There to Here...Here to There...

Here's a brief summary of 2009...into 2010.

Last year in 2009...

Jan: Honeymoon to Sedona: hiked, ran up trails, mountain biked, hot air balloon...and etc...Started teaching ESL at Southern Nazarene Univ in Bethany, OK ...taught there until December. :o)

Feb: General training & teaching. (2009 training was bike specific training since it was my weakness.)

Mar: For 2 weeks, went to CO to train with Sean Wendt & Riptide and was fortunate & thankful to live with Amy & Jordan in Golden, CO - fun & great training.

April: St. Anthony's - wanted to get my pro card here...the swim was canceled because of the choppy water conditions...no pro card.

May: Got a new road bike the weekend of Captextri. (Unfortunately, it didn't have aerobars for the TT race.) I raced on it and was the 4th amateur overall...needed to be 3rd to get a pro card. The next weekend in OKC, I decided to jump in the local Route 66 race...which happened to be the Best of the US qualifier. I ended up winning.

June: By mid/end of June, my back was throbbing and was strained. Initially, I thought I just needed to get used to the new bike position, so I kept riding, but my back only got worse to the point that even lying down was painful. It ended up that the frame was too small, so I got a bigger one. 

July: Recovered, started training hard again...Steve Schlegel gave me a loaner TT bike and also loaned me Zipp wheels to use in my races.

Aug: Went out to CO to train with Riptide again...a couple weeks after getting home, went to Age Group Nationals in Tuscaloosa. Won my age group, 5th overall which qualified me for a pro card. Yay! With Best of the US amateur race a month away, I decided to wait to get the pro card so that I could compete there.

Sept: Pacific Grove - (TriCal puts on such great races!) very fun race...the Pacific Ocean is COLD :o) I won it, and again qualified for a pro card and felt like my fitness was the best it had ever been. 2 weeks later was Best of the US in Mission Viejo. I had the race of my life there, and ended up winning.

Oct: Literally 3 days before leaving for Dallas, I got word that I could race at the US Open, and decided to go up against 5 of the top 10 women in the world...and...I got smoked by 15 minutes! The main problem for me was that they were MUCH fitter than I was and had much more experience! To make things worse, it wasn't my day - just as in Pacific Grove & BOUS everything went great, in the US Open, everything went wrong...I made some bad errors and my brain and body didn't seem to be clicking...Going into the race, I knew it would be more of a learning experience than actually battling out with those girls for a medal ;o) but I just wanted to get the experience before the year ended. It was definitely inspiring and a reality check for me to understand where my fitness & experience was compared to them. 
Nov: Asked Barb Lindquist to possibly coach me...ended up being a great fit - yay! :o) I started swimming with the local swim club here in town – Chesapeake Swim Club…I can’t remember the last time I was doing 7K yards in the pool with a 1:10 base on the main sets! (have I ever before been able to do that?) :o)
Dec: Decided to join Team Undiscovered. They are fast & furious...and also fun & funny. Lucky me that they aren't triathlon haters :o) and invited me to be part of their team!
2010...
Jan: Still enjoying the grueling training...wondering where Stephen will get a job and my training will then adapt to the new (or same) training areas…
Feb: Decided to make my first race a sprint, draft-legal one in Clermont, FL! (hello, learning curve!) I'm excited to see where my fitness is and gain experience at draft-legal racing. I feel pretty comfortable at all the group rides here in OKC, but I'm sure it's different in a race...which is also a reason why I'm excited to race a bit with Undiscovered!
The oh-so-tentative schedule :o)
Mar: Clermont Sprint; Miami Internat'l Tri
April: St. Anthony's Tri
May: Rev3 Knoxthrill; CapTexTri
June: Coteau du Lac
July: Treasure Island in San Fran; NYC Tri
Aug: Kelowna ; Chicago Tri
Sept: Pro Nationals
Oct: US Open