Retiring

Around March, this past year, I was feeling a bit lost. I was losing myself to diaper changing, Baby Einstein watching, yoga pant wearing (as an outfit), etc. You get it. So to snap myself out of it, I decided to do something that made me feel like me. So I signed up for a marathon and a sprint triathlon.

A couple of months later, I was feeling good. I did both a half and full marathon. It was Summer, so of coarse warm, which meant I was getting the vitamin D back in my system.

I was kind of over racing, come on, it was like a hundred degrees everyday in July! Who wants to train in that weather?  I just wasn't really in the mood anymore. But I did train... a little. I got in some biking, running and oh yeah, and I swam some laps in the pool twice. I did about two or three brick workouts.*

*Brick work out: Two or more events combined; commonly a bike workout followed by a short run to help the adaptation between the muscle groups.
I learned this term about a week before the race, and Trav says I use it all the time now, like all of a sudden I'm a professional athlete.

So September 8th came around, and I found myself driving with my friend Shauna at 4:30 in the morning all the way to the country, Olathe, KS.  

This was a really cool and well organized race. It was an all woman's race, which was great, no male speedos! 

The race started at 7:30, but my heat wasn't until 8:10. I was a little nervous because this was my first race in a real body of water, not just a swimming pool. They gave us real shower caps to use which  were fluorescent pink, for just in case we drowned, they would see us.

When the race started, we all jumped in the lake. I was totally getting kicked in the head, and may have kicked in the head as well. Once we separated out a little, I was feeling great! It was so much fun swimming in a lake, but I had no idea what was going on. I could have been first place, or last place.  I really did feel like my pace was decent, and that I was possibly out in the front of the pack. 

Once the swim was over, I ran to my bike, dried off a little bit and took off. As I was going out the entrance, I saw these little twerps roll in.

The bike was fun. Since we were the last group, it felt like I was passing a ton of people. But then out of the blue, I got passed by this chick. Whatever. The whole 10 miles, we kept going back and forth, passing and getting passed. I couldn't kick her. I think on the last mile, just by pure annoyance, she pulled back, because I didn't see her again. Sorry girl, I have a disease.

The last event was of course, the run . I got off my bike and started awkwardly running. When I sign up for these races, I honestly just do it so that I can feel good about myself, and have something to train for. Then when I'm in the race, I get this weird impulse to just beat everyone. I don't think of myself as competitive, but apparently I am because I kept seeing people in my age group and trying to pass them.  So I saw this girl up ahead who was in my age bracket, and yeah, my pace was a little faster than hers, so I casually passed her up. Then the 3.2 miles, I swear turned into 10.2. My legs were burning, I had a cold, so I couldn't breathe, I was not in the best place! The last mile, the chick who I passed up on the first mile, totally passed me up. She was flying! I tried to keep up with her, but I was going to die! So girl with the orange tank top, PROPS! Thank you for humbling me, you ho! 

Travis, thanks for snapping these beautiful shots, I wanted to crawl in a hole and die at this point.

All in all, I thought my swim and bike were great but my run not so great. When I looked up the results, I was surprised. I seriously was slow slow slow on the swim, I did good on the bike, and I rocked the run.  Weird. 

Anyways, I took 2nd in my age group (no thanks to you orange tank top girl with two braids,) and 15th overall.

Next triathlon I'm gonna brick it up in the training... yeah Trav, you heard me.

But for the year of 2012, I am officially retired. I think I found "me!" Bring on the sticky floors and poopy diapers. 

Speaking of poopy diapers, the kids were great fans, but then they got bored and decided that they were going to jump in the lake

Oh and Travis, who never appears in pictures was there too. Thanks for the support!