Big Jo Update

Well there has been not a whole heap of training but some ups and some terrible lows since my last blog.
Swimming is the same, riding is getting colder and requiring way too many clothes so not much of it has been happening and running has been going well.
The rest of the last 6 weeks can be shown in pictures...

The PC's discovered water from the tap

I discovered the perfect post training food - coke and ice cream

My ferry broke down with me on it and I had to get a ride in a rubber ducky

We had a wild party and someone left a spoon on the lawn

I became an All World Athlete. Whatever that means.

I have been running home every Wednesday.  Now it is dark when I get to this point

I made ANZAC biscuits and they were delicious

I ate a giant sausage.  And brocolli/cauliflower/carrot mash in case anyone is wondering (not cat sick)

I run with a pink fannypack

I got some stylish new MINI kit

We lost a very dear friend :(

We made a new friend

Who has very sharp claws

I got new shoes

New PC discovers water from the tap

PC's work in tandem to steal bread

Cat bench on a Sunday afternoon

Auckland Half Ironman Race Report

Auckland Half Ironman was a relatively successful outing in the World of Jo, my main goal was to be happy and achieve Triathlon Zen and I am pretty sure I did that.

I find it very weird doing a big race (I call a big race a Half or full Ironman) at home.  The night before the race I was vacuuming and cleaning up kitty litter - I can't imagine doing Ironman and going to work the day before, emptying the dishwasher in the morning, etc.  So the night before I tried to remember I was racing the next day and managed to get all my stuff together without forgetting anything.

Saturday was a lovely day - nice blue skies and no wind.  Race start was a leisurely 8.30am which got dragged out to about 8.40am due to the usual Matt Tuck tardiness.  The sea was nice and flat and I had a few people to swim with at times, I came out of the water after the first lap and didn't really feel like I had swum 1km already.  Running out of T1 after a lengthy transition putting on my uber aero bike top, my helmet, my shoes etc and then trotting the 50m or so out to the timing mat and my official swim/T1 time was 30mins16.... Hmmmmm maybe a few hundred metres short?! The first team swimmer did the swim + T1 in under 20mins, so around 19 minutes for 2km - world record pace?! The organisers assured us afterwards that it was GPS measured - maybe need to get their GPS machine calibrated! Sadly they didn't use they same GPS for the bike and run as these were both spot on.

All aeroed up

The bike was pretty good albeit rather sloth-like on the descents, more like a terrified sloth as I seem to have lost my nerve for anything not in a straight line.  I pity the fool who gets stuck behind me on a downhill.
I had hoped to bike a bit faster but I was happy in my biking so I can't ask for much more considering I hadn't really been taking bike training too seriously recently.  I had a few boyfriends on the bike course who obviously liked the look of my arse and I only knew they were there when I looked behind me but none of them seemed to last long.

Uber aero

Nice day for a bike ride

Davo riding like a crab

The run was pretty good, I trotted along passing a few people and getting lapped by Amelia Watkinson who won the women's and came 4th overall in a smoking record time.  I managed to catch a girl in front of me who I had given an odd nickname (as the voices in my head tend to do) which perked me up and put me up into 6th place. The run was 3 laps and the first two were one second different and the last was about a minute slower so I thought my pacing was pretty good.
Leggies weren't too sore but feet were a bit ouchie with a hotspot/blister on the ball of my foot.
Team SpeedTheory did well coming 2nd in the teams but the outcome might have been a bit more interesting if Captain Pudding hadn't have got a puncture which cost them a few minutes.
Nonetheless we all went home winners with me wining an Orca wetsuit and Jared Razzle taking home some styley sunglasses.

Actually looking biomechanically correct for once

About to catch my new nemesis

What Triathlon Zen looks like

Thanks to Scottie T for the awesome photos, I will stop being a tight arse and will buy some soon.

I have had quite an enthusiasm for running since the race and am planning my running timetable to try and up things without hurting myself.  My awesome new yellow running singlet helps with my enthusiasm and my pretty new shoes I will be buying soon.

PC news

No actual news just some cute pictures

Maybe not a PC but a nice sunrise

Family photo minus one

Look at that little face

Kitty in the wild

Back in Business

I bet you didn't expect to hear from me so soon did you.
Well I have managed to string together some decent weeks of training so thought I would report back.

SWIMMING

I have surrendered to the beeping in my swimcap (my tempo timer) and have dropped down a lane to see if keeping my strokes low actually makes me go faster, so far I am not convinced.  I feel too comfortable in that lane and feel like I will be faster if I have people to chase - kind of like sitting in a bunch of cyclists your own ability versus riding with better riders and trying to hang on.  But coach Haydn keeps going on and on at me about stroke counts so thought I would make a concerted effort.  We will see...

BIKING

I did my own little Auckland Half Ironman course reccie last weekend and it is as nasty as I remember.  My number one goal for the race is to finish the bike not feeling like I want to hang myself, if I can get through feeling happy that's the main thing.  I might need to revisit "The Triathlete's Guide to Mental Training" before the weekend.  It took me 3hrs15 to bike 90km mostly at what I considered to be half Ironman power so maybe I am not quite as fit as I want to be...
I had a funny little moment during my reccie ride where I was obviously a bit tired and perhaps under nourished (note to self: carry more than one bottle and one bar on race day) and I somehow managed to ride off the road and into some gravel.  I realized I was in trouble once I discovered I was off the road so I tried to slow down before the big pit of gravel in front of me, I had almost made it and had one foot unclipped (or decleated as Kezzle would say) when the gravel gave me the death wobbles and I ended up in the ditch still attached to my bike.  I didn't have far to fall and didn't hurt myself or my bike luckily but I think it highlighted the importance of paying attention even on a seemingly straight piece of road.  It was a shame I didn't have anyone to share it with because I did feel a bit silly extracting myself from my bike all alone on the ground.

I do heart bikes even when my bike throws me into the ditch

RUNNIES

I did something very exciting last week - I ran home from work.  6km from work to the ferry, a 15 minute ferry ride then 10km home - 16km run on a Monday, unheard of! I wasn't sure how the leggies would be after sitting around on the ferry but they seemed to be all good.  So now I am finding a way to make this part of regular training.  It is doable just take s a bit of uber organising which I am uber good at anyway.
Running finally seems to be feeling a bit better like I have got a bit of fitness so hopefully I won't be suffering too much next weekend.

I run through the sea

PC's making it hard to get up from my nap to run

PC'S

In PC news they are growing bigger by the day and we have introduced them to the catdoor with mixed success.  No-one has peed on the bed (our bed) in about a month now so we are doing well.

Spooning kitties

Meatloafing kitties

Whoopsies half of January and all of February...

Life at Fort Torrington got a bit more exciting at the end of January with the arrival of two baby pussy cats in attempt to fill the void which my dear friend Murfy left behind.  I'll blame these two for my serious lacking of blogging over this time...

Baby kitties

Perving kitties

The two little kitty cats (Duff - nothing to do with my obsession with The Simpsons game... and Sigi - after the town we spent six weeks in Germany in) are very cute but make leaving for training in the morning a bit difficult as they are always keen to get outside which makes getting bikes outside and leaving on time a bit hard without people escaping.  But it does make coming come at the end of the day a bit more exciting when two little faces are waiting at the door for you.

Let us out

We certainly haven't bonded yet like the bond I had with Murfy but I am sure that will come.

In triathlon related news I have officially entered Auckland Half Ironman so am trying to train seriously for it. I have even shown my face at the O'Hagan's twice with a couple of rather embarrassing results but on the up side I can only improve and I took 20seconds off my time on my second run so if I keep that up I'll be in the low 18's in no time...;) Running at Stroke and Stride is starting to feel a bit better and I even cracked the top 15 for the second time this season last week, nothing to do with the fact that all the young fast girls were at the ITU race in Australia of course.  But despite being slow I am uninjured which is all I ever want so I will take it.  We had a delicious run along the Huka Falls track in Taupo in the weekend while we were spectating IMNZ and the Bowden's took it easy on me on the downhills so I was able to keep up the whole way.  I rolled my ankle a couple of weeks ago running downstairs offroad so I am extra super paranoid (rather than just my usual super paranoid) when running downhill at the moment.

We attempted to do the Rangitoto Swim a couple of weeks back which is a 4.6km swim from Rangitoto to St Heliers across the channel.  I wouldn't normally do a 4.6km swim but this one is a bit more interesting and a whole heap of people we knew had signed up which would make it a bit more fun.  Sadly they decided to use the alternative course because the wind forecast was a bit too strong and they were worried about people's safety, pffft...

Obviously not the day of the Rangitoto swim

So we did a 3.2km (hopefully it was longer than this otherwise we are all very slow) loop course around the inner harbour - boring.    But at least we got something for our money because in other years they have cancelled due to bad weather and not offered an alternative.  I somehow managed to win my age group so I think the rest of the AG must have been filled up with cripples.  I have become a bit of a cripple since the race after a nasty timing chip strap tore up my ankle.

Ouch

Our trip down to Taupo for Ironman New Zealand was very exciting - IMNZ weekend is my favourite weekend of the year.  We were mostly down there to watch our friend Nick but also knew heaps of other people doing it as well.  Nick had a good race despite becoming a first time Dad in December and there were some other notable performances which have riled me up to get fit and get fast. IMNZ 2015 look out!

Go Nick

Kitties meet your toilet

Sigi pretending to be Miley

Surprise!

Pussy in the wild

Oh and we saw Bruce! Lucky I had a midget in front of me

Half of December and half of January

Well despite my hopes that my amazing smartphone/laptop/tablet trifecta would update my blog for me I have now realized that is not going to happen so I am back.
When we last spoke I had just done Taupo Half Ironman.  After that I did a little bit of pootling around on my bike and some jogging.  Swim squad ended the week after Taupo and I left the Teps for the year in shame after attempting to participate in a squad "fun" relay in my bikini (last squad for the season is always bikinis and boardies) and completely exposed myself when I dived (?dove) in and my top ended up almost around my waist and someone had to tell me as I was standing at the end of the pool after my length.
Swimming over Christmas was a bit of a non-event with all of our swimming buddies away and no motivation for us to swim by ourselves (more like Jared doesn't want to swim just with me because I'm too slow, fair enough really) so coming back to swimming after the two week break was a bit rough.  Not sure what is going on but I suspect I am just slow and unfit and have been dropping down a lane a bit in the last week because I'm sick of being slow in the lane.  I'm not even the slowest in the lane but it gets very frustrating when you are getting dropped (and sometimes lapped) in the easy stuff.
The worst thing about riding over Christmas was that our stalwart riding partner Uncle Roy was out with his fractured clavicle and ribs, and Kezzle-Anne was in Hawaii so we were stuck with the softie group if we wanted company.  We dared to suggest a course change one morning since they did the same route every morning and oh my goodness the commotion that caused!
I pulled out a 4 hour ride yesterday keeping Nick company with his Ironman training.  He was a bit concerned there was going to be a tadpole sized explosion at some point since my longest ride for the last month had only been about 2.5 hours but I actually fared pretty well.  Didn't even have to crack into my in case of emergency Snickers bar.

I found a panorama setting on my cameraphone

Drive through cafe

I've been a bit Strava happy recently and have decided to put all my rides on there for at least the month of January but maybe it will be a bit more interesting when I am actually training properly.
Running has been a bit unremarkable but unremarkable means no injuries which is good news.  I see there is a new ASICS DS Trainer out which looks rather delicious so maybe I need to step up the mileage so that my current ones wear out a bit quicker.
I feel too weird to put my runs on Strava - seems a bit personal for my liking.  Maybe when I am running a bit quicker...

We had a fun morning spectating the Auckland 70.3 this morning and got to see all the big stars.  I had a little bit of FOMO but was feeling a bit icky with the start of a cold so wasn't too sad not to be doing it.  I had a bit of an awkward moment when I tried to get a high five from Frodo on his way in to take the win with about 2.5 km to go but he denied me - SHAME! He did acknowledge me so maybe he is just a germaphobe.  It is the only time I have ever tried to high five an athlete and I think I may have been scarred for life.

Sad news in the Jo-Rad household this week with our dear friend and pussy cat Murfy passing away after a short (or maybe a long but silent) illness.  She was 15.5 so had a good life and was her usual spritely self until about 3 days before she died so didn't suffer for long.  We were very sad to see her go and are missing her very much.
RIP Murfy Razzle Cat.

BPC surveying her kingdom

Enjoy pussy cat heaven Murfy

Crossing the fjord in the mighty Honda. Summer in NZ...

It bakes focaccia bread