Friday am swim/run/Tri Bike shopping

Swiming 2400 yds and then off to Hyland Hills with Nim, mini cooper and Al to run for an hour.

Looking for donations for tomorrows shopping spree at Gear West Bike,

Happy thanksgiving

NIM, Baker and I got a 10 miler in today before all of our big feasts. Happy thanksgiving.

Great end of season and congrats on PRs

We all ran the monster dash half marathon today with everyone beating their goal times and three great PRs. Brett slams his 1/2 M time and finishes in top of his age group. Baker man destroys his PR and beats his goal time by 4 minutes. NIM runs a 1:28 1/2M besting his record and finishing 62nd in a race of 4,300 people. Congrats guys. What a great way to conclude the season. We can all take it easy over the next several weeks but training will have to kick back up in early December. Enjoy your success gentlemen.

2011 Half Marathons Results

Nothing in Moderation:

Location	Race Time	Time of Day	Overall Place	Division Place	Sex Place
Time	1:28:42	9:59:20	61/4665	9/275	53/1759
GunStart	00:00	8:30:30
ChipStart	0:09	8:30:38	75/4665	10/275	65/1759

Monster Half Marathon Results

Nothing in Moderation:
2010 results

Location	Race Time	Time of Day	Pace Between	Overall Place	Division Place	Sex Place
Time	1:37:04	10:10:16	7:32	211/3501	26/258	175/1428
10M	1:13:45	9:46:56	7:25	210/3501	24/258	172/1428
GunStart	00:00	8:32:47
ChipStart	0:26	8:33:12		252/3501	30/258	197/1428

At least we wont have to watch out for Gazelle in Lake Placid!

Work travel takes it's toll

I spent sunday through Tuesday on the road traveling and it looked something like this. Sunday- short walk and easy trail bike then get on a plane and head to work function for bad food and no sleep. Monday can't drag out of bed to run so end up working all day then doing an evening event that meant dinner was chips, dip, beer and cake. Three hours of sleep then an early am Tuesday flight (no workout day) with work all day prepping and delivering two hour presentation. Hop on a plane home. Three days of no sleep, bad food and beer. Traveling and training don't mix!

Stay at home vacations rock!

i love stay at home vacations -- i can workout as much as i want and even catch a nap every day! Sat; 11 mile run with the dog. Flat ground, but it still counts for something. Sunday: P90X with a 2 hour ride towing 75Lbs of screaming shildren in a trailer. Great strengther training! Monday Morning opened up with 10 miles of hills in the Hyland Ski area witht he dog and then 1 hour bike twoing my kids. Tuesday morning -- 40 mile ride on my tri bike. I have to say, I've never had an easier ride in my life. After twoing 75Lbs every time I've been on the bike for the last month -- gliding on my race bike is easy as hell! Wednesday I stood up the crew at 5am because I overslept. Then  I ran 11 miles around Harriet and Nolomis. Today is a 3 hour brick (2X1). Friday was a day off. Saturday I put in 60 miles on the bike with a 14 MPH headwind with a negative split of 15 minutes. Sunday -- 13.5 miles in the Hyland Hills again. 226 miles between th bike and run! Vacations... gotta love em!

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish

I was deeply moved when I heard of the passing of Steve Jobs yesterday. While I am sure others will do a much better job of memorializing his accomplishments and contributions, simply put he was a beacon of light for our generation. My gosh, he invented the personal computer out of his garage and then sold his Volkswagen bus to finance it – changing the way personal computing was done forever. If that wasn’t enough, he was fired from Apple and then rehired after starting a little company called Pixar. He then transformed the world once again with IPod, IPhone, IPad… taking Apple out of the ashes and creating one of the most successful companies today. He invented things we did not know we needed and then defined the market – talk about a visionary.
About a year ago I watched his commencement speech at Stanford on YouTube. In that speech he noted the quote, “If you live your life every day as if it was your last, one day you will be right.” He went on to describe how he lived by these words noting that if too many days went by where the above wasn’t true, he changed his course. The message is elegant in its simplicity. He concluded his speech with a quote that he had learned earlier in life – “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish”.
So what does all have to do with 4 guys looking to complete an IM? I am not sure but perhaps we are (in our own small way) pursuing a dream, living life as if each day may be our last and staying hungry and staying foolish. Thanks for the advice Steve.

If we were all labrador Retrievers

Vote on which one you think NIM is....

Sore Legs

Great run this morning, started at 5 am. To most people that sounds rediculous (from what I hear). It was about 60 degrees, which is wonderful for Oct. 5th.

regarding NIM post on sore legs...it's interesting because for the next year, none of us will have more than a day or two with out sore legs, arms, or back. If you go a day with nothing sore, that means it's time to get off your ass again and go for a run, swim or bike ride.

After a while you stop noticing you are sore.

It becomes a way of life. Walking around at work, doing your day to day things, and your muscles have been worked over.
It sure makes everything else in life a lot easier when you've ran your ass off the morning before.
You can think to yourself, "of course i can complete that task, i ran 10 miles at 5 am this morning. no problem."

Everything else is easy compared to training for Ironman

Diet

My diet of ice cream, cookies, beer and wine might prove to be a problem over the next 10 months.

Diets

My diet of smoked oysters, tuna, granola bars, Muscle Milk, vitamins, fruit and water is starting to work! Now if I can just keep it up for anouth 10 months...

Mondays...

Mondays are always the toughest! We've just spent the whoel weekend working out and now you're starting your workweek off tired. The key is to do a workout on monday moring after the first cup of coffee. That way you start the week off right and don't give into laziness. Too many weeks have gotten away from me for taking mondays off... If i had to pick an "off day" it would be Wednesday. I have no logical data that supports this theory -- only experience...

on turning 50...

Hey NIM, I can't remember but I think I left my bifocals in your car. I need them because I can't see the fine print in my new AARP membership and I think I can get a discount on Viagra.

...Bakerman, Nim - great run through Highlands today. I would say 14-15 miles of distance through those hills!

Open water swim seasoned be over

Stout and I went for a swim and bike at 7 this morning. It was 34 degrees when I got in the car. We opted out of the swim. The bike was no bargain either. I tried to get Stout to wait til it hit 40 out. I even offered to play shakira videos in my warm car. He was adamant. We froze our asses for the first two hours. The double egg sandwich was good even though bistro man was unusually grumpy. Nothing like fall in minnesota.

The Iron Blog: And so it begins...

The Iron Blog: And so it begins... Each of us four have selcted names that properly identifies one another. Of course our names we decided by the group -- not individually.

A few words about us.

What makes four drastically different individuals crossing multiple generations and from vastly different backgrounds all get together to achieve the single common goal of competing/completing Ironman Lake Placid 2012? For the next year our story(ies) will unfold. Let the fun - and pain and suffering - begin.

And so it begins...