Just from my personal observations watching several hours of Ironman Hawaii it will be an interesting 2008 season visually.
To begin with, a lot more bikes painted in light blues and whites. I have not noticed many white bikes in the past but they are certainly turning up now.
The dress of the day can be summed up in one word, Retro. Macca wore a Day Glo blue one piece with the entire side panel in hot pink. Very 80's.
Torbjorn Sindballe wore all white on the run which is not very fashion forward, but it was all compression material. A long sleeve compression top, long white compression shorts and compression socks. Why all the white? Apparently he believed it would keep him cooler and have more places to put ice and water to cool his core. In fact there were a couple dozen people out there, it looked like, that were wearing compression socks. Now I used a compression sock to help heal my stress fractured tibia instead of a cast but its application to running has been fringe at best in my understanding.
Photos from the Underwear Run, and conversations about modes of dress during race week, have led me to believe that speedos will once again be worn a local races in 2008. Designer speedos were being shown off as fashion, like striped or textured pieces.
Also, word is that Speedo Fast skin suits were THE most talked about piece of clothing of the day. Apparently in 2006 only Normann Stadler wore the super slick in water fabric and at the 2007 race the beach was lined with bodies wearing the stuff.
Confidence is sexy. If nothing else, confidence and preparation favored the race. With so many former world champions out of the race so early, many people who planned only on a top 15 finish, came in top ten. What does this mean for us? Its an object lesson that no matter how many times we have missed the podium or a Top 5 placing in our divisions, Anything Is Possible.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
Saturday, October 13, 2007
Kona Update
MACCA WINS!!!!!!
Seven years of effort on this course has paid off for Chris McCormack. He gave up his Olympic dreams this year to focus on being the Ironman Champion. He never let up.
Craig Alexander, also an Australian, took second in his first Kona race. Aussies take 1 & 2.
Seven years of effort on this course has paid off for Chris McCormack. He gave up his Olympic dreams this year to focus on being the Ironman Champion. He never let up.
Craig Alexander, also an Australian, took second in his first Kona race. Aussies take 1 & 2.
Kona Update
Macca has overcome a ten minute deficit to take the mens lead on the run from Chris Leito! 70.3 Ironman champion and new comer to Kona, Craig "Crowie" Alexander is running at break neck speed to catch up and it could very well be a run down between him and Macca. It seems Leito is shot.
Chrissie Wellington (who?) is leading the woman and five minutes behind is Samantha McGlone who is a short course and Olympic champion in her first Kona showing.
My friend Nick is off the bike in 210th place. He climbed almost 300 spots with a 5:10 bike (21.66 mph). His total transition times equal six minutes.
Chrissie Wellington (who?) is leading the woman and five minutes behind is Samantha McGlone who is a short course and Olympic champion in her first Kona showing.
My friend Nick is off the bike in 210th place. He climbed almost 300 spots with a 5:10 bike (21.66 mph). His total transition times equal six minutes.
Kona Update
Watching the live stream at IronmanLive. Crazy day at Kona so far. No clouds and no wind.
A flu bug has knocked out Norman Stadler and Faris Al Sultan. Both up puking all night.
Luke Bell and Cam Brown are out too for reasons unknown right now.
Chris McCormick ten minutes back from Torbjorn Sindballe leaving T2. Tim DeBoom is right there too. Macca last year almost overcame a ten minute deficet on Stadler and is hauling ass to take the lead. Both Macca and DeBoom are faster runners than Sindballe.
Natasha Badmann has hit a traffic cone, ripped up her shoulder grabbed a different bike and tried to continue but could not.
Michelle Jones dropped out from a perforated ear drum injury she sustained in SoCal a few weeks back, also where Stadler and Al Sutan got their flu bug.
There will definitely be a new womens champion today.
Tim DeBoom is the only man on the course who has won Kona.
A flu bug has knocked out Norman Stadler and Faris Al Sultan. Both up puking all night.
Luke Bell and Cam Brown are out too for reasons unknown right now.
Chris McCormick ten minutes back from Torbjorn Sindballe leaving T2. Tim DeBoom is right there too. Macca last year almost overcame a ten minute deficet on Stadler and is hauling ass to take the lead. Both Macca and DeBoom are faster runners than Sindballe.
Natasha Badmann has hit a traffic cone, ripped up her shoulder grabbed a different bike and tried to continue but could not.
Michelle Jones dropped out from a perforated ear drum injury she sustained in SoCal a few weeks back, also where Stadler and Al Sutan got their flu bug.
There will definitely be a new womens champion today.
Tim DeBoom is the only man on the course who has won Kona.
Friday, October 12, 2007
It's a dance
You don't expect triathlon to be considered a choreography or a dance. Sometimes you will see the absurdity of gigantic NFL lineman being led through an aerobics class by some small, well trained instructor and the juxtaposition of the her well rehearsed moves verses the unwieldy, clumsy excuses put forth by football player make a funny visual.
When it comes right down to it, we triathletes have a similar choreography. The gracefulness of good swimmer. The body may be 85% underwater with just heels, side of the face and of course the arms being seen, but there is no mistaking someone who is so damn good at it. When watched they move so fast in the water and yet it looks as if their arms move in slow motion out of the water.
Cycling has its own choreography. A cyclist who has a near perfect pedal stroke does not look considerably different than someone who just learned how to ride. The power of a good cyclist is the obvious indicator. However the speed of the rotation, the angle of the body, the lack of sway, all work in concert for smooth movement through the environment. While I personally don't enjoy being passed by anyone on the bike, the parallax of the disc wheel humming past me is like a symphony. Who says music isn't allowed on the bike course?
Running is not so much a choreography. Let's be honest about that. Running is completely different than cycling and swimming. Running in a triathlon is more about the capacity for enduring infinite pains than anything else. You can see a swimmer or cyclist and even at the fastest, break neck speed you can say, boy are they smooth and smooth equals fast. When you watch the best in the world run a marathon or a 5k, their is a this incredibly frenetic movement that blurs the precision of movement with kinetic energy. When brought down to the level of the average age grouper, we seldom feel we run with perfect movements; we lead with the heel, run too far bent over or too upright, gasping for air or wondering where the speed is.
The ballet of T1 and T2 can make or break even the best race.
There is no doubt that in every sport there are routes to be run, plays to be executed. Triathlon though a solitary sport although incorporating three different events is the same. I think to an affirmation I use quite a bit, "Slow is smooth, smooth is fast." Next time you watch the best of the best do what you love to watch don't forget to appreciate the choreography of their movements and not just the score or the time.
When it comes right down to it, we triathletes have a similar choreography. The gracefulness of good swimmer. The body may be 85% underwater with just heels, side of the face and of course the arms being seen, but there is no mistaking someone who is so damn good at it. When watched they move so fast in the water and yet it looks as if their arms move in slow motion out of the water.
Cycling has its own choreography. A cyclist who has a near perfect pedal stroke does not look considerably different than someone who just learned how to ride. The power of a good cyclist is the obvious indicator. However the speed of the rotation, the angle of the body, the lack of sway, all work in concert for smooth movement through the environment. While I personally don't enjoy being passed by anyone on the bike, the parallax of the disc wheel humming past me is like a symphony. Who says music isn't allowed on the bike course?
Running is not so much a choreography. Let's be honest about that. Running is completely different than cycling and swimming. Running in a triathlon is more about the capacity for enduring infinite pains than anything else. You can see a swimmer or cyclist and even at the fastest, break neck speed you can say, boy are they smooth and smooth equals fast. When you watch the best in the world run a marathon or a 5k, their is a this incredibly frenetic movement that blurs the precision of movement with kinetic energy. When brought down to the level of the average age grouper, we seldom feel we run with perfect movements; we lead with the heel, run too far bent over or too upright, gasping for air or wondering where the speed is.
The ballet of T1 and T2 can make or break even the best race.
There is no doubt that in every sport there are routes to be run, plays to be executed. Triathlon though a solitary sport although incorporating three different events is the same. I think to an affirmation I use quite a bit, "Slow is smooth, smooth is fast." Next time you watch the best of the best do what you love to watch don't forget to appreciate the choreography of their movements and not just the score or the time.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Operation: Get Smart
After a few minutes of mostly me relating my liteny of head injury's, there was an uncomfortable pause as Mistress and I sat across the desk from the doctor. I thought, "We need an ice breaker."
Me: "So. Am I an idiot-savant."
Dr: "No."
Me: "Am I an idiot?"
Dr: "No."
Me: "Am I a savant?"
Dr" "No."
Me: "Can I tell people I'm a savant?"
Dr: "Sure. Go ahead."
Me (leaning in my chair to Mistress): "Honey. I'm a savant."
Mistress: "That's nice dear." "Now wipe the drool from your chin."
It didn't go exactly like that but nevertheless, here I am still a highly functioning head injury victim let loose on society. It took quite a while to go through the history of the open head injury, the closed head injury, the lack of effort the medical community put into me afterwards, the lying I did to get out of therapy, the mulitple concussions I've had since. The treatments I recieved for the physical recovery like learning how to walk and talk and tie my shoes. The treatments I got for the cognitive functions, the routines I learned. The coping mechanisms. At many points she cursed under her breath at the lack of effort and resources that were available to me at the time.
It was easy to express the the areas I felt I needed work with. It was a bit more difficult to listen to Mistress express her concerns on my changes. I purposefully did not read her list of things to review before hand, she would ask me. I would agree with most of them. Not all. But the problem with this condition is what is part of the brain injury and what is part of just being a driven guy.
By the end of the session, I realized that I had given her enough verbal cues to conditions past and present that there was no way I could be faking the severity of my symptoms. Like when I told her that for as long as I can remember I haven't been able to smell. Turns out the sniffer nerve is right next to where I had the big hit. I was relating something like smelling things differently and she suddenly stop writing, looked at me, smiled a second, then look back down. Sort of a 'Ah ha' moment. Lots of those.
The doctor explained that many victims of a multiple traumatic head injury such as I have sustained begin to exhibit breakdowns of ability around 20 years and mine will be 21 years ago next month. A good portion after twenty years of tying to cope, simply cannot and regress to a level where they become removed from their family, society or the workforce.
She gave me some 'Ah ha' moments. The almost universal mental response among TBI's to read the same thing over and over again (like I do when writing blog posts for example), how it takes much more mental energy to accomplish the same in a day as a normally functional person and this can make the person feel more tired, worn out or experience signs of slight depression.
In the end she is scheduling me for a test. I forgot the name already. It's basically an all day test to see where I am at and get baselines for future comparison. There are tests for lower functioning people and then people like me that are more high function but still have issues.
If for nothing else, I appreciate all of you who have stuck through these maybe inciteful but probably boring, self expressive posts. Maybe you know someone who has had a head injury like mine or maybe just a traumatic or mild concussion. I am not given to hyperbole but even one concussion can do harm, let alone the damage someone like me has done to himself repeatively.
Me: "So. Am I an idiot-savant."
Dr: "No."
Me: "Am I an idiot?"
Dr: "No."
Me: "Am I a savant?"
Dr" "No."
Me: "Can I tell people I'm a savant?"
Dr: "Sure. Go ahead."
Me (leaning in my chair to Mistress): "Honey. I'm a savant."
Mistress: "That's nice dear." "Now wipe the drool from your chin."
It didn't go exactly like that but nevertheless, here I am still a highly functioning head injury victim let loose on society. It took quite a while to go through the history of the open head injury, the closed head injury, the lack of effort the medical community put into me afterwards, the lying I did to get out of therapy, the mulitple concussions I've had since. The treatments I recieved for the physical recovery like learning how to walk and talk and tie my shoes. The treatments I got for the cognitive functions, the routines I learned. The coping mechanisms. At many points she cursed under her breath at the lack of effort and resources that were available to me at the time.
It was easy to express the the areas I felt I needed work with. It was a bit more difficult to listen to Mistress express her concerns on my changes. I purposefully did not read her list of things to review before hand, she would ask me. I would agree with most of them. Not all. But the problem with this condition is what is part of the brain injury and what is part of just being a driven guy.
By the end of the session, I realized that I had given her enough verbal cues to conditions past and present that there was no way I could be faking the severity of my symptoms. Like when I told her that for as long as I can remember I haven't been able to smell. Turns out the sniffer nerve is right next to where I had the big hit. I was relating something like smelling things differently and she suddenly stop writing, looked at me, smiled a second, then look back down. Sort of a 'Ah ha' moment. Lots of those.
The doctor explained that many victims of a multiple traumatic head injury such as I have sustained begin to exhibit breakdowns of ability around 20 years and mine will be 21 years ago next month. A good portion after twenty years of tying to cope, simply cannot and regress to a level where they become removed from their family, society or the workforce.
She gave me some 'Ah ha' moments. The almost universal mental response among TBI's to read the same thing over and over again (like I do when writing blog posts for example), how it takes much more mental energy to accomplish the same in a day as a normally functional person and this can make the person feel more tired, worn out or experience signs of slight depression.
In the end she is scheduling me for a test. I forgot the name already. It's basically an all day test to see where I am at and get baselines for future comparison. There are tests for lower functioning people and then people like me that are more high function but still have issues.
If for nothing else, I appreciate all of you who have stuck through these maybe inciteful but probably boring, self expressive posts. Maybe you know someone who has had a head injury like mine or maybe just a traumatic or mild concussion. I am not given to hyperbole but even one concussion can do harm, let alone the damage someone like me has done to himself repeatively.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Kona Call
Today is the day that most athletes will be traveling to Kona for the Ironman World Championships. How exciting. While I personally have very little desire to do Kona, I, like everyone am in complete awe of every person who qualifies for a spot.
I plan on spending Sunday with the laptop open and following special people. My friend, triathlon coach Nick (Nicholas) Goodman will there. This is his third trip. He started this years journey by winning a full Ironman slot at Ironman California 70.3, then winning a Kona slot by "doing well" (how modest) at Lake Placid.
Nick believes he will come in sub-10. In 2005 at Kona he was 10:10. He has sub-10 at IMAZ.
Do you have someone for me to track online? I think the more the better to pass the time.
I plan on spending Sunday with the laptop open and following special people. My friend, triathlon coach Nick (Nicholas) Goodman will there. This is his third trip. He started this years journey by winning a full Ironman slot at Ironman California 70.3, then winning a Kona slot by "doing well" (how modest) at Lake Placid.
Nick believes he will come in sub-10. In 2005 at Kona he was 10:10. He has sub-10 at IMAZ.
Do you have someone for me to track online? I think the more the better to pass the time.
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