7, 2008
Casual Friday
I was all set today to write a bit of a retro-active report about my general haplessness, because I completely forgot to go to the Kick Off last Saturday. Err...I didn't forget, but I thought it was at noon. It was at 9. That + getting bike stolen + birds pooping on me (see three entries back) seemed like good enough evidence, and I had a whole charming thesis about being a romantic comedienne-type triathlete.
However, that has all been eclipsed.
I went to the gym this morning, and after a good mile swim and two mile run, I showered and found I had forgotten to bring my work clothes. I sit typing this, waiting for my boss, the Executive Producer of one of America's top commercial & music video production companies, to come and find me in sweatpants that say "Wolf Pack" on the butt.
In other news, first big training meeting tomorrow!
Bike fittings tomorrow!
Then bike searching on eBay!
First swim practice next Thursday!
Fundraising letters going out tomoorrrrowwww ek eeek eeek!
Ah, and in the spirit of tracking my costs:
new Masterlock = $4.99
LA Fitness membership = $29.99/mo. (I would NOT get this were it not for the pool....necessary cost)
Need to find a good gas costs tracking widget.
However, that has all been eclipsed.
I went to the gym this morning, and after a good mile swim and two mile run, I showered and found I had forgotten to bring my work clothes. I sit typing this, waiting for my boss, the Executive Producer of one of America's top commercial & music video production companies, to come and find me in sweatpants that say "Wolf Pack" on the butt.
In other news, first big training meeting tomorrow!
Bike fittings tomorrow!
Then bike searching on eBay!
First swim practice next Thursday!
Fundraising letters going out tomoorrrrowwww ek eeek eeek!
Ah, and in the spirit of tracking my costs:
new Masterlock = $4.99
LA Fitness membership = $29.99/mo. (I would NOT get this were it not for the pool....necessary cost)
Need to find a good gas costs tracking widget.
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