All pack and ready to go.

Finished all the packing and off to Peterborough for the Half Ironman.

Canada Day

Got up at 6 something to meet up with Darren and a few tri boys for an open water swim.
Swim for 30-40 min. My left shoulder was tight.
Went home, ride for 40 min. Just holding a HIM pace. Because of the holiday, the road has no cars....nice!
Then ran down the street (400m) to grab a newspaper.

Now eating breakfast....scramble eggs plus cheese with ham and grounded pepper...very good...

comatose..need to get up and enjoy the holidays...

Tapering is going ok. Quads are stiffer than expected. Good to see Darren again. Three more days till I will be rocking Half Ironman at Peterborough...

One foot in, one foot out


This picture was taken at Guelph Olympic Tri last Sun. This is Cliff's patented speedy riding position. One foot in and one foot out. The wind was blowing from the left side and the foot on top of the shoe improves efficiency by 5%.

Note: This post maybe fictitious. Reader's aware.

I will stop when I stop having fun

Yesterday, I did a 1 hr 50 min run. 15 min warm up, 30 min Half Ironman Race pace (5 min/k), 6 min EZ, 30 min HIM race pace again and 20 min cool down. This is my last hard run session and taper is rolling in.

The reality is that the EZ and the cool down pace was almost as fast as my Half Ironman race pace. My legs were feeling it. It was tough but it felt good.

I went for a bike ride with a friend after. She asked me, "when are you going to stop?"

I thought about it and I said, "I will stop when I stop having fun."

I latter thought about the kids who are recovering in the transplant clinics and those who had cancer.

Even though taper is setting in, there is still a bit of time to train. Chuckie V did a post on taper to first drop the run, then the bike and slowly the swim. The rationale is that the run is the most stressful on the body and so it is better to taper for that earlier. Then the bike and since the swim is the least stress activity, you should drop it last.

Especially for me, my swim fitness is not there yet. So I am going to swim longer (2 k) and do a few intervals (200,400s) before I race.

Guelph Olympic Triathlon Post Report



In the video forgot to mention:

- right before the race, my right contact came off and was attach to my goggles. Oh well. I race pretty much without it (not a big difference b/c my left eye is the seeing eye)
- read on Chuckie V's blog that one pro consider a race day as another training day. And that's what I did. Hard when the ego wanna push on the run.
- swim a 2:30 min/100 m <- need to work on! I wish they had another lap of swim. I was so gung-ho in the second lap I was actually passing people :D
- need more practice on the transition :) this is free speed. Will focus more on this during taper.

Total time: 2:46 Age group Placement: 17/22 <- not good for ego, but my A race is Peterborough
Swim: 37 min
Bike: 1 hr 16 min
Run: 49 min

Side note: My cat is doing much better. The vet suspect he ate some lily. Lily is poisonous for cats.

Update

- Guelph Olympic Tri this Sun. My first tri for the season.
- I have 8 days before I taper for Half Ironman Peterborough (July 5th). This week packing a lot of double sessions and a few nice hard sessions :) (hill repeats, miles repeat etc.)
- I feel stronger on the bike. However, looks can be deceiving. Will see whether those big gear grinding sessions are paying off.
- My cat was sick yesterday. He stopped eating and drinking. Will bring him to the vet today after work.
- I finalize all my payments to the Australia Transplant Games in Aug. Will now figure out how to bring bike over and where to go in New Zealand.
- Got a lot of friends getting into running and triathlon (Anners).

- for now...train, train, train, eat and rest.

Recycle Me program...

I think this is super cool:

http://www.recycleme.org/

You know you have a friend when...

Right now is 8 pm and I am tired. This week was my rest week and I took it easy. Mainly work is a bit busy. On Tues, I managed to do a set of miles repeat. My normal time was 7:30 and I was hitting 7:03, 6:51 and 7:01. WOW. I guessed that's how fast I can run when I am well rested.

I usually go and hang out with my Christian friends on Thurs. A friend usually texted me when she needed a ride. This is how the conversation went:

She: Cliff, can you give me a ride tonight?
Me: Sure, I can come get you after I ride my bike.
She: Don't worry about it. I asked Sam to give me a lift. You go ride your bike.

You know you have a friend when she realizes how important it was to go ride your steed.

I have two more weeks to build before Half Ironman Peterborough on July 5th. One week will be bike focus and the next will be run focus.

Oh yeah, I booked my tickets and prepared the bank draft for the Transplant Games in Australia. I will be participating 5 km run, 5 km bike Time Trial and 20 km bike race. I am also planning to take 10 days to fly to New Zealand and ride around. I am still figuring out the latter part. I also have to figure out is to get a bike box and learn how to dis-assemble and assemble my bike.

Tired

Today I did a long run of only 16 k (10 miles) before I called it off. My legs were sore and I was done for.

I did some math tonight and realized yesterday I rode 120 km (75 miles), did a few hill repeats on the escarpment (brutal) and ran 10 min afterwards (just keeping moving).

I ended the day by lying on the living room half dead. Hehe. I roder harder and longer than expected.

Good times :)

To all you blackberry and iPhone users...

It's funny because it's true :)