Ever says...

Pop (Soda) is spicy water.

The Truth

I must apologise but it is true.

I judge and mock you in my head if you are carrying a purse while walking/ hiking trails.

Family Fun

To my utter delight, Ever likes cars, and trucks, motorcycles, and basically anything that moves- except bicycles. Yes that is a sarcastic sentence. Anyways he likes them and to be a good parent, a loving supportive parent I thought that he would love to go see race cars race.
Thus for the low family cost of $24 we went to Varney Speedway to enjoy Hillbilly Racing.

Failure

Ever thought the cars were too loud, protested loudly, and fell asleep. Umm this was for him?
Perhaps I could convince him now to like a bicycle race.

Mount Forest Triathlon

This was a little gravy race, community fundraiser. The organizers were really happy with the response with over 70 racers- a good percentage of those were relays so quite a few people on site.
This was a pool swim which I had never done before... and quite frankly I think I buck the trend and swim faster in open water. They said that the race was 500 metres and I'm sure it wasn't There was no way that pool was a 25 metres. In any event my time was 11:30. Slow any way you look at it. Also the wall wasn't so obvious I kept on running into it.
After you were done the swim you had to run through the change rooms out to the yard to your bikes, and as this was an entry level triathlon, you saw all manner of nakedness in the change room. Seriously it takes time to change, and there is nothing wrong with being wet for a little bit, and you do dry.
The bike was a windy, unexpectedly hilly out and back 20k. Some misery. Could have been faster at around 43 minutes. Wishing for race wheels.
Run was 2.5 not flat route completed twice. Portion of it along hwy 89 which was slightly scary. IF I was race director I would ran the loop in one direction on the way there and the other to come back. Little slower than I would have hoped- 25:30ish.

I had to leave as soon as I got food to get to work so I missed out on the posting of results which would have showed a second place finish. Although I don't know if there were awards or not.
The first place women does well- she has won the K-town triathlon several times- so bet her lead on me must have been at least 15- 20minutes.

Lusting

Challenge

At the beginning of the summer I issued Maya the challenge of riding her bike either to walkerton or home from walkerton and her reward would be lunch at a restaurant.
Initially Maya was completely against the idea, then after going for a bike/run with Maya and realising that she had cycled half the distance of the trip she was ready to tackle the challenge.
Thus yesterday we cycled 15.5km home from walkerton. Pictured is one of the few stretches she walked- she'd rather cycle up the hills???
We went slow and took a couple of candy breaks but she made reasonable good time for a six year old- around two hours.
Around 12k she started complaining about her legs hurting, but perked up after some water. She chose the outfit and foot wear. Something are just not worth the fight.

Her next challenge???? She wants to walk 5km on the treadmill.

Observation

As mentioned I have time to surf the Internet. I still nurse Ever at the computer, less and less, but also kill many hours during the night at work.
So thanks to facebook and other social networking excitement I have looked at some pictures of people I grew with, went to camp with, people I was very close to at one point, people I thought I would never forget about.... and now when I look at there pictures I don't even recognize them.

So if you are lurker and we once met, and you see me, and we make direct eye contact and I act as a snob... really I have no idea who you are.

Pacing at the Dirty Girls

Ron over at WestGreyRunner said he was going to run 24 hours at the Dirty Girls Trail race, so of course I thought this would give me a great opportunity to volunteer to pace him through the night. Just like a tough night shift I thought. A free race experience. Just so there wasn't the appearance of anything not of the best intentions I also volunteered Luke, thus there we were running through the forest at 3am. Awesome good times.

Basically the race is a 10km loop though the Mansfield Outdoor Centre. The 10km loop was surprisingly tough. Although not incredibly technical, mostly good single track, the never ending hills really worn one down. My job was to keep Ron on task, oriented to reality, at a reasonable pace, to keep him company, make him sit and make aid stations go easy, and to point out obstacles. Basically help him not to have to think. Cause your mind can tend to go a little crazy after 12 hours of constant running.

Overall I thought it went ok after I grasped what his expectations were. How fast to go, when to run and when to walk. He kept on repeat some of the same stuff over and over, otherwise he was surprisingly with it. We had fun comparing the ultra race to the birth experience, and the signage got a chuckle at every turn. He was amazingly positive, I kept on waiting for him to get even a little not nice, and that would be ok, but that didn't happen.

Overall he did 120k is roughly 23hours. I did 40k is eight hours and man I was hurting... so I know he had to be in way past rough shape. It was mentally exhausting as well. Intense positive talk- no negatives, putting a spin on everything and being alert to all the dangers and keeping him on the trail... although he had it past memorized by the point I joined him.

Overall it all looked like such fun! I am sure I will be doing one, although Ron you will definitely have to pace me cause Luke said no way he would do it for me. Somehow I do not think my grump's would stay away.

I wonder if I could be ready for Horror Hill 6 Hour race?

Run For Youth 2010

This race into its third year has provided me with two previous third place finishes in the 10k distance. To allow somebody else the joy of third, and frankly because I am sick to death of third place, I decided to shake things up a bit this year and do the 5k stroller roll with Ever. I really meant to practice pushing the stroller and running but somehow that didn't happen...so out I went not having ran with the stroller in a couple of years. Race went by really fast.. it was only 5k after all. Should have seeded myself closer to the start line cause I was kinda jerky saying beep beep wising past people. Part of the race was on railway bed soooo it wasn't the smoothest ride for Ever but he didn't seem to mind.
At the end of the day Luke beat me doing 25:35 to my 26:35. Slightly ashamed.

Sweetness

Last night Maya and I started reading Charlie and the chocolate factory together. She cried when it was time to stop and go to sleep.. she simply had to know how Charlie got his golden ticket. I explained to her that if she could read better she could stay up and read it all night... she seemed to get this and promised me that she would work on her reading and after just one more chapter she went to bed with out complaint.

I woke to her this morning...early.. book in hand begging me to continue.

Next lesson taught, how the amount of sleep Mommy gets directly correlates to how grumpy Mommy is.

July Totals

Swim: 10, 050 metres- The summer pool hours don't really work for me.
Bike: 267km
Run: 109.5km- In my defence most of it has been trail.

Personally I find it a challenge to exercise consistently in the summer due to the out and aboutness of it all.

Maya is going to Camp tomorrow.

She is not packed......however there are three packages/letters ready to go for mail call daily.
Priorities.

On another note... very grateful for a 24hour grocery store.