I was online, I was ready, mousing fingers loose and poised for the start.  At 9:00am sharp I jumped onto and started the registration process.

I got no further than accepting the waiver before the remaining slots filled.  Damn, that was fast.

So I’m still on schedule for IMWI-2009. 

Sunday’s run sucked eggs. Big, honkin, smelly ostrich eggs.

After a good bit of time away from the iron, I’ve been hitting the weights pretty hard again, but still trying to keep up the training volume and intensity.

Bad Idea

Friday’s weight workout and run left me stiff and sore. Saturday’s 55 mile ride, left me shelled. On Sunday, I really, Really, REALLY didn’t want to do the run, but I got a big shot of motivation from TRI-DRS, and I headed out the door.

90 min later, I shuffled back in the door, more tired, more sore, and totally dejected. Everything between my nipples and knees were screaming “no mas”.

So I had my usual rest day on Monday, and had a lousy massage on Monday night. Tuesday morning I felt even worse. I could barely get myself out of bed. Any thought of a run, much less an interval run was right out. I stayed in bed and gave myself another rest day.

Which brings us to Wednesday.

On the menu was a 60-90 min bike and a 30 min run. I decided to do a Mountainville loop that would take me 30-35 miles. I took the fast bike and went out hard.

1:42 and 30.06 miles later I’m back at the car and headed out for the :30 min run. 29ish later and I’m back at the car and done. For the entire 2:12, I felt strong, solid, loose and fast.

Ladies and Gentleman, the snap is back, and it feels Goooood…

Next week, I’m scheduled to go out to Madison WI, for Ironman Wisconsin. My plan is to hook up with Rob, who got me a sweet gig as a wetsuit peeler, then head over to marshal the run course. On Monday morning I had PLANNED on standing in line to get a slot for the 2009 edition of IMMOO.

Until this showed up in my inbox this afternoon:

Entry Slots Available for 2009 Subaru Ironman Canada

Penticton, BC – A limited number of general entry slots for the 2009 Subaru Ironman Canada will be available on-line. These slots will be available through the target=”_blank”>www.ironman.ca website beginning at 9 AM PT Friday August 29th. Demand for these slots is expected to be high and therefore athletes are encouraged to go to the website as soon as possible.

Information regarding NA Sports Community Fund Slots and slots available through qualifying events will be posted on the www.ironman.ca and www.nasports.com websites in the coming weeks.

Umm, yeah… change of race plans for 2009? We’ll see what happens on Friday morning.

Never, ever say “I can’t”
– Man With No Arms, Legs Takes Part In Triathlon

In the end, he finished 275th out of 308 participants.

To think that I was ahead of 35 people just blew my mind,” said Dietz. “I would have been happy with 307th, beating one. Not being the last person out of the water would have been a good day for me.”

Money quote:

“I didn’t do the race for that, my reason for the race were quite selfish — to challenge myself,” said Dietz. “I was there on Sunday for the same reason as all the other persons… to challenge myself and to prove something to my self. I never set out to prove anything to anybody else and I think people do what they have to do to survive in life. You overcome whatever you’re faced with and that’s all I think that I’ve done.”

Yep, he’s one of us. He’s got it from the gettin place…

have met the enemy, and He is us”

“Global warming is causing significant changes to the Earth’s natural systems and it is highly unlikely that any force but man-made climate change can be blamed.”

If you believe that the earth needs to be “saved”,  then if you have bred, or have consider breeding, or continue to breed, then you are part of the problem, not part of the solution.

Step to the left for mandatory sterilization.

At the very least, donate the US Federal tax exemption you get for your child to the World Wildlife Fund.

I do believe that by our very existence, we as modern humans cause damage to our environment from which we can NEVER hope to recover.

This is one of the main reasons I don’t have children. I choose not to be part of the problem.

In fact, I should drive an HUMMER over the top of a grade-school parking lot in the morning.

Instead, I’ll ride my bike to work. Your kids owe me, big time…

read more | digg story

WTF?
these gadgets foretell the end of days? – Gadgets- msnbc.com

The continued existence of MSNBC as a “news-outlet” is a better indicator of the end of days.

If you get all your ‘current event’ information from MSNBC, please step to the left to be sterilized by a Windows-based robot.

Pray for no blue screens during the procedure.

Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner…

We have a serious contender in the AKFB “Best Unintended Use of Government Resources” category:

2008 August 2 – Eclipse Shirt

The APOD website should be included on everyone’s RSS feed. It never fails to educate and inspire.

Occasionally, it will make you laugh…

misty eyed, and loving every minute of this stuff.. the torch lighting always gets me going..

Great post by Elizabeth Fedofsky

adventures of…: Unwritten

Note to self: Have my coach pencil in some track work, or find a local club that does track workouts.

Did I mention that Elizabeth’s post was great? Really freakin great? Like Best.Post.Ever. Great?

What are you doing sitting on the knob? Clicky the linky above already

I think that I’m getting really close to 100% recovered from IM.  Normally I try to jump right back in to heavy training or hammering with group rides.  This always leads to an extended illness as my old abused immune system can’t keep up.  Even though I feel fine, I’m not.

This time around I listened to my and followed his recovery plan almost to the letter.  I think that it worked, because this week is the first full-load week.  Monday was supposed to be a rest day, but I bike-commuted.  I kept the HR dialed to high Z1/low Z2.  Tuesday was a 1hr run, and I nailed it with at 8:30ish pace.  I missed the Tues night swim as I had to take a con-call from Hong Kong (on my home phone:  $278!! )

Wednesday morning I started back into strength training, and my run at one hundred pushups.   I squeezed out 35 for my ‘baseline’ then went into a new routine that alternates upper body work with some core work.

Wednesday’s brick was 60-90 min bike, 30 min run.  I was running late, so I opted for the 60 min ride, but kept HR into high Z2.  I ended up with 20.5 in 1 hr flat.  The 30 min run was a guesstimate, because my Garmin 405 battery died about 10 min before the end of the bike.  I ran my usual 30min out and back from BedOne, and I think that I came in a under 30 minutes.

Thursday morning I woke up with REALLY sore pecs,lats, delts, bi’s-n-tri’s  (note to self:  never, ever stop strength training).  So that made the 3500y swim very interesting.  Still, I managed to complete the set in 1:01.

Thursday was a total C-F day.  I worked from home, thinking I could focus on ‘real work’.  Did. Not. Happen.  To top it off, I got a recall notice about my Keo pedals, so I had to swap out pedals on the F2C and Blackbird, then run the Keo’s to High Gear, run home, load up and meet the MAFW for the Thursday night ride.  And about 4 miles from home, I realized that I forgot my Garmin wrist unit.  Back to the house, drive like a fiend to make the 6:00pm ride, get suited up and off we go..

1hr42min later we’ve completed the 34.4 mile ride.  2k climbs just to keep things honest.  I hit HR peaks that I’ve not seen in at least 6 weeks, and rarely see on a road or tri-bike.  Even though I tried to ‘recover’ during the last 3 miles, I was shelled at the end of the ride.  It felt GREAT…

We’ll see what happens the rest of the week, but I’m gonna keep pushing..

Ever forward..