Family and Friends Friday - IM USA participants

There is a special kindred relationship I now share with participants of Ironman USA. Having lost my Iron-virginity at Lake Placid I am extremely excited to be travelling to this awesome little city with Aimee this weekend. We get to cheer for approximately 15 Cleveland area Iron-peeps, as well as some bloggers and the pro women.

Next week I will post my Ironman USA Spectator Race Report. This is going to be a great weekend.

Now I leave you with this moment of Zen:

Don't eat a jalopeno hamburger with onion rings and swiss cheese the night before a hard tempo run. It will come back to haunt you.....perhaps three times.....maybe even once during the run. Not that I have any personal experience with that.

Game On.

A quote for Ironman USA participants

The man who can drive himself further once the effort gets painful is the man who will win. Roger Bannister

Good Luck to all who are going for 140.6 this weekend.

LOOK OUT!!!! It's the Police.

Yes the Police were in town Monday night. I'm not talking about the fuzz, cops, coppers, troopers, the man. And they weren't singing "Bad boys, bad boys, whatcha gonna do when they come for you...."

I'm talking about THE POLICE

What an amazing show it was at Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland. Our seats were upper bowl but the view was great. The lighting and video production was very good. Large screen TVs provided close up views of Sting, Andy and Stewart. I was so impressed with the drumming of Stewart Copeland, who also turned 55 the day of the concert...July 16th.

These guys may be "old" but they rock like it was the early years.

The following picture is from concert. No I wasn't that close but a newpaper photographer was. The bass Sting is playing was worn and weathered. He's probably had it since the beginning of the band.

This was definitely one of the best shows I have been to. I'm glad we spent the money to see it.

Some Weekend Motivation

Two for Tuesday - His and Hers

It's Tuesday right? Yeah...Tuesday. Sorry I get all confused when the week hits a holiday and I work on the weekend and my brain gets frazzled like that.

So yes a return to Two for Tuesday

His

I did a training run/race this past weekend. This was the Columbia Station 10-Mile Run which was called the Columbia Station Roadkill and Roller Coaster 10.5 miler last year because of the dead animals along the ride of the road, up and down course layout and the killer heat of July 2006. Oh and the 10.5 part is because it was a longer that advertised course.

Well not much changed between '06 and '07. Same course. Same hills. Appeared to be the same road kill. The RD told us the actual mileage is 10.4 miles. The only thing missing was the oppresive heat and about half of the runners from last year.

So on with the report. I had two days of rest due to work and was itching to run. The plan was for a marathon tempo run hitting a 7 min/mile pace. Cool.....I'd be done in just over 70 minutes. I was going on pace and not worrying about heart rate. Figure out what the heart did after the run.

I started out feeling great. Immediately was out near the front of the race. There was no way I was going to hang with JP, who would eventually win at 6 min/mile, so he was not even chased by me. I settled into what I felt was a good effort. We hit the first mile marker at 5:59. The girl, Tara, I was running with also let out a "what the F" and we both tried to temper our pace. She was shooting for 6:45's and me 7's. Turns out she is training for an Olympic qualifying time in the marathon. Once I let her go I watched her pull away a nice steady pace. I caught another guy during a downhill section before the mile three marker and never saw him again. I felt great the entire run and took one HammerGel right before the water stop near mile 6.

The final 3.5 miles back to the finish is where all the hills are. I felt powerful going up the hills and never suffered. I took water or Gatorade at each aid station, 5 total. Here are my splits form the race.


Mile 1 5:59
Mile 2 6:29
Mile 3 6:51
Mile 4 7:09
Mile 6 14:21 Missed mile marker 5
Mile 7 6:14
Mile 8 6:45
Mile 9 6:43
Mile 10 7:19
Mile 10.4 2:14

I averaged 160 for my heart rate. I finished 1:10:02 which is a 6:45 pace, imagine that when looking at my splits. I was also second overall male and third finisher. I got chicked by 3 minutes by Tara....I didn't mind one bit.

Here was my moment of Zen during the race. Our friend Jane is handing me a Gatorade while Michelle is taking a picture. I never have pics of me during a race. This rocks.

Hers

Aimee rocks. She works hard, trains hard, party's hard....when she can and rests harder (solid sleeper). Anyways, she was made an equity partner in the firm she works for. It's 5% which came out of the majority owners share. They appreciate and respect her for all that she does which is a hell of a lot. I'm so F'in proud of her and love her more than I can ever tell her. She's definitely go Game.