January

It seems that I have fallen off the blogasphere. Going on a bit of a hiatus.

We are renovating the house. Everything is moved down to the basement. Tonight, I bought my bike up for a quick 2 hr ride.

I went snowshoeing last Sat. It was nice. As much as I want to go more, there isn't that much snow here. This year had been unreasonably warm.

Running wise my left foot is getting sore. Not sure what's going on. Perhaps it is from the extra weight from the off-season (maybe I need a pair of new shoes).

Will update whenever I can :)

Old man.

Text messages

Friend: We ought to head to City Hall around 10 for a decent spot in the crowd + take in some music. Call me when you 're almost downtown :) You gonna stay around for some dessert after midnight?

Me: I wanna go home n sleep :p

Friend: Old man :)

-----

Been quiet on the blog end. Training is fairly steady given the holidays of friends and family visiting. Slept a lot.

Eying on a pair of snowshoes. Really in need of an adventure. Of all I look forward to, it is to be out in the woods.

Too bad I can't go to Australia and backpack again...(like I did in Sept).. or can I? :)

Hope everyone have a great new year. I am looking forward for the morning swim first day in 2010!

Hehe

Parking

Tonight I drove to the YMCA for a swim.

As I was waiting for a spot, a van pulled up from behind and about to take it. I instinctively flashed my high beam light to indicate that it was my spot. I was here first and it was mine. He had no right to take my spot.

The van stopped. For 10 sec, it did nothing.

Then it pulled around and looked for another spot.

At that moment, I saw there was another parking spot a further away. I thought about what was I doing? Why was I so focus on taking this spot? A spot was a 15 meter away and I could have taken that one easily.

As I walked over to Y, I recognized the driver from the van. I run up behind him and asked if he was driving the van that I flashed. He nodded. I immediately apologize for my rude behavior.

....

You shall love your neighbour as yourself.

....

In the locker, I realized I forgot my goggles. So I had drive back home and picked them up.

Cannot help but to laugh and see that God do have a sense of humor in light of my lesson on humility.

Yummy!

My meal after a 2 hr or so ride.

Still around.

Been quite on the blog front. I am still around. Been training again :). Well not really training..just running, riding and swimming around. On Sat, met up with Darren and rode for 2:45. Well i rode for 2:45 and he rode for 2:30 b/c he spent 15 min waiting for me :P. Good to be in the hills at Orangeville area. It was good to hang out with Darren again. He got a new rocket. The P3C! I am sure he will be rocking with it this coming season.

Tonight I did miles repeat in a really long time. Starting it easy. Or so I thought easy. 7:30, 7:24..then 7:3x...well sorta blow up half way. I was getting cramps. Last season, I was running them at 6:50, 7:00, 7:10. So you see, my fitness have dropped a bit. No need to get worry. I will start ramping it up and if it goes well, we should see some improvement in a few months. Despite the 'slowness' of the miles repeat. It feels good to be in good pain.

As for everything else, I have been helping out at Open Door. It is a drop in shelter located in Square One (one of the prominent mall in my city).

Every Mon night, we go and sort clothes. People give clothes and we sort them depend on gender and size. Once a month, Open Door give away to those in need. Tonight we moved the clothes from the storage to the store. It was lots of fun. Despite the hard times, people were very generous and we sorted so much clothes. I am pretty sure we will give them all out....

I just finish dinner and ready to pass out :)....

Repost: Surfs up

another great torch relay photo.

Post taken from Simon Whitfield's blog.

:) 2010 Winter Olympic is right around the corner...something to watch while I ride on my trainer.

The best part about running

Haven't update this blog for a while..I have been slowing getting back on training. Swimming 2 k, 2-3 times a week. Riding and running whenever. I just came back from a semi long run (17 km). It was easy down the trail and back. In the last 30 min, my stomach was growling and all I thought about was chocolate. Huge temptation to stop at McDonalds or the gas station for chocolate bar. I ended up going back home. Had two oranges, dark chocolate, yogurt, then some noodles and veges.

Hmm..best part about running clearly is the eating after.

Tour De France

I hope Lance Armstrong trains hard next year. Forget about Contador. Richard is going to own the mountains.

Transplant Games Pictures

I am back home for a week and slowly getting adjusted back to the chilly Canadian weather. Here's a few pictures from the Transplant Games.

This is Captain Canada and taken before my 5 km run race. He was standing about a km from the finish line and yelled at me, 'Cliff, hurry up. He is right behind you.' I was at the point of slowing down and because of him, I just gave it all I got in the last 800 m. Because of him, I was able to hold the second place by 1.4 seconds. I had a lead from him 8-10 seconds in the first km. He just reeled me at the end.

The Hungarian and me with our bling. He is a duathlon and he got first place in the bike TT and I got second. He had a kidney transplant.

We had to do four laps in the Bike Time Trial. A lady made me do an extra lap. Some people rode three laps. There were a lot of confusion. I was placed 9th. An aussie and a few Canadians spoke to the official on my behalf and they corrected the positions and I was placed second.

This is the Canadian Transplant Team. We were donned with our red jerseys. There were 50 countries participated in this game. Each of them have different style of uniforms.

I have a lot more to share from Australia. More to come :)