fullertons – Page 2

July 8, 2015

How you know you’re in love with the sport of triathlon

There’s just something about triathletes – something wrong in our heads. When others see an hour of free time, they think about playing a game or having a drink. When triathletes see an hour of free time, we see time for a quick session. Case in point: Yesterday I had a late afternoon meeting in downtown Chicago. Knowing that it would end at the start of Chicago’s rush hour(s), I grabbed my running shoes, Garmin and a change of clothes. Why sit in traffic on 290 for two hours when I can spend an hour of that time logging a few miles? So, after fighting through the foot traffic to get to the Lake Shore Trail, I hit the pavement and put down 8.5 miles. It was nothing spectacular, but it was the best possible decision I could have made. The hour+ running delay pushed my ride home back just enough that…

June 18, 2015

Why buy a bike when you can build it?

As I’ve fallen more and more in love with the sport of triathlon, it’s become clear to me (though perhaps not my wife) that I was in need of a triathlon or TT bike. It was also clear to me that I was not going to drop $5000-$10,000+ on a brand name bike built of a Chinese-made frame and off the shelf Shimano components. While these brand name frames are undoubtedly very slippery and of high quality, until I get my dental certificate, I’d prefer to buy a frame inspired by the name brands, for a fraction of the cost, directly from China and bolt on the same components myself. So, I started looking on Alibaba and stumbled upon the MC-095 from Miracle Bikes. I contacted “Jenny” and we began talking about the frame. She sent me CAD drawings with dimensions and I compared the frame to my body dimensions. As best I could…

June 15, 2015

I’m back at it.

The sling officially came off this past Thursday! I celebrated with a slow 5k around the neighborhood in the rain. On the bright side, the run was not as bad on my legs as I had expected. On the less than bright side, my abs were screaming. Something about avoiding using my abs for 6 weeks while my broken ribs healed. The next day I pushed it a bit harder and did 5 miles in the heat and humidity. Barring the annoyance of the heat/humidity, my body was feeling good all around. Though Sunday felt like a post-marathon day, with each stair an exercise in pain tolerance. Good pain tolerance. I missed that pain. My shoulder is feeing significantly better. Basic movement is of no annoyance. Only lifting up as if signaling a touchdown and to the side as if signaling to turn left are issues. Thankfully, this is just the…

May 31, 2015

And the x-rays are in

I must admit, I am very pleased with the work done by my surgeon, Dr. Stephen Chudik. My clavicle went from a 120° angle to arrow straight. Through an open reduction, internal fixation procedure (ORIF), Dr. Chudik was also able to stitch the bone back together perfectly, giving it the best possible chance to heal correctly. The before and after surgery x-rays are even more impressive. It’s clear that this “elective” surgery was only barely elective. (Give them a click below to see them larger.) Had I chosen to let the bone heal naturally I can’t imagine that I would have regained full function of my shoulder joint. This break would have, at minimum, severely impacted my swimming, if not everything else in my life. My new jewelry is just over 2.5″ long and the long screw is ¾” long. It’s quite obvious that something is there under my skin,…

May 27, 2015

I refuse to slow down

After my brick session last night it occurred to me: I refuse to slow down. I worked hard to get where I was before my crash, and I don’t want to lose my conditioning because of one mistake. I had set a goal at the beginning of the year to exercise at least one hour a day. Despite holiday delays and one two-week Dr. ordered rest period, I was beating my goal handily before my crash. In fact, I had not done less than one hour a day since the middle of February when I was cleared to resume training, banking a nice buffer of time in the process. I think I may have set my goal too low. Nevertheless, I jumped back on the elliptical after taking a two day break following my crash, where I broke my clavicle, scapula and two ribs. I also mowed the lawn one handed a…

May 22, 2015

And I Bonked – or how I nearly DNF’d the Chicago Marathon

The Chicago Marathon was off to a great start. I had spent the morning hanging out with my brother, whom was also running, the weather was cool, but not cold, my body felt energetic and I was injury-free. For the race I decided to wear some of my ultra sexy running shorts. As these were designed for runners, they had two small gel pockets, one on each hip. To help fuel me through my 26.2, I had stashed four Rocktanes in these pockets, hoping to take them every 30-45 minutes. Almost immediately I noticed something was wrong. The bit of extra weight at my hips was gone. Not more than five miles in I had managed to lose all four gels. At the time I was just annoyed, but I didn’t think it’d come back to haunt me. Through 13.1 I was doing great. I was on pace to PR by…

May 20, 2015

The Triple Challenge – three triathlons in two days

Apparently there’s a lot of crazy people out there. I’ve discovered I’m not the only one. There’s enough of us that three individual triathlons have been combined into a single event, catering to the crazy few that see a single triathlon as not large enough of a challenge. This event is the Chicago Triathlon Triple Challenge. You get to do one SuperSprint, Sprint and Olympic triathlon in the span of about 30 hours, “for a total of 59 miles that includes 1.63 miles in the water, 46.3 miles on the bike and 10.85 miles on the run.” Looking at those numbers, I realized that it was about a half Ironman and I thought this would be a perfect Ironman test. If I could do this without trouble, I’d work towards completing a full Ironman in 2015. In 2014, the order was a SupersSprint on Saturday morning. Then you get to…

May 20, 2015

TrainerRoad kicks your ass

Let’s face it, I’m a bit of a wimp. There’s no way I’m going to take my bike outside when it’s below 40°, but I also will not allow myself to slow down in the offseason. I’m also cheap. I don’t mind spending money to help achieve goals, but if there’s a way I can spend less to achieve the same goals in mostly the same way, even if it requires more work on my part, I’m going to less expensive route. (I think my wife thinks both routes are too expensive.) TrainerRoad allows me to achieve these goals in the comfort of my own pain cave, I mean basement. In case you’re one of the uninitiated, TrainerRoad (TR) is a subscription-based online service that pairs your computer with your bike, allowing you to take on hundreds of power-based workouts, or as TR puts it, “TrainerRoad picks up live power, heart rate,…

May 16, 2015

ITU Chicago Triathlon

It’s time for my first olympic triathlon, and my first “big time tri,” ITU Chicago. For those of you not in the know, this is close to the same race that the professional triathletes do as part of the ITU tour. The day started off wet. As in, my car nearly hydroplaned into a concrete highway divider on 294 due to the torrential downpours. Not the best way to start the day. Given than transition setup was the day before the race, some athletes had the foresight to cover parts of their bike to protect from the rain. This was a massive transition area, but thankfully my spot was near the end of a row and right by a sign. I felt bad for those in the center somewhere without an easily recognized landmark. Annoyingly, transition was a good half mile or more from the swim start. Preferring to not throw away…

May 16, 2015

My first marathon

My brother’s been into running for much longer than I. Back in 2013 he suggested I do the half marathon while he did the full Twin Cities Marathon. Not to be outdone, I figured I’d shoot for the full distance and signed on up. Given that my longest (and only) race to this point had been a 5k, I had a lot of work ahead of me. Looking back, I don’t think I prepared nearly enough, with only a few long runs and a max run of 20 miles and a max week of 60 miles run. Based on the training I was doing a few weeks ago, before I went full idiot and broke my shoulder, the two months running up to the marathon look relaxing. Click the calendars if you’d like to see my totals. Nevertheless, the race went well. I held a relatively constant pace, only dropping about one…

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