Friday Funny 821: Parenting

Oh the joy of kids.

I may or may not have done something like this at one point.




















This is 1000000% true.

Check out one of last week's Friday Funnies about the joy of kids. So much joy. :) I love my boys.

And see more funny stuff posted 10x a day on steveinaspeedo.tumblr.com!

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Friday Funny 820: Awesome Kids Costumes

With Halloween just a week ago, I thought I'd share the best kids costumes:

And this just HAS to be shared: check out this FANTASTIC "Krang" costume from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. This takes me back to after-school cartoons:

Lots more funny stuff on steveinaspeedo.tumblr.com!

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Thirsty (for knowledge) Thursday: 10 Things to Think About While Swimming

I recently came across a SwimSwam article that gave some good swimming tips. I've never been a "real" swimmer, so some of their ideas are a little lost on me. Here are their 10 points with my thoughts after each:

1) LOOK DOWN
Everyone jokes about following the black line all practice, but I’ve known plenty of athletes who spent more time looking for the wall than down at the pool bottom. Raising your head out of the neutral position does wonky things with your body position – not to mention it can give you a seriously sore neck after two hours. Relaxing your neck to lower your head may, at first, feel like you’re burying it. Ask a coach or a teammate to tell you if your senses are giving you accurate information. The waterline should be about mid-cap on the top of your head, deep enough that when you rotate to breathe, one goggle is easily submerged.

Good point. I'll do this. Good check on form.

2) FINISH PAST THE WALL
Frequently, sprinters are the only ones who seem to grasp this concept – and only during their fast sets. What’s the difference between finishing well in a fast set and making sure to touch the wall before lifting your head during warm up? Really, there is none. Your body will do in a race what it has trained to do in practice, and if it has learned two different behaviors in workouts, your body is going to pick the easier one when you’re too dead exhausted to tell it differently.

For distance athletes – maybe most races don’t come down to touch-outs, but how great is it to be able to brag that you out-touched your competition by .01 in the mile? Or, in a race that isn’t supposed to be so close, would you rather explain to coach how lifting your head and gliding on the way in managed to lose you that race by a hundredth?

So here it is – whether it’s reps in warm up, warm down, hard aerobic work or guns blazing pace sets, drive hard into that wall. It’s not hard to do, and everyone loves down-to-the-wire victory stories. Especially the victors.

I'm guilty of this. I TOTALLY pull my head up too fast at the end of 100 repeats. Being I'm not a "swimmer," it's less of a big deal for me. But I'll make an effort to be better about this. Sometimes. Maybe. No promises.

3) WHERE’S YOUR HAND?
When you’re swimming, can you answer this question? Where do you put your hand in? Where do you lock into your catch on the water, and what’s the pattern of your pull? When you do butterfly do you make a keyhole shape, or do you pull straight down like two simultaneous freestyle arm pulls? Knowing where your hand is in the water can help create a physical awareness that will allow you to make adjustments in a set as you get tired. Know what swimming “right” feels like, so you can keep your body engaged as it gets tired.

Also, building a kinesthetic awareness can help you make changes in your stroke – like if you sweep out too wide in your catch, or cross over underneath your body as you pull. Ask a coach to look at your stroke for suggestions.

I'm asked "Where's your hand" a lot, but it's usually by my wife, and it usually means that she KNOWS where my hand is and just doesn't approve. I don't think that's exactly what they're talking about here. But in all seriousness, I didn't understand about half of this point. I don't get a lot of swimming lingo. But I guess what I take away from this is to make sure my hands are being useful, and not just flopping around (like they do on my wife).

4) COUNT YOUR KICKS
If you do underwater kick sets, counting your kicks is the surest way to get across the pool without panicking that you are going to drown. There’s just something about knowing that there are only X more kicks to go before you can surface and gulp in sweet air for a few seconds before having to resubmerge and do it again.

Counting doesn’t just help with kick sets though – knowing how many kicks you take off each wall in a race can help you prepare in practice to become better. Experiment – do you swim faster with a few more kicks? Or fewer? Once you know your number, try to maintain it off every single wall. If you’re doing repeat 200s, make sure that last wall has the same (or more!) kicks as the first wall. If you don’t count, you won’t know.

"IF YOU DO UNDERWATER KICK SETS…" WHAT?!? That's a THING?!? You lost me on that first half sentence. I have a traditional "triathlete's kick" - meaning it sucks big time.

5) COUNT YOUR STROKES
Along the same vein as counting your kicks, counting your strokes provides a good idea of where you are in the pool, and how your training compares to your racing. If you are practicing at race pace and you know you take 15 strokes a length, but today you’re hitting 19, think about holding onto more water, and maybe slowing the arms down a little. If you usually are at 15 and today it’s only taking 13 strokes to cross the pool, see if you can decipher what’s different. Are you going slower? Are you going faster? Are you taking more kicks off the wall than usual? Are you holding onto water better? Knowing what you are doing in practice is a good way towards becoming your best self.

Counting your kicks is crazytalk. But I can count strokes. I've done some of this in the past, actually, when swimming some of Coach Jen's swim workouts with former swimming buddy Julia. I still do this now-and-then. It's a good thing to consider. How much do you have to move to get across the pool? How much energy do you have to exert? Can you be more efficient?

6) WHAT’S YOUR TIME?
While at one point or another, we all want to kill the clock because the sendoff approaches too soon, or time stops and practice takes forever, the clock is a tool for you. Use it. Know your times – on everything. I know my splits for a warm up 300. That’s probably overkill. However, knowing how fast your easy is will give you an idea of where you stand before workout even begins for the day. You might feel crappy in the water, but if you look at the clock during warm up and see you’re cranking out 1:05s on easy 100s – maybe despite how you’re feeling, your body is ready to go today!

The other part of this is remembering your times. I don’t know how many times I’ve heard coaches ask their athletes, “What’s a good time for you on this set?” and all they get is a shrug in response, or a wild guess after a minute’s hesitation. Don’t be that athlete. Know that a 30 second 50 breast might be outside your range on :40, but that you can cruise :28 freestyle 50s on that same interval without breaking a sweat.

OK, I've never swam in a practice like they're talking about here, so it's all a little foreign to me. But I CAN understand this idea: "knowing how fast your easy is will give you an idea of where you stand before workout even begins for the day." If I'm doing 100s, I can get a sense for how the workout will go after seeing the times for my first 2. So I get this.

7) TURNS
Do not look up when you start a turn. Do not raise your head. Do not grab the wall and try to climb to the ceiling before giving up and resubmerging to push off dejectedly in the other direction. Turns are like finishes for many people – we’ve got so many of them during practice that we just sort of tune them out. In some aspects, turns are worse because there are so many more. That’s good news as well as bad. Because there are so many turns, and because we get sloppy in long sets where we’d rather think about the latest gossip on Facebook or what’s for dinner, often we train our bodies to be sloppy where turns are concerned. Heads raised, feet crossed, one-handed open turns – all sloppy. All fixable. Because there are so many turns, if you think about them all the way through that set of 12 x 200, in the space of one set, you can begin to make a difference in your swimming. Pretty cool, huh? The downside is that to keep any alterations you make you’ll have to keep thinking – for a lot of practices, until the changes take hold and your body forgets how bad it once was in light of how good it has become.

"Do not grab the wall and try to climb to the ceiling before giving up and resubmerging to push off dejectedly in the other direction." Oops. That's exactly what I do. Really. (Check out my first swim meet "race report", and you can see video of my first 50 freestyle. Look at me pop up at the wall to take a breath.) I've about given up on my turns. They are what they are.

8) BREAKOUTS
Ever heard another athlete tell her coach that she could have had a great 100 fly, but her breakouts were bad? Got caught under water, kicked too far so her feet were breaking the surface, lost momentum, just plain stopped in the water.

Don’t be that swimmer. When you’re dealing with breakouts, some sort of speed is key. Gliding to the surface is not okay. Off every wall, you have a chance to figure out what the best way for you to begin swimming is. Coaches can give excellent pointers on things like this one.

I had to google "swim breakout term" to see what it was. I kinda figured it out by the 2nd sentence above, but I wasn't sure. I think I need someone to watch me to work on this one, but they make a valid point here because I rarely think about this aspect of swimming - for me, it's all "stroke, stroke, stroke, turn, push-off, stroke..." But there's the breakout aspect in there I need to be aware of.

9) WHAT’S THE POINT?
Usually I don’t condone asking questions during a practice, but if you’re really stuck for things to think about, this question can sometimes work wonders. Occasionally a coach will ask you to do something that sounds ridiculous. Maybe it’s a 200 of backwards swimming. Maybe it’s butterfly with a freestyle kick. Maybe you’ll spend twenty minutes swimming in circles without touching the wall – whatever it is, sometimes asking what the point of a crazy notion is, is a good idea. Knowing what you should be striving to accomplish in the set is part of the point, after all – no good going through the motions if you won’t be able to gauge your own success!

But don’t ask questions when it’s an aerobic set you want to get out of. You won’t escape.

I started doing this after Coach Jen coached me leading up to the TC 10 a number of years back. What's the point of this workout? What's this trying to accomplish? Great point.

(Wait, people can swim BACKWARDS? What the hell?!? I might need to try this the next time I'm at the pool [and it's empty].)

10) EAVESDROP
If you’ve run out of things to think about in practice, then this little nugget might get your brain going again. Listen to what your coach tells other athletes. Think about your own stroke, and whether you are doing what your coach is asking someone else to do. This one requires a lot of control: if Coach tells Swimmer A he needs to stop reaching so far on his freestyle and you take the advice, you may not be getting from it what Swimmer A would (if he turned his brain on and listened). Maybe your freestyle arms are already right. The point of eavesdropping is trying to gain nuggets to compare to your own technique and see if there are areas where you might be able to improve. But check with your coach before making any radical changes!

Again, I'm not at a swim practice, but this is still good advice when swimming in ANY group and you hear people talking about form/training.

Any thoughts on this list? Anything you'd add or tell me to ignore?

Click the "Thirsty (for knowledge) Thursday" tag to see all Thirsty Thursday posts - they're about training and other fun "knowledgeable" things I've come across.

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Stills from the TC 10 Race Video

WARNING: there are 2 semi-gross images in this post. They're not bad, but you maybe don't want to be eating oatmeal or chucky vegetable soup while reading this. You have been warned.

As they've done the last couple of years, Kare11 has archived their streaming video coverage from the end of the TC 10 Mile and TC Marathon. When I watched myself finish, I saw something I clearly remembered: being greeted with a smile and a half-hug from a man in an orange vest:

Walking across the line with a smile for the guy in the orange.


After a word of congratulations, a smile, and a pat on the back.

What I didn't know was what this guy had been doing moments before I crossed the line. Here he is a minute before I finished as he deals with puke and/or other bodily fluids:

Oh God. My first human interaction after finishing the TC 10 was from the "puke guy."

Fan-freaking-tastic.

I went back in the video a few minutes, and I found a 22-year-old named Sam who was the one making the mess at the finish line:

He pushed to break 60 which he DID, so it was all worth it. I hope.

Here are 4 more photos of me working my way to the finish as seen in the Kare11 video:

Nearing the line.


Hitting my watch on the mat.


I didn't even notice the covered up puke.


Just as the "puke guy" was about to come over and congratulate me.

(I'm not actually appalled or annoyed at that EMS person. If you know me, it's actually quite fitting that I was first met by him. Thank you for helping out, EMS person! And congrats on a good finish, Sam!)

If you want to see the video, go to this Kare11 video link, and click on the "8:00 - 8:15" link near the bottom. Sam (the puker) starts doing his stuff just 30 seconds in, and I cross around the 2:30 point.

Speaking of barf, did you see my last post about my "Kitten Mile?" :)

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'Kitten' Mile 2014!

This past weekend, I tweeted this:

Here's what I've said in the past about this event:

What I'm talking about is a "Kitten Mile."

Here's how it works:
- Someone shouts "GO."
- You chug some cat nip.
- Then run 1/4 mile.
- Chug more cat nip.
- Run another 1/4 mile.
- Chug more cat nip.
- Run another 1/4 mile.
- Chug more cat nip.
- Run a final 1/4 mile.

That's a total of 48 ounces of nip and a mile of running. All of the cat nip chugging has to take place in a "transition zone" - you can't start running until after you're done chugging. If you throw up your cat nip before you finish, you have to do an extra penalty lap. If you have too much cat nip left from your 4 containers (usually something like 1 oz can be left when all of your extra is added up), you have to do a penalty lap.

Let's spell this out for everyone right now: "cat nip" and "kitten" are referring to something else. You probably can figure this out. But I cannot reveal any identities or say what was ACTUALLY going on because there are people who did this race who are powerful congressmen, mayors, and other public high-power figures. We need to protect everyone's identity and reputation.

This race offered a new "relay" wave this year. They went out before the "competitive" wave:

Finishing the first lap. "R" is for "relay." And for "really too excited about this."


Things are getting a little more difficult now...

SIDENOTE: When I first got to the race, someone (who I only see yearly at this event) started laughing and came over right away. She told me that she appreciated that I protected the identity of her nipple in last year's post:

Last year, I captioned this "Not only did I have to hide her identity, but also
the identity of her left nipple."

So THIS year, she told me she placed her number in a location that would prevent a mishap like last year. So here she is running away from transition in this year's race with her "better" number placement:

Let's go R6!!

Then it was time for our wave. I was "well dressed," but not as well dressed as this race buddy of mine:

He's more of a man than I. No really. I mean, look. He's MORE of a MAN.

Oh, and yes, that's the same inappropriate outfit with a children's top that I wore to Matt and Angela's wedding reception a week ago. It's more than skin-tight, and it has Elmo dressed as a cowboy saying "tickle fight" on it. Pervy. (Oh, and the dude racing in JUST the Speedo is extra impressive once you realize it was around 40 degrees that night!)

I learned the "Italian Stallion" wasn't Italian. This race is full of deceit.


Getting ready to go. I also had to protect the identity of the Speedo.


Who's the douche checking his split while chugging?!? Oh wait...


Oh God. Look at #6's face. And this is her first catnip of the race.
(The rest of the race didn't go well for her.)

I was one of the LAST out of transition, but I passed about a dozen runners to quickly move into 3rd. I'm not a good chugger. I let out 3 long, loud burps in the first 25 meters of the run right as I was catching up to a group to pass. One of them cheered for my gas. Thanks man!

Finishing my first lap in 3rd overall.


The guy next to me and the guy in the white tank across from me were 1st and 2nd.


Canada's having a rough time.

The 2nd run was tough. I was nearly hit by a car at the end of it. This red car nearly backed into me:

Awkward.


Still awkward. (But at least I had 3 people compliment me on my boobs.)


Oh dear God. I hope this is my "O" face. My lucky wife.


Some belly and biceps in my too-short and too-tight shirt.


Another angle from another friend.


Running off (far left) still in 3rd. These guys are chugging for 4th.

This 3rd run sucked. I mean, a "kitten mile" never feels GOOD, but this one was extra rough. I was running hard (maybe too hard), and I didn't have enough oxygen during my chugging times.

Back to transition for the last time (coming in from the far left), about to lap these folks
and be barfed on by Canada. Really. I mean, just look at her face right now - she's done.

There weren't any photos of me finishing, because I think my photographer got enthralled in a conversation with someone else. I finished with my SLOWEST of 4 kitten mile times in 7:09.9 (unofficial). Here are my splits:

0:20.5 chug
1:27.2 run
0:32.7 chug
1:29.9 run
0:37.0 chug
1:31.7 run
0:39.1 chug
0:31.9 run (the first 3 runs are a bit long, so the 4th is short to make it a true mile)

When I compare my splits from previous years, I gave up the most time in the 3rd and 4th chug. Comparing 2011, 2012, and this year, my 3rd chug was 0:31, 0:31, and 0:37. And my 4th chug was 0:27, 0:30, an 0:39! That's 6 sec slower than both previous years in the 3rd chug, and 9-12 seconds slower in the 4th chug.

Here's how my running vs. chugging times add up from the last 3 years I did this race:

2011: 4:59.9 running time, 1:47.4 chugging time
2012: 5:04.0 running time, 1:49.6 chugging time
2014: 5:00.7 running time, 2:09.3 chugging time

I've only been getting slower at chugging, and slower overall. My 4 years at the race (chronologically) are 6:46, 6:48, 6:54, and 7:09 (with overall finishes of 3rd, 3rd, 5th, and 3rd). But coming in 3rd to TWO national duathletes of the year (1 with 35+ wins in over 150 tris/dus, and the other with 20+ wins) doesn't seem that bad.

Oh, and a quick "conspiracy"-related thing to mention: well after I'd finished, someone noted that my "overflow" cup was overflowing (meaning I didn't drink enough and should have taken a penalty lap). But after 3 chugs, my cup barely had anything in it - the bottom wasn't even covered. If there's one thing I pride myself in (it sure ain't my choice of wardrobe), it's that I always finish my "chugging." My theory is that someone emptied the "puker's" excess (who was right next to me in transition) into my cup. She didn't fully finish her 3rd chug before quitting.

The Italian Stallion trying to take off with the winner's trophy.


l to r: men's winner, women's winner, and the 2 relay winners.
(The relay partners just switched trophies because he wanted the bigger one [for penis reasons].)

The party started outside. About 15 minutes after finishing, I told someone "my lips are hot." I was feeling the effects of the chugs. Then we went inside. We all talked about childbirth, sex, Catholicism, and boobs. So basically, my normal Saturday night conversation.

Delicious (and censored) food. Big thanks to the good sir who made the apple crisp
under the tinfoil and the kind lady who brought it. So good!


This mac and cheese did a good job counteracting the effects of the "kitten mile."


She's admitting to all of us that she had her first 2 "chugs" EVER in the relay at this race!
At least there was ONE lighter lightweight than me at this race!

I had a neighbor drop me off at the race, so I had to run home. I was in no shape to drive. I couldn't run much at first because I felt like the left side of my abdominals were going to bust open. Kinda like this:

Really. I was picturing this video when I was trying to run.

I was able to start running a bit later. I felt like I was moving well, but checking my watch between 2 landmarks that I know are a mile apart, I learned I was running about 8:30 pace. (Thats's like my slowest cool down after a hard tempo run pace.) I snapped a photo after that 8:30 mile:

The camera couldn't focus so it came out blurry. Yep, that feels about right. Cut, print, that's a wrap.

Well, my 7:09 is still "Hall of Fame" worthy - the race director has deemed sub-8 for men and sub-11 for women as "Hall of Fame" times. I think it was just us top-3 guys and 1 female to make the Hall of Fame this year - I'll post the (censored) results when they come in. (I think I was all alone in 3rd - first place was around 6:02, 2nd wasn't far behind, and then 4th was a ways after me I think.) Let's see if I can turn around this slowing trend next year.

If you'd like to look back on the history of this event, here are 3 links: 2011 with few photos, 2012 with a lot of photos of me racing, and 2013 where I didn't race (injury) but cheered and took photos.

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Off Season Training Plan

Here are my thoughts for my swimming, biking, running, and strength work for the next few months:

• SWIM:

After just a few short swims in September, I'm trying to start to swim more. Again. This is like my mantra every fall. "This fall/winter, I'm going to swim more." I actually did it this past winter, so lets see if I can keep it up this winter.

I posed a question in a BeginnerTriathlete forum a few days ago as to what the "best" swim workouts would be for someone just swimming once or twice a week. I got some interesting responses (I'll share some of their thoughts in a week or 2), and I tried one this past week. Someone suggested 6x400 doing the first 100 of each interval at 85%, the next 100 at 90%, the 3rd 100 at 95%, and the final 100 at "puke pace." I tried a shorter version of just 4x400. They felt good, but nasty. (Like a good swim should.) I swam 6:15, 6:15, 6:15, and 6:13.

And just last week, I did a 1500 tempo as my "baseline" check-in for the start of winter. I was hoping to keep it under 25:00 - my last few 1500s were just under or just over 25. I was pretty happy with my 24:48 (1:39.2/100)..... until I looked farther back in my training calendar. Sure, it WAS my fastest 1500 since June, but I swam a 23:27 (1:33.8/100) in early April before I sprained my ankle! That's almost 90 seconds faster, and 5.4 seconds faster / 100. Yikes. I've lost a lot.

GOAL: I'd like to work on a lot of fast, hard swims this winter, and I'll see if I can get that 1500 time down to around 24 flat. I'd love to drop back into the 23s. We'll see.


• BIKE:

I haven't even looked at my bike since the Treadman Duathlon on September 20th. I'm OK with that.

GOAL: I didn't hit my bike trainer at ALL last year, and I'd like to get in a few trainer rides this winter. Lets shoot for the moon and say 2 rides / month. I know, I know... CRAZY! Right? Me and my over-the-top dreams.


• RUN:

I was ready to go out for a "harder" mid-distance run on this past Wednesday morning. (My hip/sacrum has been feeling a little better since the TC Loony Challenge and then the ALS Superhero Dash 5K the next weekend.) Then I realized I'm not really training for anything right now. And I also remembered how I didn't do ANY hard runs between September of 2013 and my first tri of this summer (the 2014 Waseca Tri), and I finished that run as my slowest of 4 attempts at that tri, but within 20 seconds of 2 of my races there. So if that hard training aggravates my hip/sacrum right now, is it really worth it? Especially when I'm not training for anything in particular? So I'm sort of going into "base" mode - easy to moderate runs, nothing too crazy long.

GOAL: I hope to put in some miles, but no real intense training until I have an event on the horizon. I need to be smart here. No injuries.


• STRENGTH:

After a year of solid physical therapy exercises, I slowly started doing less as I was able to start running more. But after the "Loony Challenge" nearly a month ago, I've started doing more again. I need to keep that up to stay healthy!

GOAL: "Blast that ass." Don't give up on your old physical therapy leg exercises.


p.s. Here's my brave knight and my plump monkey from last night:

Have a good weekend!

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