It's A Short, Yet Powerful Video

Some of the testimonials relate to running, triathlon, etc. It's only 8 minutes.

RACE SCHEDULE ANNOUNCED

I know, I know, you've been wondering waiting, biting your nails, sitting on the edge of your seat in anticipation of the races I plan on conquering (ok, participating in) in 2010. Well, now the three of you can rest at easy (that's the 3 people that know this blog exists), because here it is:

Falls Duathlon, May 1
Oakdale Du (team with Jace?), May 15
Tri Rochester TT's, May 6, 13, 20, 27
Med City 1/2 Marathon, May 30,
Trinona (oly distance), June 13
Rochesterfest Tri (volunteering), June 20
Awesome Blossom 5 mile Run, July 4
Byron Good Neighbor Run (with Jace), July 17
Chisago 1/2 Iron, July 25
Festival Run 10k (with Jace), Aug 7
RASC TT's, Aug 3, 10, 24
Treadman Du, Sept 4
Cannon-Wells Du, Sept 25
Mankato Marathon, Oct 23

Those are the potential races. Not all will be raced. When planning a season its a good idea to put every possible event on there that interests you that way as the season approaches you can narrow it down.

Some of the above will be done with Jace and/or my wife Carin, but all will be for fun and training. I am going to train at the bare minimum in 2010 just as I did in 2009--which is 5 hours on an R&R week, 6-9 during the majority of weeks, and 10-11 on a high volume week. If done right, you could be competitive within your age group in sprint distance events on that amount of training. However, with the longer events I have on there and the hours I'll be training, being competitive is no longer a goa. I am ultimately training for the mother of all tri's (in terms of distance) in 2011. You know...

Just Click It Already

Click here

Martinize Your Bike

Yesterday I was planning to wash up the bikes and store them thru the winter. I did a thorough job on the cross bike, but only got partially thru another. Martinizing--that's a type of dry-cleaning, right...? Well, that's the best way I know of to clean a bike--no water, except for a wet rag to wipe it down after you scrap the mud off. The muddier the bike, they better cleaning it without water works. You just brush/scrape the mud and dirt off with non-abrasive brushes--toothbrush, scrub brush, pretty much anything plastic ... Here's some before and after shots...

The little strips of cloth are what I call 'gear floss'. Old towels, t-shirts, anything you can tear into strips works. Then after you run the chain thru a chain cleaner, you take the 'floss' and run it between the cogs (rear gears/cassette) as you do floss between your teeth. Works great.

The Favor polish is a cheap-ass Pledge knock off. After the bike is clean, and you have the wheels off, spray the frame and fork with the polish. Hold a rag/cloth over the gears, brakes pads and anything you wouldn't wants waxy polish to get on. Let the polish sit for only a couple minutes then wipe it off with a clean cotton cloth. The polish gives a nice shine to any parts of the bike that are painted and/or clear coated--it also makes mud or other grime wipe off easier later on.

BEST (cycling) PRANK EVER!

This is the best prank! Unsuspecting cyclists apparently just won a huge race... I first saw this at the Rochester Flyers website (www.rochesterflyers.com), but had to post it on mine. The more people that see this the better.

BLACK FRIDAY RIDE

Nope, not outside...inside.

Friday, Nov 27, we changed the regular 5:30am Cycle Class at the RAC from 45 minutes to a 75 minutes.

Here's a link to the November Cycling Schedule: CLICK THIS

See you there! (if you're a member :)

Who says you have to eat meat to be a successful athlete?

Back in April of 2008, after watching a couple DVD's/documentaries, and reading a couple books to further educate myself about diet, sports nutrition, and the real history of what humans ate as we evolved (dietetically) I decided to go mostly vegan. By mostly, I mean I am not going to turn down a chocolate chip cookie if it was made with butter, instead of vegan margarine. Also, many people hear 'vegan' and think non leather wearing-twig eating-tree hugging-anti hunting-weirdo, etc, etc. Its not like that. The word vegan is the same as saying 'strict vegetarian', but when you say vegetarian, people think you don't eat meat, but think you still cheese/dairy. The common question someone asks when they hear you don't eat meat or dairy are: "How do you get your protein?" Followed by a close second is: "How do you get your calcium?" Truthfully, the thoughts we have about sources of protein and calcium are not based on nutrional facts, but based mainly on marketing by meat and dairy producers, but that's a whole different conversation.

Anyway, I found an article that highlights a handful of athletes, from various sports, that are vegan or mostly vegan. Before you read the article thinking that these are going to be obscure nobody's, here are the athltetes who's stories are in the article:

• Scott Jurek, Ultra-marathon runner
• Tony Gonzalez, NFL All-Pro, and Pro-Bowl selection 10 times
• Prince Fielder, MLB, 2009 Home Run Derby Winner
• Mac Danzig, Mixed Martial Arts Fighter
• Pat Neshek, MLB pitcher, Minnesota Twins

In the article, you'll see that a vegan diet doesn't make you bullet proof nor does it make you perform better, necessarily, but from a common-guy standpoint, I can attest to the common claims touted by others that you recover faster from workouts, you suffer less lactic acid build up (as certain dairy products contribute to that), you feel better overall, have more energy and are quicker to 'wake up' in the morning. And I can bunny-hop a bus with my road bike. Ok, that last one is not true. Click below for the article--its a good read:

Who says you have to eat meat to be a successful athlete?

NOTE: not mentioned is Dave Scott, 6 time Ironman World Champion--he won all his titles on a plant based vegan diet. He has since added some meats to his diet (mainly of the fishy kinds).

IT'S ALL ABOUT "PERFORMANCE"

To Race or Not to Race?

I've figured out that I probably strained something in my hip while riding the CX bike and/or dismounting for run ups--since was two weeks ago was the first time I did any CX riding in 3 years. I didn't notice the pain till the next day after I did a 30-45 minute run. What's weird is that since then, what most likely hurt it, doesn't hurt it. I can run, go up steps, do things that you think would aggravate, it like do squats or step ups, but nothing bothers it. The higher my knee goes, the less its hurts. Walking...that was what has been bothering it. Maybe I should just run or bike everywhere :) I did some searching and finally found an article that sounds exactly like what I got goin' on.

So far, to try and remedy the problem I've just been training less and its been getting better. That only makes sense, right? I decided to not do any running, biking, or any strenuous exercise that involves my legs for a few days--that would be Sunday, today, and tomorrow--to see if I can get rid of it. However, I don't want it to go away solely because of inactivity, then have it come back once I start up again. I am going to start doing the exercises in the above linked article and see what happens. I have randomly been icing and taking NSAID's, but have now started doing both around the clock. We'll see how all of it works together. With that said, the answer to the post title is: TO RACE (unless the hip gets worse). The race this Sunday is in Northfield, but I'll only do it if they let me in the 'B' race. I don't feel like racing for 30 minutes in the C race. I might only last 30 minutes in the B race, but I want to enter it as its a 45 minuter. I emailed the guy that will most likely be the USCF official about doing the B race without a license, but he hasn't replied.

Invisible Shield & Suunto T3c

First of all, I am not getting any kickback from reviewing this thing... I am talking about the protective skin I put on my Suunto T3c Heart Rate Monitor. But seriously, if I had known these things existed a few years ago, I wouldn't have 3 HRM's with scratches and gouges all over the glass/screens. If you have a cell phone, iPhone, Blackberry, iPod, GameBoy or other handheld gadget, you gotta check these out. Anyway, see below and you'll know what I am talking about.

So...I got the new heart rate monitor (HRM) a about a week ago. You know the cheap little film that comes over the face of a watch or a phone...? Well, that peeled off after a couple of hours of playing around with the functions. Since I have scratches on the other HRMs and watches and cellphone, etc, I decided not to wear the HRM until I did something to protect it. The down side of the the T3c is that the face glass is not subset at all so if you were to drop it, its most likely going to get scratched. I read a review on some site that warned of this problem with this particular model, but they recommended getting an Zagg Invisible Shield. I found an online company called Invisible Skinz and ordered a skin for the HRM. The shield or skin sounds simple--I thought it was just a piece of clear flexible plastic that you stick on the glass surface, right? That's what I thought, but it turns out to be more than that (its actually a military level protective shield--check out their site). I ordered it Saturday, got a reply right away (same day) then on Monday they shipped it out. I was expecting it to just come in an envelop since the face of my HRM is about as big as a 50 cent piece, but it came in some pretty top-shelf packaging... Check it out: The tri-fold box on the right was folded up and inside the sleeve (left). In it were the following (below):

The little pack with the bar code had the skin in it, the tube (top) is a spray of some kind and the little black thing is a squeegie. A squeegie. A squeegie. One more time, squeegie. Cool word. Anyway, I cleaned the face of the watch, carefully peeled the skin from the backing, careful not to touch the adhesive side too much (I pinched the edge with my fingernail tips), gave each side a light misting of the top-secret spray as directed, then applied the skin to the watch. I then squeegied it until there were no bubbles. Here's some before and after pix:

Can't tell the diff--neither can I.

How much was the Invisible Skin for the Suunto? $9.95. Plus, I had a discount code of the net which gave me a $1.99 discount (which offset the shipping). Total was $9.93. You could think that is a lot, but if you have a $300 Garmin or even a $50-100 Polar or Suunto HRM, or a crazy expensive handheld, what is a scratch worth to you? Their stuff ranges in price, but they have skins cut specifically for 100's if not thousands of gadgets. You can even get large skins for lap top screens. ALSO, I got a 20% off discount code included so next we are going to order one for Jace's Nintendo DS. Here's their site again: https://www.invisibleskinz.com/

Ok, I gotta get to bed--instructing cycling at 5:30am!