cingular adventure

i feel horrid. i am a bloated puffy monster. in the past 48 hours i’ve accrued about 15 extra pounds and increased a dress size. my tits ache and i hate EVERYONE.

running yesterday afternoon only made things worse. i plodded along at a 9:30min/mile pace, my internal organs gurgling and slopping with every step. i honestly thought my uterus was going to jolt right out of me, dropping in the trail with a squishy red *glurp*.

i whacked my funny bone in the shower (not so funny) and was 15min down the road before i realised the parking brake was still on. entered the cingular store with a chip the size of texas on my shoulder. behind the counter is a pinch-faced man with harry potter glasses.

- can i help you.
- well, see my cellphone, which i got less than a year ago so it’s still under warranty, well the hinge broke and it flips open kinda jiggly so i was wondering if i could get a replacement.
i hand over the phone for his inspection. harrypotterman fiddles with the hinge, which is predictably jiggly.
- yep, she’s broken. let me see if we’ve got this model in stock.
harry vanishes and i gnaw my cuticles for several minutes. the door opens and in march two women. they’re both outfitted with walkie-talkies, nightsticks and handguns; both wear shirts saying “parole enforcement officer.” why do i suddenly feel as though i’ve committed a felony?? but harry’s back. and he’s smirking at me.
- sorry. we don’t have these in stock right now. AND there’s water damage, so we can’t accept this phone.
- excuse me?
- water damage. see?
he’s slid off the back of the phone to reveal some telltale dot that confesses my sin of getting caught in the rain once while riding with my cellphone.
- but… that has nothing to do with the hinge.
- sorry. it’s water-damaged.
- it is NOT water-damaged. i can call people on it. people can call me. i can play SOLITAIRE on it. the only thing wrong with it is the broken hinge, which has NOTHING to do with water WHATSOEVER.
- sorry. it’s damaged. we can’t accept it.
i’ve just sat in 30min of rush-hour traffic for nothing. i sigh deeply and turn to the woman behind me.
- can you shoot this guy please??
she straightens, thrusting her shoulders back, hand on holster.
- ma’am, that is a terroristic threat.
motherfucker. is this what the world’s come to? harry’s stiff as a fucking board and helga and her dominatrix sidekick look like they’re ready to handcuff me. they do not know that i am suffering from probably THE worst PMS of my life, and even if they did they would not give a rat’s ass. it’s off to one of those secret CIA holding cells and then straight to guantanamo for me. my dog will grieve for years, wondering why no one takes him for R-U-Ns or plays goalie with him anymore. i had better tread carefully.
- i’m sorry. that was a joke.
- it was a terroristic threat, ma’am.
technically, it was a question not an imperative, and terroristic is one of those words like irregardless, used by people who haven't enough to do with their time besides add extra syllables to words that don't need them. then again, our Commander-in-Chief persists in saying "nucular" so why should our law enforcement officers be any more eloquent? we get what we deserve.
- i am sorry. i didn’t mean it that way. i think i’ll just take this – i pluck my now-perfectly-fine who needs a non-jiggly-hinge-anyway phone from harry’s palm and sidle toward the door – and call later to see when you’ve got it in stock. thank you for your time. have a super evening.

all the way home i check my rearview mirror for flashing lights.

this shit better pass before i get myself in real trouble.

query:

WHY is it that sometimes PMS ain no big thang, and other times i want to bite the heads off babies??

crits: love 'em or hate 'em

george carlin once defined a sport as something that involves a ball and a chance of goddam serious injury. bike racing, therefore, is not a sport but we can rally around it anyway because it does involve a chance of goddam serious injury.

2 weeks ago Downers Grove hosted crit nationals. the pre-race talk was all about the perennial sprinter favorites tina pic and laura van gilder. i was pumpin for LVG, not just because she's my friend but because she too is a crusty relic racing wee sprylings half her age. and for the last 4 years, tina's pipped laura on the line to win. i figured there was shit to dish.

it was the LVG and pic show going into the final corner before the finish. then laura was vectoring over her top tube, tina was going over the handlebars in front of jen mcrae, and a no-name ended up national champion because she was in the right place at the right time. LVG was 2nd. again.

to view some great action shots, start here and continue "next"ing.

serious goddam injury. i don't miss crits onebit. i hated them. crits are all about positioning yourself close enough to the front so you can cover breaks and not rubberband around every corner or get caught in the crashes that occur there; while at the same time you don't want to do any extra work at the front. but everyone else wants that perfect position 6 people back, so the whole race is a physical and mental fight to STAY IN ONE PLACE.

the people who are really good at this have certain characteristics. they typically

• have huge quads and shoulders and pointy, convincing elbows
• are great bike handlers
• either come from the track or believe bike racing is a contact sport
• have very large balls

at the lower providence crit eleventy-billion years ago, i watched the pro 1,2 men set up for the sprint. in the field was my at-the-time boyfriend -- a little guy with a powerful sprint -- and marty nothstein, a trackie from trexlertown with a closet full of national, world and olympic medals. going into the last corner, marty decided that dave's line was better than his own, so before my wondering eyes he delivered a powerful head butt to dave's left shoulder and forced him off his line. i don't remember if marty won, i just remember pissing myself and thanking god my race was done because my shrinking violet spirit had been crushed just watching that.

dave was undeterred though. that guy's such a dick. i know i could have taken him, he ranted. i had to hustle him home before he started a fight with cycling's version of mike tyson.

goddam serious injury.

sine metu

from yesterday's associated press:

ORLANDO, Florida - A missing runner was rescued from a Florida swamp after spending four days stuck in the muck with only the waist-deep swamp water to drink. His first request: some good, old-fashioned drinking water. more.

FUCK THAT. if i get stuck in a swamp with biting insects and stinky mud for even an HOUR there had better be jamesons in my near future post-rescue. and after four days, there better be goddam laphroaig.

that is the problem with old people. they do not exercise sound judgement.

water. feh.

but hurrah! good news to report. yesterday afternoon i went for my first run since worlds, over a month ago. sure it was raining and i had to run on the roads during rush hour because the trails were a soggy mess, but i ran almost 4 miles and it felt wonderful.

i didn't know just how cramped and curtailed my stride'd become since that first hamstring tear in june, but now that rudy's ironed out the muscle fibers so they're running smooth and straight, running is pleasurable again. not perfect -- piriformis is a bit crankly -- but certainly this morning is much brighter than yesterday's, bright enough to celebrate with my own pot of ass coffee and 2 handfuls of dark chocolate m&ms. b-fast of champs.

word to motherfucking SLJ

just be glad they were snakes, and not stingrays.

banksy trumps paris

if you haven't heard about banksy's latest prank -- his skewering parody of paris hilton's Paris CD -- here's more detail and here are some pix, courtesy of The Gossip Rag (where you can see the entire CD booklet):

the orig cover:
banksy's take:

insets:



the going price on ebay for one of banksy's Paris CDs is now $762.
meanwhile, the paris version is $2.35.

justice.

lance in paris

that bastion of gossip integrity, The New York Post, reports that lance armstrong's been consorting with paris hilton. now paris may be a vivacious young lady capable of scintillating repartee, but i can't help wondering what she and lance talk about. like, blow jobs, maybe? and, like, how they, like, put holes in your face?

"My mom told me that you get those holes in your face, craters... from giving blow jobs. "I totally believed her. She's like, 'It's from sucking.' I'm like, 'Ewwww!' "I told my boyfriend - he's like, 'Why don't you ever do that?' I'm like, 'Because my mom told me you get these craters.' And he's like, 'Paris, you're 19. You're allowed to do this.' "I've only done that (fellatio) with maybe three people in my life."

i didn't make this up, though i'm embarrassed to be able to reference it. the web is a terrible thing.

lance armstrong & paris hilton is just wrong. that's like ian thorpe & ... oh ... tommy lee. i'd dwell on this more if i hadn't just been struck by this:

upon further thought, i realise i have never seen these two men in the same place at the same time. and then i found this:

run with that, NY Post.

office cat, cont'd

there are mouse turds in the microwave.

the idea of Office Cat is still under discussion. now vlad the siberian dotnet dude wants, quote, a little pony.

i want a wildebeest.

Deadline

it's shit or get off the pot today for iran -- will it or won't it comply with the UN security council's demand it cease production of enriched uranium? if ahmadinejad and his mantrain refuse to comply, the planned response is military and/or economic sanctions. smashing. that worked so well before.

meanwhile, guess who's blogging now?! the great Satan-hater himself! ahmadinejad's blog was live for only a couple days before it got hacked by Y! Underground Group which you'd love to believe is a junky, subversive LA crew but is actually an irananian group arguing FOR iran's right to proliferate nucularly.

Nuclear Energy is Our Right claimed the Y. the body of the message continues in farsi. if yours is a little rusty, i've provided the translation below:

jenabe Ahmadi Nejad	Tell me, O muse,
ma ke nemitoonim shomaro molaghat konim	of that ingenious hero
vali az tarafe tamame hacker haye iran	who travelled far and wide
azinke az haghe melate iran dar barabare tamame	after he had sacked the famous town of Troy
keshvar haye jahan defa mikonid tashakor mikonim	meow
azinke ba hemato talashe khod abadi va abadani ra	Many cities did he visit,
baraye mahroom avardin jaye tashakor dare	and many were the nations
omid varim	he beat the crap out of
ta akharin nafas az Energy hasteyi ke hagh	goddam axis of evil
mosalame tamame mardome irane	more salami please
defa konid	meow

really, i think nothing good can come of UN sanctions and our moral blustering. the issue isn't nuclear proliferation -- or else cheney would clamor about india and pakistan -- it's the fact that iran's a hostile regime, and sanctions won't do a thing about that.

office cat

it's come to this:

From: der bossen
Sent: Tuesday, August 29, 2006 9:15 PM
To: der dung beetles
Subject: cat idea

All,

Besides for providing J info on the mice whereabouts (J - lobby on the way to D and S's office tonight) for the exterminators, someone threw out the idea of an office cat to deal with them temporarily.

If we can not build 100% consensus, we will not do this. You could object because you don't like cats, don't think it fits in professionally, don't like it because the cat can't be billable, or may be allergic to them, etc. But, it could be nice to have an office pet, and, since it might be quite amusing to see a Tom and Jerry show in here (no, not L and F), then I felt to throw out the idea presented to me.

Please let me know if you object.

der bossen

i, for one, think it's an excellent idea, quite amusing. we'll start by putting tape on its paws and i know lou is with me on this one.

here's some more info on cat abuse.

have prunes, will travel

travel, and the change in lifestyle it usually ushers in, wreaks havoc on a body. you get stressed & excited; you eat differently. these factors, combined with the global change in daily routine, totally fuck up my bowels. in a new place, i can go DAYS without shitting -- though not for lack of trying! -- and whatever i finally produce is guaranteed to severely stress my bunghole and clog the crapper.

i now travel with prunes, and a knife for cutting my shit into flushable chunks. last week i brought neither, believing that a trip to a beachhouse a mere 80miles away didn't qualify as bowel-challenging. mistake. the toilet there was total namby-pamb, one of those jobs where the water swirls gently and meanders down the poop tube with a politely muted gurgle. i had no recourse but to lift some flatware from our favorite diner and spend some quality time in the bowl. if the lord really loved me, he'd give me only industrial strength crappers.

my system's still getting back to normal. this morning my crap and i had a war, me trying to flush it away while it resisted valiantly, poking its playful nose back into the bowl just when i thought i'd delivered it to Holding Tank Heaven. stupid turd made me late for my master's swim, and it's still sitting there waiting for me.

back to reality

little mousie little mousie
you do not make me want to walk like a camel
but your death dismays me
especially since it happened right by my litterbox,
where i keep all my food
because you and your starving masses
eat my stuff and then poop it all over my desk.

my keyboard keys are probably dried-up urine pools.

remember that time you got in my litterbox
and ate my crisps and chocolate and kiwi fruit?
you finished my box of Nutty Flax
but i didn't know
because you left so much poop in the box
that i thought it was cereal until i shook it over my yogurt.
how you must have laffed and laffed!

o funny mouse!
stay away from my house or you'll end up in the warshing machine.

AWOL

to the beach for a week.

catch you peeps when i return. behave yourselves.

and this too shall pass.

just blue.

rudy says come 9/1 maybe i can ease back into running. i had pipe dreams about racing my team's du in sept, and cape henlopen in october, but my du & tri season effectively ended with rudy yesterday. what motivation now? even the road racing season will be tapering off by the time i'm back in shape.

just blue.

drudge report a bucket of bad news this morning: wife pleading for her cameraman husband's relase, hybrid mutant mauling dogs, jonbenet, floyd landis's father-in-law's suicide blah blah hit me with the blue hammer again.

googled "happy news" -- hooray! first result is HappyNews.com: Positive US and international news. take me to Happy News please! -click and.... no dice. Happy News a dead link. fitting.

just.

UPDATE
okay, this made me a laff a little: madonna's cameltoe MySpace.

another race report from corner brook

here's someone else's take on du worlds -- in this case, elizabeth fedofsky, who won the women's race. SHE is a true MF badass. you would never catch me self-psyching in a porta-john. in fact, my last pre-race trip to the pooper was notable because at the top of the dump-pile was a huge mound of pellets the size of my dog's kibble. it looked like a herd of deer had filed in and taken craps. what the hell do you eat the night before to generate that? certainly not a hurricane-sized margarita and vegetable stir-fry.

maybe i would have placed better if i'd spent more time visualising my race strategy instead of staring at a pile of shit. but then i'd be somebody else.

fur-spangled bedsheets

my 3 cats are unfriendly, dumb and completely ineffectual as far as vermin-catching goes. so there are mousetraps, the old-fashioned neck-breakers, scattered throughout the house.

sometime last week, the trap under the kitchen sink nailed a mouse... but by the leg, not the neck. mouse had enough strength to drag its broken body AND mousetrap through a hole around the sink's piping. it dropped down the hole into the basement, into the laundry room, and then burrowed into the pile of dirty clothes atop the dryer. there mouse died and began to decompose. i know this cos i smelled a bad smell but couldn't find its origin.

sunday morning i blithely loaded the washer and ran the cycle; and when it was done i pulled out the bedsheets and tees and shorts. it wasn't 'til i got down to the little stuff, my cute Think Pink panties, that i reached down far enough to emerge with the trap and what was left of the mouse, gray and pink held together by threads of fur and wet.

i dropped everything and ran screaming upstairs. the cats fled; the dog howled. i gibbered and wailed and flapped my arms frenetically to the point of exhaustion; then i washed my hands until the skin was raw while D, bless his heart, collected and disposed of the remains.

-- i wish i knew how to use your camera better, D said. i'd give anything for that video. you were shrieking like a schoolgirl.
-- fuck you, okay? that was horrible.
-- it was a mouse.
-- it was a DECOMPOSED mouse in the WASHING MACHINE.
-- what would you have done if i weren't here?
-- i would have dealt with it. eventually.
-- you better do an extra rinse this time. and use the dryer instead of hanging 'em outside. that'll separate some of the fur out.
-- move. i think i'm gonna hurl.

i'm suing the cats for psychological trauma.

i wish this would happen more often

lou's wife hates squirrels as much as i do, PLUS she's deathly afraid of them. this morning she sent him this email:

Dear Lou,
When I went to the car to go to work this morning there was a dead squirrel in the driveway. I thought at first that maybe you ran over it when you left, but there wasn't any blood except for a little bit on the head. I think he fell out of the tree. I wish this would happen more often. I LOVE YOU.

if she weren't already taken, i'd marry her.

dead bodies everywhere

it's high summer here in delaware. the corn is sweet, the tomatoes ripe, and in the afternoon the chorus of cicadas rises and falls.

and the cicada killers are here. cicada killers are wasps that excavate small, gopher-like holes in dry, sunny soil. in this burrow, the female lays an egg and then goes on the hunt for cicadas. she stings the poor fuckers, flips them on their backs, drags them back to the hole and then seals it up. when the wasp egg hatches, the voracious larvae's got a meal right there.

seriously icky, eh?? well consider a whole yard overrun by these creepy little creatures. mounds of dusty soil everywhere, punctuated by creepy little holes. the garden looks like fucking Desert Storm.

to make matters worse, we've got a cicada killer who rides the short bus. this individual persists in digging holes in the cracks of the stone steps leading to the front door, holes that she later discovers are TOO SMALL to accommodate her victims' bodies, which end up either stuck ineffectually in the entrance to the burrow, or littered across the steps where i tromp on them when go out to hang the laundry. here's our Short Bus Killer at work:


the only solace i can take is that her larva won't survive. thank god for natural selection.

met with sir rudy yesterday, who decreed another 2 weeks off running. his probing Fingers of Steel found 2 superficial tears in my hammie, and one more serious, deep-seated one -- probably the culprit responsible for the original despair and compensatory damage.

again, his ministrations called forth involuntary oaths and sweating. when i sat up, a wet pool in the shape of my body remained.

-- quit sweating on our tables, rudy said. jerk.
-- quit beating the crap out of me, i retorted. sadist.

i am in love with rudy the way you're in love with your therapist, or the tech guy who saves your ass when your hard drive fries.

have a good weekend, all. i'm starting mine early. it's mother-fucking booze time.

workin' for the man

fatmammycat's observations tickled me more than usual today. i don't like working with people either. so, do i like my job? (yes.) why?

let me numberate some ways.

Reasons Why My Job is a Pretty Good Despite the Fact it Depends on People, not Puppydogs (for instance) or Meerkats or Swimming Butterfly

• flex-time. i'm usually the first to arrive and first to leave. *i* make the first pot of ass coffee.
• my co-workers make me laugh.
• they don't mind my tourette's
• or the fact that i'm a human jukebox
• or that i attract mice
• and meow a lot.
• we get free lunches on MWF.
• i can wear cargo shorts and an awitha teetha tour tee.
• i've got administrator rights on my box.
• my bosses appear to respect me.
• when i get in the car to drive home i'm leaving work behind.
• if i worked at home i'd probably just masturbate all day.

so that is that.

i hope you're all celebrating World Breastfeeding Week.

for Cat

for u to wear to work tdy:

free cat

awesome.

(thanks to e, who pointed me to this.)

fucking floyd

i didn't want to believe floyd was doping when he won the tour this year. i couldn't warm to his weasly visage like i did to lance's chiseled stoicism, but i gave him big props for his gutsy, epic breakaway effort on stage 17.

when i heard his first urine sample tested positive for testosterone, i withheld judgement. i didn't think testosterone wreaked an immediate effect; i thought it was something riders used early in the season while setting their base.

the second sample's since confirmed results of the first, and velonews has reported jesús manzano, an ex-pro, testifying to the quick efficacy of testosterone in competition.

"Its effects are felt almost immediately," Manzano wrote. "It gives you a lot of force and produces a sort of euphoria."

Manzano outlined three ways to take testosterone during a competition.

First are patches, called AndroGel, which are applied during a light massage usually during the evening mealtime. Manzano said the patches had to be used less than two hours to not risk going above the T/E ratio threshold and risking a positive doping test. Manzano also said clandestine suppositories are used as well as intravenous injections, called Rastandol, taking about 20 minutes to 1 hour before competition.

considering this, it's not so passing strange now that, following the shattering state 16 in which landis lost 8min, he boasted and blustered to his teammates that night, hinting they should expect big things the next day.

a little androgel before dinner, and some rastandol up the pooper right before the race and you're good to go.

fuck floyd and jan and tyler and basso and beloki, mancebo and sevilla. you guys deserve all the shit you get.

axis of evil brownies

heavens they're tasty. and expeditious.

melt 1 stick of butter in a 13x9 pan.
add the following, in this order:
1 c. graham cracker crumbs
1 c. coconut
1 c. choc chips
1 c. butterscotch chips
1 can condensed milk
1 c. chopped nuts

press down with spoon to make sure nuts stick.
bake at 350 for 30min.

yesterday i made 2 pans of these brownies and ate 3 almost straight out of the oven. i vacuumed the entire downstairs, did 2 loads of laundry, wormed 3 snorgoyles, watered all the plants and re-derived the thomas-fermi equation, all in 45 minutes. then i sugar-crashed and slept the rest of the afternoon.

masturbate-a-thon tomorrow!!

for my next endurance event: Charity wants Britons to come to Masturbate-a-thon.

Hundreds of Britons are being urged to attend what is being branded as Europe's first "Masturbate-a-thon," a leading British reproductive healthcare charity said on Friday. (more.)

here are the rules:

• you must be over 18
• no touching others
• no faking
• you can bring any "aids" you need

i know what i'm bringing.

but since i'm not a Briton, i'll have to play along in spirit, in delaware.

after that i'll make brownies. (with coconut, T.O.)

another morsel

18yo steve duplinsky, from bethesda MD, on his way to taking the junior du world title on sunday (notice the lack of torrential winds and rain).

He's just is so relaxed out there," Landon Coach Addison Hunt said. "It's the same way the best athletes in the world look when they're running, like it comes naturally. It's a beautiful thing to watch...

sigh.
i think i need an intervention.

(more pix from the pro, junior and U23 races here.)

du worlds

ITU du worlds (short course)
10K run – 40K bike – 5K run
sat 29 july 2006
corner brook, newfoundland

it's 1am, and i'm wide awake because bob dropped off our luggage an hour ago and i cannot get back to sleep. bob was a very accommodating, friendly person tasked with cleaning up after Air Canada's fuck-ups – in this case misplaced luggage. i met many bobs during the trips to and from newfoundland. hooray bobs!!

we flew out of philly last tuesday, expecting to arrive in deer lake, NF late tues night, but flights were cancelled and overbooked, and the earliest arrival Air Canada could guarantee was saturday morning. maybe i would set foot in deer lake before my wave took off in corner brook, 2 hours south.

we ended up taking a boat instead – and after a 6-hour ferry ride from nova scotia to NF, we finally arrived in corner brook on thursday with enough time for me to cobble my bike together, take a spin on the bike course and then rush to the opening ceremonies. there i met up with my nemesis K (with whom i duel in local races) and S (who roundly schools us both, but in a very nice, bob-like way). during the Walk of Nations, we filed into the pepsi center country by country to a rolling din that reached a crescendo when the canadian team poured in last. S took pix while K and i checked out the swiss boys.

the next morning S and i rode a lap of the bike course (10K/lap) and ran a lap of the run (2.5K /lap). the course suited me well: both ride and run course were either up or down or windy, posing few opportunities for ADD racers like me to daydream ourselves into a different time and place. plus, hills and wind offer me an advantage over the Tiny People who otherwise blow by me on their teenytiny legses.

run course is good; bike course is good; what more could i ask for?

how about RAIN. drizzly rain, sheeting rain, bucketing rain – many permutations of rain come saturday morning. i have found that rain and general inclemency (like wind, obvy) make the Tiny People nervous. they get blown about. they ride their brakes on the descents and chirp their rear tires on the climbs. as multi-sport people, we typically eschew riding in the rain, electing to run instead, or ride our trainers, or make chocolate chunk espresso cookies; thus we sometimes forget how to ride in baleful weather.

the question the rain brought with it (besides how slippery is that manhole cover) was will my hamstring get cold and seize up faster. i hadn't run since the last hamstring pull and had no idea what to expect from it. all week i'd been slathering that puppy with biofreeze, with arnica, with freakin' emu oil in the hope that it'd hold together for the race. the back of my leg was so constantly tacky i stuck to chairs.

saturday morning i tried a new drug, greasing up with sports balm before K and i trotted out a warmup. she kept edging away from me and i knew she was raring to go. me? -i was kind of sleepy.

my and K's wave comprised women ages 35 to 54, and i took some comfort in the fact that i there was a chance i wouldn't be the last one to pull my bike off the rack as long as i could stay ahead of a 50-year-old or two.

4 laps of the out & back run course meant dropping down a significant hill twice a lap – death to crankly hamstrings! – so i took rudy's advice to heart and chopped my stride down to a near-shuffle every time down that hill. i began a rousing game of Red Light Green Light with a girl from great britain: she'd dart by me on the downhill, and i'd creak by her on the uphill. every time we passed the start/finish line spectators hollered (sometimes in english), pounded the barricade and, if there was a canadian competitor nearby, did the wave.

my mile pace was about 45sec slower than it should have been, and i was 5min down on K by the time i finally reached my bike, 11th out of 16 in my age group and 50th in my wave, with a time of 45:05. OTOH i was pumped about making it through the 10K AND my legs were fresh. i roared onto the bike course and instantly caused some consternation with several older gentlemen from an earlier wave as i made a move to pass on the inside right before the turnaround, the whole mess compounded by the fact that the course organisers had us riding on the left side of the road, passing on the right.

the rain started in earnest, and i rode the brakes on the first descent and chirped my rear tire on the first climb before i finally loosened up and had a blast. despite the rain, spectators still mustered on the course, sitting on their lawns with golf umbrellas and signs recommending "Ride it like you Stole It" and collecting on the windy straights to cheer and play triangles (must be a canadian thing. like badminton).

i made up some time on the bike leg and passed a lot of women, including my great britain friend, but i was certain most of these women would pass me again in the second run. my bike split was 4th fastest in my AG, 7th in my wave.

getting off the bike was entirely a different experience than getting on. when i finally got both feet on the ground, it felt as though all the muscles from my ankles to lower back had been replaced with steel shafts. nothing was bending or giving. i shuffle-skated with my bike back to the rack and pulled on my flats, thinking there was no way on god's green earth that i could eke out a 5K run. but volunteers were gesturing and herding me back on the run course and here i was going down the same old hill and here's that same guy exhorting me: work the hills! you love hills! you're a runner now! –and i felt i should stop to apologise, to explain, to somehow excuse the fact that i've brought 8min miles to worlds.

but i didn't because i was now back in the neighborhood where spectators had hung all the countries' flags, and they were playing fiddle music that transported me back to county clare, and they were cheering for me by name because they're armed with start lists that match race number to name. you cannot pull out of a race when strangers are cheering for you personally.

at the first turnaround, my back and glutes were beginning to loosen up. the hamstring was very obviously Present, however; and i knew that pushing it beyond the edge meant walking, and i could not walk because here, approaching the turnaround, was my Red Light Green Light companion. she.would.not.give.up. so i trundled on, exchanging wry grins with a japanese woman every time we passed on the out & back course.

a canadian woman in my AG passed me halfway through the 2nd run and i didn't counter. i expected more to follow in her wake, including great britain, but none did. i ran that 5K in 25:21 – smokin' eh?? – but i finished.

so, i was the ole mid-pack fodder, locking in at 8th in my AG. K was 2nd. S won her 30-34 AG and was 2nd F overall with a time that would have put her 3rd among the pro women, who raced the next day.

thanks for your well wishes. :) FMC, it is now time to take your advice and give the hammie a rest. also, there are choc chunk cookies calling my name.

countdown to corner brook, pt 4

thanks for all the good wishes for my race. it's this saturday, the 29th, and here's the info. i should be going off at 9am.

"should" i say because on saturday i tweaked my hammie again while doing some fartleks. i wasn't doing anything outrageous, running maybe 7:30 mile pace, when i felt a frisson of badness in my semitendinosus. 10sec later everything seized up and i hobbled home -- quickly, because i didn't want to be late for J's wedding.

it hurts to walk now. rudy will weigh in this afternoon. all i want now is a clear path forward. i'm tired of babying this injury and, on every run, wondering when/if the shit will hit the fan. if i need to take 12 weeks off running to heal this (like you said at the very first, FMC), sobeit.

meanwhile i will have a great time in newfoundland with D and my folks. there's not much else i could have done or can do.

i'm flying out tomorrow, returning next tues.

peace.

countdown to corner brook, pt 3

my team kit came yesterday. american women are in blue & white this year.

there are two things wrong with this picture, AFAICS:

1.) orca forget to screen on the Team USA logo. oops. guess i'll be racing as a bandit.
2.) it's teeny -- just a sports bra and daisy duke shorty-shorts. where on EARTH am i supposed to put my wobbly parts??

shipping a bike to canada is a lot more complicated than i thought it'd be. we couldn't ship it from rik's shop this morning, so i'm now toting it around the city of wilmington in my trunk/back seat, hoping just HOPING i can pass it off to FedEx or DHL sometime today.

vacation? this is no vacation. this is a logistical pain in the ass. especially on 4 hours of sleep a night because of the fucking Tour. i take back everything i said about this year being kinda snoozers. landis was an inspired man yesterday. and today -- the race of truth, the indiv TT.

i am exhausted but have miles to go before i sleep. if we didn't have mice -- i saw one run across the floor yesterday while i was eating lunch -- i'd curl up under my desk and hide from all my deadlines.

countdown to corner brook, pt 2

it's taper time! now that the race is less than 10 days away, the only things that will make me stronger for the 29th are rest and short, sharpening stuff.

yesterday i shoehorned in my last hard workout before corner brook: 24mi ride with 30min of tempo followed by a 30min trail run. bike felt great; run was so-so -- my rhythm's coming back slowly but i haven't fully opened up my stride because when i start to, my lateral hammie and sciatic nerve begin to quibble and i back down.

hash worked on me for 2 hours tues and wed; today he's flying to LA to meet maria sharapova, his client for the next 6 weeks.

-- what're the biggest differences between working with the men's soccer team and a tennis player? i asked him, trying to take my mind off his fingers in my hamstring.
-- i'm not sure right now... but for one thing i didn't have to contend with the guys' parents.

apparently maria's dad is very territorial.

tonight i pack up my bike -- well, rik packs my bike -- to ship it to the hinterland, where it will hopefully arrive intact. what can Brown do for me? treat my machine gently.

poor floyd. he picked a bad day to feel crappy.

for those in need of heroes

in Je t'aime, Zizou, sydney morning herald columnist james button offers an eloquent take on the man, and his final moments on the pitch:

After the taunt, Zidane walked away from Materazzi, stared at him for a few long seconds, then moved towards him. It was as if, in front of 2 billion spectators, he chose his fate. As if he chose his mother over his motherland, sticking up two fingers to fairytales and imaginary multicultural bliss. And so the France of 1998 became the France of 2006.

bravo button, y zizou.

floyd in yellow

so landis is leading the tour after the first day in the alps, and he's placed himself in a good position to nail an american victory for the 8th year in a row. the french just can't get a break.

even though floyd's a local dude from just 'cross the border in PA, i can't get jazzed up on this Tour. sure, i'm sleep-deprived from watching OLN's daily coverage, but if phil liggett and paul sherwen weren't so entertaining, it'd be a bit snoozers, IMO, aside from sprint finishes where robbie mcewen pops out from nowhere after taking a mad zaggity line into a just-opened hole and then unleashes a pocket-rocket explosion nobody can challenge. poor boonen gave up and pulled out yesterday, while robbie hung in and led the autobus.

maybe the next couple days in the mountains will bring more attacks, and more excitement, but i think cycling fans in general are dispirited with the sport after the Fuentes allegations. how can we defend cycling against the nay-sayers who brush off apparent heroism and herculean efforts by commenting, "they're all on drugs anyway"? are they? i couldn't understand why someone who's so in tune with his body -- and who's confronted his own mortality as armstrong did -- could wilfully endanger it by taking EPO. but E had another view. it's like an addiction, he posited. take smokers. they know there's a good chance smoking will kill them, but they do it anyway. doping as an addiction? that puts a new light on it.

in the spirit of honesty and transparency, i feel i've gotta confess to this addiction: ice-cream flavored Skittles (limited edition). skittles and a liter of diet coke will get you through a week of road-tripping to NIN shows on the east coast and alternately ensure you're somewhat functional during the three weeks of late-night tour coverage.

i turned klim onto the new skittles.
- ice cream flavored?
- yeppers.
- what do they taste like?
- sugar. they taste like pure sugar.

she was skeptical at first, but now she's an addict too -- and we're not the only ones. she even thinks they taste like ice cream.

what's yer poison of late?

countdown to corner brook, pt 1

during a recovery ride with E last week, a big question came to light after the fifty-millionth mental loop of MIA's Bucky Done Gone.

- okay, here's a question. what percentage of the day would you say you have a song in your head? on average.
- on average? -about one percent.
- one percent? that's all?
- yeah. and i'm guessing you're upwards of ninety to a hundred. every race report you write revolves around whatever song is in your head. you're like an ipod set on shuffle.
- that is untrue. i am an ipod set on repeat... only one percent?? really?
- yes. and that's normal.

so much for validation.

medial hamstring continues to improve, thanks to the bruising ministrations of rudy and hash. compensating lateral hamstring has become crankly, so i have a new bruise line running down that as well. small children stare at me in awe. jaded adults wonder if i'm a battered wife.

ran 5 miles of slow trail on sunday and was sore yesterday. i continue to keep my head buried in the sand, blithely trusting that in the next 10 days i'll drop my mile pace from 8min to 6min.

and if i can't? well, at least i'm not in lebanon.

damage update

after 2nd round of rudy's Manhandling:





it's like you're black, but only in that one spot, lou observed.

ted nugent on deer hunting

A British journalist asked Ted Nugent, "What do you think the last thought is in the head of a deer before you shoot it? Is it, `Are you my friend?` or is it `Are you the one who killed my brother?'"

Nugent replied, "They aren't capable of that kind of thinking.

All they care about is, 'What am I going to eat next, who am I going to screw next, and can I run fast enough to get away.

They are very much like the french in that way."

new mantra

WWZZD

better ppl than me will weigh in ad nauseum on this so suffice it to say that the man is human, and a badass.

i would have given good money to see federer do the same to nadal, and tom boonen the same to robbie. there's nothing wrong with a little drama now & then.

mothers, don't let your kids tear a hamstring

fisch pulled strings and got me on rudy's docket yesterday, bypassing the whole "need a prescription from your doctor and we'll see you in 2 weeks" bullshit. "any runner of coach fischer we get in right away," rudy told me. saints, both of 'em.

rudy draped my foot over his shoulder and after about 10 seconds of probing found a 3cm tear deep in my intermedial hamstring.

-- what are you feeling right now? i asked.
-- well, it's like muscle fibers run north & south. a tear is a perpendicular break in the flow, as though you've sliced partway through a rope, fraying the fibers and sending them every which way.
-- oh. what do you do?
-- rest and ice and regular deep tissue massage only get you so far: the muscle will mend, but there'll be a lot of scar tissue that builds up in the meantime, and that means the healed muscle won't be as strong. what i'm going to do is push those frayed fibers back together, so they're going north-south again.
-- like deep tissue. like denise's massages.
-- no. not like denise. you like denise. you will hate me. i'm going to work on you for 3 minutes, but it'll seem like an hour. but it's just 3 minutes i promise. and during that time, i won't take anything you say to or about me personally.

whatever, dude. i've met pain before. knitting my obliques back together after my iliac bypass surgery was pretty bad, and then all the lymph and blood moved downward into my labia and for a couple days i had a testicle. very painful, but also kinda novel. i know pain. or so i thought.

when rudy laid into that intermedial i almost bit my lower lip clean off. the pain was so sharp, immediate and overwhelming that i could see it. mr. asshole sado-man behind me then demanded i bend my knee to raise & lower my foot slowly.

-- oh, and finn? i heard through a fog of agony. it'd be nice if you breathed.

right.

i took my ujjayi breathing and went someplace else for a while. when rudy finished an hour (well, 3min) later, i peeled myself off his table and swayed, disoriented and exhausted.
-- there'll be some bruising, he said cheerfully. i'll get you an ice pack and see you again monday. 3 or 4 more sessions of this is all you'll need.
-- 3 or 4 more sessions of this and i could be DEAD, i said in my head, still too cognitively impaired to move my mouth beyond monosyllables.
-- by the end of next week you'll feel 90% better. two or three weeks from now you can go back to intensive training. you'll be healthy and strong for the 29th.

rudy is The Man.

yes

rudy says:
i'm going to worlds.

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

the damage so far

my pulled hamstring has resulted in physiological, psychological and financial trauma. and by financial i'm not even talking about the extra massages or PT visits to address the physical manifestations. i'm talking shopping as a coping mech, pure & simple.

before last week, i hadn't bought a new bra in about 6 years. if you've driven by my house when my laundry's on the line, you know some of my underwear's hanging together by a thread.

now, thanks to a sudden surfeit of free time (what to do after work, before cocktails?), i am this much richer (or poorer depending on your accounting):

• 4 bras (so comfterbles)
• 8 panties
• 2 running shorts (for when i can run again)
• 2 running tops (one very very red. o i luvs it.)
• 2 pairs of jeans
• 1 pair cargo pants
• 2 tops which fit perfectly

i need to stop now before i end up in shoe stores.

am hoping to sneak in today or tomorrow to see rudy, renowned repairer of busted hamstrings and erstwhile PT for the US soccer team. after taking 5 days off running and the bike, i tried to run on tuesday. it took one step for the hamstring to become a Factor and 90sec for it to seize entirely, putting a considerable damper on the fireworks that evening.

must get better. the Morsel and i have a running date on sunday. if he knew what nefarious designs i have upon his person he would not be so eager....

worlds are still up in the air.

another hero, fallen

Operation Puerto has claimed another victim: the already-embattled, vanishing-twin, american-as-apple pie tyler hamilton.

quoth velonews:

In Monday's edition of El País, the paper cited secret police and court documents alleging that Hamilton not only engaged in banned blood transfusion practices, but also used EPO, anabolic steroids, human growth hormones and IGF-1 (insulin-like growth factor 1) during his collaboration with [spanish doctor Eufemiano] Fuentes. [full article]

in addition to connecting hamilton's name with fuentes' code "4142," invesigators confiscated #4142's racing schedule, medical log, and an invoice fuentes faxed to a girona hotel c/o "haven parchinski."

if you've ever read a tyler race report or update, you know about his dog named tugboat (RIP) and his wife, haven. it's an odd name that sticks with you. but "parchinski"?? happens to be her maiden name.

tyler's protesting his innocence, again, but those of us who held him up as the hero with the broken collarbone and huge heart in the Tour three years ago are pretty disappointed. while lance sits on an entirely different level, untouchable by mere mortals, tyler always seemed like the guy next door who worked hard and made good.

on the other hand, i've got new respect for some pro cyclists. that shit is expensive.

"we need dirty dirty girls"

Snakes on a Plane booty call in LA (from craigslist):

Snakes On A Plane Music Video Needs Booty Girls!!!!

We need dirty dirty girls who want to shake their asses in our video. Are you one? Do you know one?

Become part of Pop-Culture History!!!

The official video for Captain Ahab's Snakes on the Brain, featured in the film "Snakes on A Plane" will be filming next weekend and we are in need of BOOTY GIRLS. If you've got junk in the trunk and think you've got what it takes to shake on camera, Hit us up!!!!

Extras are also Welcome!!!!!

1 day shoot 3-6 hours --Sun. 07/09

possibly 2days--Sat. 07/08

Booty Girls/Babes will provide own wardrobe. suggestions:
• Bikinis preferably metallic, but any bikini or bikini top will do
• Sunglasses (locs, gangsta shades)
• Thong Underwear
• Weird hip hop tops
• Butt shorts
• Ball caps
• Lip liner make up
• Stripper Shoes
• Bling (gold chains and shit! $ signs!)
• No green! No Brand Name LOGOS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Independant Production

Send Headshot or something close.
Meal, Cred, Copy
no nudity guaranteed!!!

in other words, skinny white bitches need not apply.

my ass is substantial, but not that substantial.

speaking of the SKB, if you've not checked out geoffrey chaucer's blog, a great intro is his Interview wyth Parys, of the Lyf Symple.

finally, read ulysses along with me a page a day. if i'd had my act together i'd have started on bloomsday, but back then i was happy and didn't need to drown my sorrows in literature (instead of riding & running this weekend, i was reduced to reading. urk.) Heap Big Revelation: drinking really doesn't make it better (a lesson i'll have purged by friday).

the evidence of wrong-doing

for FMC.

Ex-Friends Say Armstrong Admitted Drug Use
Teammate Andreu, Wife Cite 1996 Hospital-Room Conversation

from betsy andreu's deposition (which never was supposed to go public, btw):

have you ever used any performance-enhancing drugs? And Lance said yes. And the doctor asked, what were they? And Lance said, growth hormone, cortisone, EPO, steroids and testosterone.

one could argue that lance has been clean since then -- he's certainly been tested a gajillion times -- but getting caught in one lie certainly casts aspersions on anything else you say...

will there even be a Tour?

beloki, mancebo, sevilla, scarponi, ULLRICH and ~50 others -- all booted from the Tour as a result of Operation Puerto. the prologue is tomorrow. this morning, ullrich, sevilla and rudy pevenage were sitting in the team bus, on their way to a meet & greet, when they were informed of their suspensions. that's harsh way to start your day.

this is a bigger clusterfuck than the Festina scandal of '99. and one of the lovely ironies is that david millar's one of the few cyclists on form and still eligible to ride.

meanwhile, it looks like a lot of people might have been wrong about lance, myself included. a shame that this will reflect upon the Lance Armstrong Foundation.


the hamstring is still bad. much unhappiness this morning, but at least it's friday.

the world has ended...

...or so ya'd think.

the hamstring i tweaked in saturday's race yesterday became a full-on hamstring pull. it's not lookin' good dearies.

and rather than approaching the set-back with admirable stoicism and reason, i'm pissed and frustrated and generally charm-less right now.

i've prescribed myself 5-7 days without running, perhaps without riding. i cannot not go to worlds. my parents, who unlike me have already made their travel arrangements, would kill me. (well, not really, but i'd feel horribly Disappointing. and they don't ask for much). plus, who knows if the fates would ever re-align to deliver me to this point.

fucking where's the jamesons. therein lies stoicism, if not reason.

biological explanation for homosexuality?

promigeniture is an arcane notion now. the feudal tradition that passed all a family's wealth & holdings to the eldest son isn't so necessary now that the typical life expectancy is over 30. kids with an older brother or two now have more options than entering a monestary for lack of funds & worldly assets.

still, it's tough being the younger son because, according to a recent study, you might turn out gay.

Having several older brothers increases the likelihood of a man being gay, a finding researchers say adds weight to the idea that there is a biological basis for sexual orientation.

maybe this'll convince the christian coalition to quit breeding so fucking much.

petition

dear Powers-That-Be,

enough with the rain & shitty grey sky. it can stop now.

i'm asking nicely.

signed,
F


p.s.
argh.

another triumph, on a smaller scale

while most of the local multi-sport contingent flocked to the port penn TT, the tri’s in fairmount park or the Cove, i traveled to the NJ park where JZ and hen raced last weekend. i haven’t raced a du since april and need one or two more under my belt before worlds, so i opted for the 40-person du over the 150-person tri running concurrently.

as my and others' experiences can attest, in this area of NJ distances are approximate and course indicators optional. so the runs are a little longer/shorter than advertised, and ya might miss the lone, unattended cone that marks the run’s turn-around. at least you’ve got the stragglers from the triathlon to reel in, as they tipple around corners on their mountain bikes and trundle past the water tables with their children, grandchildren, great-great-aunt and pet ferrets in tow.

since the du was so small, i thought my only competition would come from M, who despite her piriformis issues averaged 23mph on a similar course last weekend. my plan was to be fast enough in the runs to sacrifice some on the bike, cos i was pretty sure i couldn’t peg 23 the whole way.

i felt awesome the first leg of the run – that kind of awesome that makes you want to cry cos it feels so good. i didn’t look at my watch and therefore didn’t begin to fret when 14min passed and we were still out on the “2mile” course. there were only a couple men in front of me, so i figured I was in a good place.

had a relatively unencumbered T1 and eased onto the bike course with nails’ The Collector – very appropriate as i began to pick off the tri stragglers, including one i nearly jammed into on a corner because the queen was now waxing pontific on paul’s divorce from the one-legged chick and i was trying to come to his defense for no good reason and why is that policeman hollering at me??

the jamming incident pulled me out of my somnolence (you wouldn’t think someone could daydream in just 12 miles couldya) and i realised i was going about 18. not 23. i threw a bit of a wobbler then, trying to figure out when M would catch me and what kind of cushion the 2nd run would give me, but i cannot do simple arithmetic on paper, with a calculator, much less in my head when i cannot carry a 1 to save my life.

the queen knocked insistently; i took a deep breath, unpacked my shoulders from around my ears and just relaxed. i didn’t average 23, but i didn’t get caught either.

i could have dogged the second run, pushing only when M got close, but it is so hard to connect perceived effort with real pace and there are so many unknowns on the course; so i just let my legs go, and when i spotted M after the turnaround i went a little faster. i closed in on the du guy ahead of me and probably could have caught him, but an unseemly dash to the line to beat someone who’s not even your sex seems like battling for 37th place in a field sprint. (erm, read: i didn’t know then that he was 2nd place.)

final results: 1st F, 3rd overall.
huzzah, baby.

joy

what're the odds

reading through some old buddyhead gossip -- i am that starved for good prose -- re-encounter this pic and realise the guy i met on the flight back from vegas was travis fucking keller. like your shirt. is that a website? my ass. aaron's tech guy, right. disingenuous prick.

fool me once, shame on ... shame on you. Fool me ... you can't get fooled again.
or something like that.

tryst in the woodsen

i confess to a terrible weakness for athletes, usu of the male variety. watching strong, nimble graceful bodies in motion makes me weak in the knees. and if there's joy involved? -if you really love what you do? i'm an absolute puddle of want.

thorpe's free, ronaldinho's dribbling, phelps's fly, armstrong's climbing, coughlan's dolphining, mcewen's sprint -- droolingly inspiring. these people were made to swim, play and ride, and when they do, their essence shines right there in front of you because they absolutely love what they do. who can resist?

late yesterday afternoon, as i ran down the cart path on my way to repeats on loj hill, i cursorily waved at another trail soul running down 9ft road. one of fisch's XC/track guys, i thought. cute. fluid. nicely-proportioned, and fit without the grotesque emaciation that some runners take on.

how the heck this lovely young man ended up running next to me i cannot say. i was on my way to hill repeats. but when i run i am a different person. i am light, spirited and articulate. vivacious, even, because i am happy. not the cranky, type-a bitch my coworkers know and tiptoe around.

this scrumptious Morsel accompanied me to the bottom of the hill i intended to run up & down for the next 24min. another good thing about athletes is that they don't seem to mind if sweat's dripping off your wristbones, your nose is running and you probably don't smell like a flower. Morsel informs me he's working as an environmental biologist at a water research facility i've ridden by eighty-million times. o be still my beating heart. he too is a cornellian ... and, get this, we have THE SAME WATCH.

i grin stupidly at him and scratch my belly because i've got THE worst case of poison ivy i've ever had. that'll teach me to hurriedly shit in the woods right before a race.

Morsel is also eighteen years younger than me. christ on a stick.

certainly makes the time pass faster.

sprint tri report

so maybe I just expand upon JZ's thundergust report:

Henry and I went to New Jersey Saturday for the Thundergust Tri/Du
and i went to middletown for wayne's marathon sports sprint tri.

arrrrgh 430 a.m. is EARLY
oh yesitis, bra. 4 poops before 8am. a banner day.

Got there with time to spare
rode for 20min, ran for 15, swam for 10. what i love about racing is the peace that comes (sometimes, if you've got your shit tidied) right before, the feeling that you've done all you can to prepare, there's nothing left to plan or anticipate, it's just pure being-in-the-moment. and simple.

"You will swim in the water, then you will bike on the road, next run in the woods."
0.25mi swim
though a bit weedy, the water in noxontown pond is relatively clear and does not smell of sewage. i start at the front of my wave because i am feeling confident. i bash into a couple women at the turnaround, but i fortunately do not encounter the sea monster of a weedy pile with which my friend franny had to contend. said it stopped him dead in the water and he thought he'd never wrassle free.

when i emerge from the water, i have no idea who's in front and who's behind me. this is the beauty of racing tri's (or at least racing them w/o a clew). the strongest women swam in my wave, though, so if i can catch all of them on the bike and run, i have a pretty good shot at winning overall.

Finally on the bike and I can start to enjoy this race...and enjoy I did
16mi bike
typically, i start the bike leg sloooow. i like to dick around with my shoe straps and eat and drink. i pretend i'm having tea with the queen. we talk about ringo starr and the nails concert on friday (the queen is a big fan).

the most powerful voodoo there is...a single verse from a really bad pop song!
or, in this case dave grohl's sick percussion from You Know What You Are. this is SO much better than The Littlest Worm or Red River Valley. the chick who passed me while the queen and i deconstructed March of the Pigs must have been a little dismayed a half-mile later when i blew by her at 22mph.

[i am not nearly as hotsy-totsy as i think i am, though, because blair, who started 4min behind me and then had to SWIM (add another minute) makes up that deficit in 16 miles.]

"there's your target!" BillyV hollered to me, pointing to blair as he exited T2 25yds ahead. i didn't know then that BV had a six-pack riding on me besting blair. that's the last time he'll make that mistake.

So now I am out there back on the trails....alone....but not really...as on continually loop I am blasted by "Don't cha' wish your girlfriend was hot like me!"
3mi trail run
mad drums in my head still. a spectator tells me there's one woman ahead of me, but i figure there must be some mistake, that that woman's from an earlier wave, cos i just rode hard and i know my competition. AND jocelyn's not here.

eschewing my normal MO, i go out fast.

with a long fluid stride, blair hardly looks like he's working, and when i pass him i can't even hear him breathing over the Drums. the woods are lovely, dark and deep, offering relief from the oppressive sun beating on the fields. i'm feeling pretty gnar-gnar, kinda close to puking, but my legs seem disconnected from my gut and they're going with the drums.

at 2 miles i close in on the lone woman. it's robin, and she must have had an incredible swim & ride. "I thought you were going to pass me in the woods," she burbles as i pitch by her with a friendly – i hope – grunt because i am incapable of putting words together. she doesn't stage a comeback, and so i finish first female and 13th overall, 1:30 faster than last year -- largely due to running sub-6min miles.

i was wasted after this 70min race. i cannot even imagine racing IM.

victory

sunday sunday SUNDAY!!

this weekend brings a grudge match between me and J at the middletown tri on sunday, which promises to be hot and sticky. last year J came out of the water a minute-thirty ahead, but i took that time back on the bike and passed her heading out of T2 to win by a minute. so she's hungry and i'm totally freaked out.

this year wayne's taken the elite women out of the age group waves and stuck us with the guys ages 18 to 34. i'm aquatically challenged enough on my own without negotiating a crowd of frothy, pumped men. eeek. i cannot even write about this anymore cos my bowels are dissolving with NervousPoops.

but at least i'll have tunes, thanks to the iCarta : an ipod dock for the bathroom.

nails in holmdel tonight but from a seat because AFAIK there's no pit. also have a ticket for jones beach on saturday night, but seeing the show and racing is a logistical challenge (even without factoring in sleep) and i kinda gotta race i think. my window for good workouts before worlds is getting smaller and smaller and smaller and i got nothing to say...

[mmm, maybe i can do both after all.]