Blame it on the rain

Family Time!

"Blame it on the rain yay ee yayuh"  Total theme song of this blog post (If you don't know what song I'm referring to you better brush up on you're 80's music/scandals) Hey, I wish I could blame it on the rain, but it just wasn't my day out there...

I'm finally back to Salt lake and settled in after a much needed vacation and time spent with family. After doing Ironman Arizona November 15th I flew directly to Boston the day after the race for a ten day vacation of eating, drinking, sleeping and the occasional trip to the gym, which was a nice change of pace from the usual training schedule of swim, bike, run. 

As I sit here there is a good amount to say as I spent the last week and a half reflecting on not just Ironman AZ but my season as a whole. You actually couldn't imagine how much of my time this actually takes up... A lot. You see I am very passionate about this triathlon thing and only have a short window to do this. I take it seriously and I want to do well. Which is why I will do what it takes to improve for next season and do what I know I am capable of. This may mean stepping out of my comfort zone more than I already think that I do. I'm ready for that. Bring it:)

Venue

So onto the race. This was the first Ironman that I've done solo. Meaning I had no Jake aka Sherpa. To be honest, the thing I was most nervous about was parking on race day and not loosing my keys. I did know some other people who were doing the race and Tom Fletcher my awesome ART chiropractor was there so that made it a bit better. It is nice to see some familiar 

faces. There is a ton to do the days leading up to the race so that actually kept me super occupied, and without an awesome Sherpa there is even more to do. Shout out to all of the support aka friends and family that come to these events, it's a lot of work. I mean a couple days before Jake is basically stuck with a nervous, paranoid, robot, who is incessantly checking the weather, water temperature and refuses to eat at a restaurant because there might be a chance of getting food poisoning. Ha! 

As soon as I arrived in Phoenix I grabbed the rental car and headed straight to my home stay at

Angie's :) Angie is so cool and is just one of those people that loves to give back to the

community.  After all she did agree to housing this paranoid robot so she's awesome. Her place

was so cozy as I was greeted by her and her sweet dog Bailey:) As soon as I entered Angie's house, I was in super robot mode already unloading my stuff and heading to the venue to get my bike and check in, which ended up not being stressful at all.  Wesley with Pro Bike Express, was all ready with my bike and gear bags set for pick up. His service is amazing! 

 The next couple days were spent, food shopping, attending the pro meeting, getting last minute workouts in and some visits to Tom Fletcher. The weather was freakin gorgeous both days prior to the race but I noticed that the on race day the temperature kept creeping down, which had me a bit concerned considering the water temp was about 63 and cold is not my specialty. It's amazing how if I keep checking the weather incessantly I somehow think I can will it to change
just by checking every hr ! I came up with a transition game plan for the day of the race with help from Steve another pro athlete staying at Angie's who was there to spectate. Arm warmers
and aero jersey in transition became the game plan.  I hate having to add a lot of clothing but it seemed like it was going to end up being necessary. 

  Race morning was pretty calm for me. I got to and parked at the venue just fine, made sure the keys were secure and took note of where I parked so I would forget in my tired haze after the race. The pro men started at 6:40 and we were off at 6:45. As soon as I jumped in I took off fast for the warm up in an effort to keep my body temp up so I wouldn't freeze. The gun went off and it was go time. I tried to stay with the kicking feet off the front but they soon pulled far ahead and I could just see them in the distance.  I was with a couple other girls most of the way to the turn around. I actually really like this swim course it's pretty straight forward and visibility was solid so no problems there. I began to feel super cold after the turn around as the initial get out fast adrenaline started to wear off. My body just felt tight and rigid from the cold
but I kept it rolling . Towards the end a couple of pro girls passed me. Not an awesome
confidence builder as you are exiting the water but whatever. As I ran to transition, it was about
55 and there was no sun out. I tried to race through transition but trying to zip my jersey was ridiculous because my fingers were all numb and of course putting on arm warmers was not a breeze either. I finished pulling up the second one on my way running out to my bike. 

I got rolling on the bike and immediately new I wasn't feeling like a rockstar. My hip and lower back on the left side had this sharp pain and it was just aggravating. I've had my hip flexor be tight coming out of the water before and it has gone away as the race went on but this didn't. As I made it up to the top of the first loop I wasn't feeling great but I knew it would be a fast way back because it's slightly downhill riding back into town and it was...that provided some relief from the back aggravation at least and I was starting to feel a little warmed up .So much that at
the top of the second loop I decided to ditch my arm warmers at the aid station. Big mistake, because shortly after that it began raining. As soon as the first drops hit I thought, I'm screwed.

Tough day at the office!

I just ditched my arm warmers, we were maxing out at about 60 degrees, there's no sun and I am wearing shorts and jersey. Awesome. It wasn't just a drizzle either it was full on raining . This was especially not ideal considering it is a very congested course being 3 loops... so a bit hectic out there. I basically spent the rest of the time on the bike debating whether or not I should take my sunglasses off and sort of see or keep them on and sort of see. I chose to keep them on and sort of see. As I began to feel chillier, the more I wanted to quit. But I just kept telling myself keeeeeep pedaling, it will be colder if you get off this bike. Just get there. For a minute I thought it was about to clear up and give us some relief. But that lasted for a short time and it was back to full on rain as I neared the end of the bike. All I could think was, man I have 

to run freezing too? Do I have anything in my run bag I could put on? Nope. Special needs Nope didn't do special needs. Crap! I will be freezing on this run! My BAD.

As I pulled into T2 I felt really weird. Like not right in the head... And my body definitely

didn't feel right, like as in I couldn't feel it. I dismounted and began running and could not feel my feet. Tom Fletcher asked if I was alright and gave me some encouragement, after which I think I mumbled back, I'm not doing awesome dude..

I was sooo excited to get into the change tent, like soooo excited because I was in for about 2 minutes of relief from the rain and cold and I'd been looking forward to it for miles.

What I felt like heading into T2!

The volunteers were so sweet and I think they thought I was a bit crazy cause I just kept saying, I'm just so cold I don't know what's going on. They got me a towel to wipe my feet and I threw my visor on and they suggested sitting by a heater that was in the tent, but I was like nah I gotta go. As I headed out it was a mess of dirt, rain, mud and more rain and there was Tom with some surgical gloves like" will these help ? It's the only thing I could find"! Tom you rock. I tried to put the gloves on but in my cold stooper I couldn't figure it out.  I couldn't feel anything and tried not to even look at my pace until I warmed up some. The good thing was that I felt like I could take in some of my calories because it wasn't hot out. I began sipping on my flask and the legs started to come around. The first about 15 miles I felt just fine. I was
singing in my head a play off the rap song, "I got 99 problems but water ain't one", as a little
mantra to keep going. Everything was going ok when I decided to hit up the Porto potty.. Bad decision. I should have never stopped, because all it did was send my body into tailspin. As soon as I began running again, my back and legs began cramping up, and the nausea monster came for a visit.. Well there goes the fueling I thought. Then next five miles were pretty bad, my upper back began cramping up too and I just couldn't really breath right. Every breath was like short and labored, but I kept running and pushing through. I saw my buddy Craig who was racing. He ran next to me for the next 5 miles which helped me so much ! Thank you Craig!  This was probably the worst I'd ever felt coming into the finish of an Ironman. Like even the last mile where adrenaline takes over and there is no pain, there was pain. I was so happy to have crossed that line ! 

     Thank you for all of those who have helped To make my dream of racing professional
become and continue to be a reality. To my sponsors with Team Wattie Ink, OFS, The Healing Willow, Tom Fletcher, Elete and Citywide Home Loans for all of the support. Coach Aaron thank you for all of you're hard work making sure I am ready to toe the line. Jake for dealing with a crazy triathlete and my family and friends for picking up the pieces when I fall apart and pushing me to get back out there and not give up:)

On to 2016! Stay tuned for training updates and races I have planned as well as who I'll be representing this upcoming season!!