Coach to the Rescue

First off, it may seem that I’m slacking in the blog department.  I promised (myself and my readers) that I’d blog every day without fail until Ironman. Fail.

Last night I had internet problems. The site seemed to be down.  The night before, I had a late massage from David at LA Body Mechanics that ended around 10:40 p.m. (more on that later).  I was tired, beat up, and needed some rest.

I actually wrote this blog last night in Microsoft Word so I could potentially double-post tomorrow (today by the time you read this).

The past few days have been eye-opening for me.  More so from a mental aspect than anything else.  Previously, I had written about my fatigue after an emotionally draining week.  That fatigue led me to miss a couple workouts.  Which caused me to start worrying – OK panicking – that I wouldn’t be at my peak heading into this weekend’s race.

For those of you who read my blog post about my night with the Lakers, I certainly don’t expect you to feel sorry for me.

Nonetheless, times like these call for a good coach.  Someone to reel you in when you start to drift – OK beeline – for an anxiety attack or confidence crisis.

Enter Coach Gerardo.  Over the past few days, he’s essentially grabbed me by the arms and shaken me, metaphorically telling me to “chill out” and remember why I love the sport of triathlon. David, during his massage, pointed this out to me too.  I had gotten too locked into “the numbers” of the sport.  We all know them well.  Heart-rate zones and duration of workout especially.

I honestly can’t remember the last time I swam, ran or biked simply for the pure joy of it.  It’s always with an end-goal in mind.  A workout to check off the list.  A time to beat.  Someone to beat.

Gerardo has really reset me and got me ready for this Sunday.  He gave David tips on the best massage for me, and reminded me why I was doing all this (because I CAN!).  Yesterday, he (and Richard) ran with me the entire set during our Griffith Park brick to show me I could run a lot faster than I think – maintaining a seven-minute mile pace for two miles while not totally blowing up in the process.  Today, Gerardo pushed me in the water farther and harder than I wanted to go, ignoring my whining to coax a personal best 1:26 100-yard swim out of me.  And, after that, he sent me an email congratulating me on a nice bike time trial yesterday, smooth cadence at 92 rpm and staying in heart-rate zone 3.

That’s the mark of a good coach.  He took me from the brink of dejection and collapse to feeling like I’m truly ready to rock this Sunday.  My energy is high, my confidence is back, and most important…I’m excited to race again.

Thanks coach.

147 days and counting.

Here Comes Hanukkah!

I finally had a chance to celebrate Hanukkah tonight with my family. It's the last night, so the anticipation had gradually built up all week. As a kid, this was the time where I'd get that one special gift, that one thing that I had been hoping and praying for all season long. The GI Joe hovercraft, for example (man, I coveted that!). In past years, it's closer to underwear and socks as a running joke in the fam, but I always get something I really want or need.

Tonight was no different. My sister and her boyfriend were kind enough to pool their resources and buy me the Surge h20 waterproof headphones and armband combo. As we all know, few things become more repetitive and mind-numbing than lap swimming. At least my rockin' tunes might help shake up the workouts a bit.

My parents apparently have been reading my blog as they bought me a trainer climber for my front wheel and a sweat guard for the head set and frame. And believe me, I really need that! I also received a few shekels toward buying a new watch computer. I'm leaning towards the Garmin 305 at this point. There are some great deals on Amazon.

Maybe the best gift of the night though was the most nostalgic. My parents recently bought a device that records vinyls and converts them to discs or MP3 files. They have a huge collection of records that span from the Beatles and Dylan to Tchaikovsky and in this particular instance, Peter and the Wolf. This story was one of my all-time favorites as a child, so much so that at a Hollywood Bowl live performance with Henry Winkler (The Fonz) serving as narrator, I shouted at him from my seat when he strayed from the script to ad lib. I was 3.

Maybe I can listen to that with the new headphones while doing my pyramid sets on Sunday.

Tomorrow in about nine hours, I've got a casual 2:30-3:30 ride with Valley Coach. Frank Lafuente, my cycling mentor, is joining me. We're riding at 8 a.m. at the Starbucks off Malibu Canyon Road and Agoura Road, if you're local, actually read this blog, and would like to join. We're keeping heart-rate in zone 2 for most of the ride so it should be a nice steady pace.

Happy Hanukkah for me indeed, and I wish the same to all my friends in the virtual world reading this.

340 days and counting.