The coolest music video ever. . .

. . . and the #1 most played song on my iPod.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=CxeQN2GWAzw

They played this on Scrubs just now and I have to go and watch this video 17 times now.

Hat Trick of Workouts

I had a hat trick of workouts today. I got up at about 5:30 this morning and hit the pool at Stacy. I swam about 2400yds in 45min so it was a nice and easy swim. I did 600 warmup and then 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 300, 100. I usually do some sort of pyramid like this when I can't think up another workout. I actually need to write some workouts down and put them in a Ziploc baggie for pool sessions like today.

At lunch, I lifted weights for the first time since probably March. I didn't push myself too hard but just got my muscles a little fatigued. It wasn't that bad. I probably shouldn't do any leg exercises because that aggravates my right calf issue.

Then, I did the core workout today with J&A. It was tough because we did 5 minute plank pose and then 100 8-count body builders. Well, I didn't do the body builders completely because I didn't do the pushups. I've decided when I lift on a core workout day, I'll go to core workout but won't do the pushup type exercises since I lifted already that day.

Now, I'm home, full from dinner (whole wheat couscous and salmon again), chilling, and geeking out to some Star Trek: The Next Generation as background noise.

Do these pants make me look fat?

Seriously, that's how I feel right now since I'm whining so much about my weight. I gained 11 pounds in 28 days. That's 38,500 excess calories total in the last 28 days which is about 1400 extra calories per day. I've been eating a decent amount but not an extra 1400 calories per day extra. Like I said before, I'm just using this as more motivation. . .

And it's working. This morning I had my first of 5 trials for a study that I'm doing for one of my old coaches. I had my LT and my VO2max tested. The VO2max test was painful as usual and I was actually shaking for at least 10 minutes afterwards. I had a total of 30 minutes on the bike and it was a higher intensity than usual. Tonight after work, I did 35 minutes on the elliptical. I was going to do 45 but I just didn't feel like it. My right calf was feeling OK. Didn't hurt but I could feel it. My left foot was going slightly numb on the elliptical. These foot problems that I'm having are driving me insane.

Then, I came home and had dinner. Spinach salad with fat free ranch dressing, whole wheat couscous, crusted spicy salmon. BTW, the whole wheat couscous wasn't that good.
I'm going to get my regular not as healthy but a lot tastier couscous next time.

Also, I think I'm going to get my Ironman tattoo this weekend. Woohoo!

I hate shaving my legs. It's a pain in the ass, but I like the finished product.

I swam 1 mile

I swam 1 mile today. Well, it was like 1600yds so close enough. I just did 8x200 easy and I wasn't that out of shape. It was a workout for sure, but at least I did something to get back in the swing of things. I was going to do the core workout tonight, but work got in the way of that. Damnit!

Oh, shoe mileage from a short run I did last week. My right foot was still hurting though.

Shoe mileage: 95.5 miles

Holy 191.5!

Yep, I weighed 191.5 lbs this morning. Wow! Like I said yesterday, I'm back on the wagon now because it's embarrassing saying that I gained 11 pounds in 4 weeks.

Cycling!

Went cycling today. It was great. The high is suppose to be about 75 so it was 65-70 when I left. I had my arm warmers on but I quickly took them off. This was actually the first time I rode a bike on the roads since IMFL and it felt great. I tried to take it easy but towards the end of the ride I pushed it a little bit. I don't know what my ride time was by the total time was 2:03 so I guess I did 35 miles or so. As usual, the Austin Wind was out and was blowing from the southeast. Actually, today it seemed to be coming from every direction. It's crazy how it's like that almost every single day I ride.

The main reason I rode is because I'm feeling very fat. I'm going to hop on the scale tomorrow and I'm afraid of what it'll say. I'm guessing somewhere around 188 but we'll see. I'm getting back into a regular workout schedule so that's good. I have nothing but clean and healthy food in my house, too. I'm also going to pick up weight lifting and yoga again since I haven't done either of those things in months.

Sore

I'm sore. I went and did the J&A core workout on Monday. It's 2 days later and I'm still sore. I guess that's good though. I'm actually not as sore as I thought that I would be. It's my abs, chest, and shoulders that are the most sore.

I'm now in NC with my mom. She actually has an elliptical machine and some sort of weight machine in her house so I can actually get some exercise in this weekend. Woohoo!

More Injuries

As expected, I'm injured from IMFL. I saw my PT today to get things checked out. I definitely have an inflammed medial gastroc tendon on my right calf. That really isn't that bad because hopefully it'll heal well. My foot is a different problem. Apparently, I have a bruised sesmoid bone in my first metatarsal on my right foot. Why is this a problem? The sesmoids tend to not heal too well. My PT thinks that one reason why I keep having foot problems is because I'm really healthy. With my low pulse and low blood pressure, there isn't much blood going to my feet and that also explains why my feet are always cold, too. I now have this great looking tape job on the back of my calf, but it helps. One problem with all of this is that I want to start running again soon, but my PT told me to not run. Oh, I ran 1 mile tonight!

Shoe mileage: 94 miles

I'm bored

This may incredibly pitiful, but now that my IM is over with, what should I do? All I've done since Friday is watch TV between doing house chores and surfing the Internet a ton. I don't feel like going out and drinking except one night on the weekend. I don't have to be at work that much because half the time I'm there I'm there just showing my face. Someone please give me some ideas on things to do now that I'm not working out 20 hours a week!

I exercised!

I exercised today! First time I worked out since IMFL. I just spun easy for about 30 minutes. It felt good and my right calf loosened up quite a bit. I'll try to swim tomorrow a bit and then another spin on Wednesday for 45 minutes.

Crazy Weight

Exactly 2 weeks ago today, I had my prerace weigh in for IMFL. I weighed 180.5. Today, I weighed 190. Yep, 10 pounds in 2 weeks. Let's assume that all that weight is just water weight. In that case, I have an extra 1.25 gallons in my body. If that's actually fat, then I consumed 35,000 extra calories in the last 14 days which equates to 2500 extra calories a day. I hate my body.

I'm tired of eating crap already

It's been 6 days since I did IMFL and I've been eating crap to make up for the stuff that I gave up before it. I'm done eating crap and I want to get back on the wagon and eat healthy again. I just feel lethargic and not well. I'm going to go grocery shopping tomorrow morning, since I don't have to get up and work out, and get some nice, healthy food again.

Post race blues

It's only the 4th day after my race and I'm already getting the post race blues. I know that this happens to me but it really sucks to be really high for a few days and then crash pretty badly just a few days later. It may just be a coincidence, but I also returned to work today.

Before the race, I couldn't wait until I didn't have to train every day, but right now, I can't wait until I can start running and biking again.

Ironman Florida Race Report

I like to have my blog and race reports to be very detailed and therefore they tend to be very long and there may be some TMI moments so grab a beer or a cup of coffee, sit down, and enjoy the tale of pee, a kitten, and a grown man growing. Not at the same time, you pervs!

Pre Race

I started packing for the race on Sunday night. I made sure I had enough clean clothes and stuff like that. Monday, I really packed stuff up and then on Tuesday, I packed up the car. My Outback was completely full with 2 bikes, a cooler of food, and all the gear that I needed. Mark, a guy from Texas Iron, and I left on Wednesday morning at around 7am. We got into PCB at about 9pm. It took us 14 hours but that included a detour from the HOV lane in Houston, a couple of spots of bad traffic, and eating dinner at a sit down Italian restaurant with Betsy. We made pretty good time and the drive really wasn't that bad. We unloaded the car and got all of the stuff in the condo. Speaking of the condo, we stayed at The Summit. It wasn't that bad. It was older but cheap. Not super nice, but not nasty and gross either. I was happy. Mark and Betsy ended up staying in the condo with me so that worked out.

Thursday was a swim workout with Jamie and Andrea. Weather was somewhat cooler but not too bad. The water was actually warmer than the air and it warmed up substantially about 50yds out from the beach. We learned how to deal with the waves and got some beach start tips. Got some lunch and then went to the expo. I looked around a bit and then registered and picked up my packet and other race stuff. The expo was OK. I thought the expo at IMAZ was better, but I hardly ever buy stuff there so it really doesn't matter. I laid out my stuff to make sure everything was ready to go. I didn't forget much stuff except for my hair clippers and my scoop for my InfinIT. I like racing with a cleanly shaved head, but that didn't happen. I know that Mike Harris uses InfinIT so I used his scoop to estimate mine. It worked out OK. And Mark and Betsy sneeked into my room and snuck a pic of me and my bike.

(If you look closely, I was having a hard time hiding my smile)

Friday was a tuneup workout. I swam a bit, rode my bike, and then did a short run. On the swim, I noticed that my wetsuit was rubbing on my neck a bit. I made sure to put on Sport Slick on race day. The first bike ride with the disc wheel was interesting. I got blown around a bit with the wind, but it wasn't too badly and I was able to keep control pretty well. I got everything ready to go and packed up in my T1 and T2 bags. I checked in my bike and headed back to the condo to relax. Speaking of, the condo was fairly close to everything, but I felt like I walked way too much the 2 days before the race. If I did this race again, I would try to get a condo at the host resort and try to minimize the walking. My feet hurt pretty much the entire trip and on my tuneup run that day, my feet were hurting and it was only a 12 minute run. Also, I had only 2 days before the race. For those IM virgins out there, allow yourself at least 3 full days before the race to get things done. THe welcome banquet that night was OK. Food was decent but finding a seat was difficult. It's hard to find a place to feed about 4,000 people but they managed. There was a lot of pep rally talk and it was good. Since this was my first IM, I went to it, but if/when I do another IM, I probably won't go. It would be nice if IMNA would include a ticket for a guest for the welcome and postrace banquets since people rarely travel alone to these.

Dinner that night was a typical high carb dinner with some of the Texas Iron athletes. Spaghetti with garlic bread and ice cream for desert. I also had a glass and a half of wine with dinner. I just felt like I needed it since I've been without alcohol for 8 weeks before the race. Since I'm talking about food, I tried a somewhat different carb loading strategy for this race. I usually don't like carb loading since it upsets my stomach pretty badly and it just isn't fun eating that much food. This time, I ate a decent amount of food on Monday, ate pretty much constantly on Tuesday, Wednesday, and THursday, and then ate more normally on Friday. That way, clean out my system better on Friday and hopefully not have to #2 in a PortaPotty during the race. We watched Pirates of the Carribbean and just hung out. It was fun. Glen and myself were IM virgins. Danny and Jen had done a few IM's before. Eric and Jose didn't eat with us since they had their families with them in Florida. Betsy and Mark were there spectating and being sherpas.

We went back to our condo and I look over my last few things. One good thing about IMNA races is that you get a lot of stuff ready beforehand, but some people don't like it. It's nice because you get up, put on your clothes for the day and head out. You don't have to worry about dragging all of your stuff and your bike and get set up. It's already set up. Oh, I had to put my special needs bags together but that didn't take too long. So, I went to bed. Well, tried to go to bed. Up until this point, I really wasn't that nervous. I would get bouts of nervousness, but was pretty chill mostly. I was much more nervous for Buffalo Springs for some reason. I guess that doing well at BSLT gave me confidence that I could go up in distance and do well. Also, BSLT was the only long distance triathlon that I did before IMFL and I still wasn't that nervous. I also followed my coaching program pretty well and trusted them. I had put in the work and the race was just a celebration and reward for all the sacrifices that I've made. No matter how calm I've been, not being able to sleep the night before the race is the surest sign of my nervousness. Rachel called me and we talked for about 45 minutes. That put me at ease quite a bit actually. I finally fell asleep at around 11:30.

Race Morning

I woke up at about 4:15. Surprisingly, I slept straight through the night. I got about 4.5 hours of quality sleep and that's awesome for me before a race. I ate breakfast which consisted of a PB&J bagel, some yogurt, an apple, and Gatorade with Nuun. I put on my tri shorts and put on some warm clothes. The temp was close to 40 which is a lot colder than what I'm used to. I made sure I had everything ready to go in my dry clothes bag and my bike and run special needs bags. Grabbed a Clif Bar and a bottle of Gatorade. I really follow Monique Ryan's nutrition in her book Sports Nutrition for Endurance Athletes, but I can't eat that much before a race. My stomach will get upset so I ate a slightly bigger breakfast than normal. This worked out great for me this race because I felt fine that morning. Another prerace thing I do is poo. I have this great ability to completely clean out my digestive track before a race. My body just knows when to empty itself for optimal athletic performance. That morning, I did three #2's in 45 minutes. This worked so well that I didn't have to go #2 again until Monday morning. At this point, we headed down to the transition area. It was cold, but not that badly. I brought some things that I had to put into my T bags. I pumped up my bike tires and found Betsy. I started to get my wetsuit on and I unknowningly had this picture taken of my better side.



BTW, my ass looks great in a wetsuit so I don't have to worry about that anymore. I headed down to the beach to get ready. I ran into Jamie and Andrea and hung out with them a bit. A lot of people were gathering around because it was getting closer to the cannon going off. Fish took off her jacket and gave it to me while she went to warm up before the pro race. It was cold out. Very cold. I had some sacrificial socks and sandals on so I wasn't that cold. I then met Herbert from Slowtwitch and Litespeed fame. He gave me his jacket when Jamie wandered off to help keep warm. I headed into the corral and a minute later, the pros cannon went off. A warmup swim was needed so I took a short swim in the water. It felt great, too. I headed back and I saw all the people lined up on the beach. Problem was that it seemed so far away. I headed back in and lined up on the beach. I found Jen and Danny and wished them luck. I lined up on the outside because I didn't want to get caught in the washing machine by the buoy line. I didn't have a watch on so I didn't know how long until the cannon went off. I just looked out over the water and was happy to be there. I've done the work to be here and I was just now waiting for the celebration. A very painful and long celebration, but still a celebration. I waited another minute and then, BOOM!

The Swim

This was the roughest water that I've ever swam in. And saying that, it wasn't that bad. I lined up on the outside as I said before because I'm more comfortable out there even if I have to swim a few extra yards. Also, it gives me a way out in case something happens. I just kept swimming forward. I got hit a decent amount of times but I just kept moving forward. I've learned to be much more aggressive on the swim. If you have an aggressive mindset, it's easier to take blows and keep moving. I had my arm slapped in mind stroke. I had some guy swimming on the left of my actually hit me on the right side of my head. Two more guys completely cut me off but closing a gap between them directly in front of me. I stiff armed at least 4 people that would've made Heisman proud since they were swimming on top of me and I wanted them away from me. I try to not take any of this personally because no one really is meaning to do it. Basically, it was the typical rugby ruck and very violent. I kind of liked it.

The swells were about 1-2 feet. They seemed like 4 feet high when in the water. I quickly got used to trying to sight but being in the bottom of a swell and then timing it correctly so that I'm on top of the swell when I sight again. I just looked for the orange buoy. I think I swam pretty straight but who knows. I finally turned the buoy and swam parallel to the beach. At this point, I stopped and just looked around for a second. I saw a ton of people swimming in front of me, a ton behind me, and the beach looked really far away. I was swimming an Ironman. I yelled "I fucking love this shit!"; I was having so much fun out there. And I kept going.

Swimming in this direction was different. The swells prevented me from breathing on my right side and I could eaither breathe in water or breathe to the left. This prevented a small problem since when I sight for a buoy, I usually breathe to the right. I quickly adjusted though. Then, I turned back and headed to the beach. This was a completely different story. I don't know what the hell was different about this stretch, but it seemed like a scene from The Perfect Storm. The swells seemed to be 6 feet now and a ton of people were thrashing around. I had no choice but to put one arm in front of the other. Sighting was easy because I used the tall condos. It was easier this way and I was pretty happy when I hit the colder water which meant that I was getting closer to the beach. I tried beaching myself since I find it much more efficient than wading onto the beach from hip deep water. Well, I got up a little too soon and I wasted some energy. I hit the beach and ran through the sand. That was tough.

Jamie told us to try to run along the beach and then swim out straight. I didn't do that because there were people in the way. I should've politely gone through them so I did what most people did and swam out diagonally. People were thinning out a bit so this part was easier. I started to pass a few people, too. I also took a line closer to the buoys, but a little too close. As I was swimming by a buoy, I saw the anchor line. Someone was right next to me and when they took a stroke, they pulled on the buoy anchor line and the buoy moved and hit me in the head. Quite funny. I then took the orange turn buoy a little too close and that one hit me in the head, too. I swam too the next buoy and turn to head back into the beach for the last time. For some reason, the water seemed even worse at this point, but I kept plugging along. THis time, I swam to the outside of the people, but was pushed by the current near the buoy line. I was getting thrashed so I moved to the inside of the buoy line and it was nice. I towed some guy into the beach pretty much this entire leg so good for him for finding a good pair of feet, but I peed while towing him in so the jokes on him. I couldn't find a good pair of feet the entire time and that happens in every race. I felt the cool water again and made sure I beached myself this time. It worked and I passed a couple of legs sticking out of the water on this swim. I hit the beach and started running under the arch. Crossing the matt meant hearing a beep and I was done with the swim.

The swim time was 1:08:30. A little slower than expected, but considering the rough water, I was pretty happy with it. I was 42/123 in my age group and 486th overall. Not too bad. My pace was 1:49/100m. I wanted to swim a 1:35 pace or so, but that would've put me under an hour and that's wishful thinking for my first IM. I'm still happy with the swim since it was a slow swim for others as well.

T1

The great thing about IM's are wetsuit strippers. I found a couple, pointed to them, and made eye contact with me. How this is suppose to work is that you peel off your wetsuit to the waist and then lay on the ground. They'll pull your suit off when you stick your feet in the air. I didn't do this. When I pointed to them and ran towards them, I was a little slow in getting the top of my wetsuit off. Eh, oh well. I thanked them and then ran through the showers and up into the transition area. For some reason, I just felt better getting my own bag than waiting for a volunteer for some reason. I was somewhat disoriented, too. I ran into the change tent and it was like a trauma ward from mash. It was crowded, chaotic, and cramped. I wish the tent was bigger because I was one of the faster swimmers for the day and it was only going to get more crowded. I went near the exit and found a chair. I dumped my stuff out and had a volunteer help me out. My HRM strap went on and the volunteer helped me put on my jersey over my wet body. I found out that if you put on socks inside out, they still work. Also, arm warmers put on inside out work, too. I just took my time through transition and tried not to rush too much and forget something. Oh, I had a breath mint to get the taste of salt water out of my mouth out and I really liked having that.

I was still pretty chilly out and I don't like the cold, but I can handle it. My plan was leg warmers and arm warmers. I put on my Sugoi cycling jacket on top since it's great for this kind of weather. Problem was that the zipper is broke. It'll zip up, but it will unzip from the zipper up. My solution to this was to use duct tape to keep it closed. Ok, jacket is on and I started filling up my pockets with stuff. BTW, this was a pain in the ass. Next time, I'm using a bento box on the bike and having all of my stuff there instead of stuffing my jersey pockets. A tip for the newbies is in transition, work on putting on your stuff from the bottom up so that you don't forget anything. You could also try from the top down, but try getting your jersey on when you have your helmet on already. Had my helmet, glasses, shoes, arm & leg warmers, jacket, spare tire, and headed out. I got near my bike and called out my number. A volunteer got my bike out but I discovered something. My spare tire was gone. Shit! I can't go without a spare because if I do, I'll get a flat. Fuck! I had to go retrace my steps through transition. I finally found my tire but I wasted about 2 minutes to find it. Went back to my bike and thanked the volunteer. Headed out of transition and I was now on the bike. My T1 time was 9:38. Pretty slow, but I took it easy and I have some ideas to make it faster next time.

The Bike

Once I got my bike and crossed the dismount line. I had my shoes in my hand so I got passed the dismount line so I wouldn't create a bottleneck there. Put my bike on the railing and put my shoes on. I had a spare breathmint and I ended up giving it to someone who was really, really excited about having it. Yeah, I could've put my shoes on in T1 and walked with them, but I just didn't feel like it. It cost me about 20 seconds so it wasn't that bad. I made sure my bike was in a very easy gear so it wasn't bad moving and allowed me to clip in pretty quickly. That prevented me from swerving all over the place. It was windy immediately so I tried to keep spinning through the wind. Almost immediately, my jacket with the broken zipper came undone. I didn't want the jacket flapping around the entire time. I had some duct tape on my top tube just for this. I put it on the jacket. Within another 30 seconds, the jacket was open and the duct tape didn't work. I had to do something and almost immediately, I tucked the end of the jacket into my shorts. It kept it from flapping like Superman's cape which would definitely not be aerodynamic and it would cost me something like 30 minutes on the bike. The jacket definitely worked for the day. I was toasty warm but I wasn't too hot. I might have been fine without the jacket and with just arm warmers like a lot of other people, but I didn't want to risk it.

As I was riding, it was windy. I was getting blow around a decent amount, but not too badly. I passed some people going out (slow bikers) and I was passed by a few others as well (slow swimmers). This continued all day long. There weren't many riders around the first bit of the ride, but that quickly changed. It seemed like riders started bunching up. There was some unintentional drafting by me. I didn't see any pacelines, but there were a decent amount of packs together. I tried really hard to race clean but on a flat, fast course like this, the packs don't get broken up easily. However, whenever there was a hill, I did attack just because that's what I do. I don't attack super hard, but I do get out of my saddle and muscle my way up a hill. The first hill that we came to was actually a bridge and I passed up about 30 people on that short hill and that was really fun doing it on a disc rear wheel.

Speaking of, I rode my 2004 Cervelo Dual for this race. It was pretty much a stock setup. I had raised up the cockpit of the bike for an IM race. I think I just raised it by a small spacer and a big spacer. I did this because whenever I race, my hip flexor on my left side starts to hurt as well as my lower back on the left side. I'll get into this later. For my wheels, Don at Austin Tri Cyclist hooked me up big time. He let me borrow a set of Zipp Z9 wheels. Yes, these are the super nice disc rear and Z4 front with ceramic bearings. This was my first race with a disc and I liked it. When you're on the disc, you don't get the cool disc sound (whooomp-whooomp-whoomp) unless you're passing something that cause the sound to echo, but it's still fun because of the intimidation factor.

Heading out was OK. It was somewhat windy and it felt like there was a respectable but not too bad headwind. The road was fairly high quality as well. There was this one idiot who was riding very aggressively and was trying to split riders. He was crossing wheels and just not that smart. I got in front of him and left him behind. My nutrition plan was to drink 2 bottles of fluids every hour. The first bottle would be of InfinIT. It would provide me with 330 calories and 650mg of sodium. I had 3 bottles of this on my bike in T1 and I would pick up 3 more bottles at special needs. The other bottle per hour was a bottle of water from the aid stations. I would fill up my aero bottle and then drop a Nuun in it. I would also take two Thermolytes per hour. This worked really well for me. I didn't have many nutrition problems the entire day. I actually had to cut back on the fluid intake. I didn't pee until 2 hours into the bike, but I had peed 3 times by the time I hit the 3 hour mark. I probably could've peed while on the bike, but I just didn't want to do that today. One, I didn't own the wheels that I was riding. Two, it wasn't warm outside and I didn't want to warm up but then cool off really badly from peeing on myself. I would just pull over to the side of the ride, put one foot down, straddle the bike, whip it out, and pee. When getting back on the road, I would look for a gap behind me and not bolt out in front of someone causing a wreck. This worked well but it was frustrating passing so many people, but then having them pass me when I stopped to pee. Luckily, I found out something about this peeing position that would help me out later on the bike.

We kept heading north on Hwy 79. Then, we turned east on Hwy 20. People told me about this road and it was true. It was long and boring and there was a headwind the entire way. I tried to keep my average speed up to 20mph but by using time and mile markers, I was falling off pace pretty quickly. I was 7 minutes behind a 20mph pace at the special needs. It wasn't too badly considering the wind. I tried to stay tucked in the aero position as much as possible. My cadence was high, too. I train with a cadence of 85-90rpms, but when I race, I tend to do 95-105rpms no problem. I do this in all my races and it just works for me, or so I think. Jamie, my coach gave me a plan for the race. He said to keep my heart rate in the 147-148 range. This was based off of my LT and VO2max numbers as well as previous race performances. I trusted his numbers and I kept it in the 145-150 range as best as possible. This part of the road was pretty cool for one reason; you could see this huge line of cyclist forever into the horizon. It was great seeing that many athletes out on the road together. I'm sure the locals were pissed off, but oh well. There were some packs of riders still, but no pacelines. There were some hills on this part and I ended up powering up these as well. I like these small hills. It felt good to get out of the saddle because my left hip flexor was starting to hurt. Any time that I got out of the saddle would make it feel better.

I was looking forward to special needs and it came up pretty quickly. I just wanted a break because this stretch of road was mentally draining. Also, getting off this road meant getting out of the headwind and picking up a slight tailwind, too. It was slightly before Mile 50. I wish it was a little later in the bike course though. It meant 62+ miles without any of my own nutritional support. Also, I like having the hard, long part of a ride being at the beginning. I came into the special needs and a volunteer gave me my bag. I straddled the bike and did my thing. I had 3 more bottles of InfinIT. I also had some Nuun and more Thermolytes. There was a PB&J sandwich in there and I had half of it. This wasn't a good idea, though. I had my jacket on and I took it off. With the broken zipper, I had to just rip it off to get the jacket off. I threw it in my bag and kept going. Oh, I grabbed another Rice Krispie treat, too. I kept riding. I really need to either keep stuff in a bento box or learn to get all of my nutrition from the aid stations. It's doable for sure but I just need to practice it. It's nice having all of my own nutritional needs, but it's also nice not having to carry anything on the bike or the run. If I do do that, I need to watch out for getting enough electrolytes.

That PB&J sandwich wasn't a good idea. My stomach starting hurting almost immediately. This caused me to not drink any fluids or take in any calories. I had a tailwind once we turned off of Hwy 20 which helped my spirits up since I was absolutely flying now, but the stomach thing started getting to me. I drank barely a single bottle of fluid for the next 20 miles. Normally the PB&J is good for me, but I usually eat it as a prerace meal. This was the first race situation and it didn't work out for me. I was starting to lose it mentally. But I had a tailwind and I was going fast! Yeah, that didn't help that much. My hip flexor was starting to hurt more, too. At one point, I dropped a tube of Nuun and I had to stop to pick it up. That cost me a few minutes.

It was getting worse, though. I headed north on Rd 2301 into a headwind again. This was brutal and demoralizing. Then, we headed on an out and back to the east into a headwind again. This road just sucked. There were cracks built into the road. Bubump. Bubump. Bubump. Bubump. My ass was starting to hurt, but I kept going and trying to power through the wind. I hit the turnaround and kept going. My mental state kept deteriorating, though. From Mile 70 to Mile 75 was the toughest part of the bike for me. My cadence was dropping. My heart rate was dropping, too. The hip flexor was feeling horrible and I couldn't stay in aero for long. This is also usually the point that in my training rides that I was failing. So this was typical, but the problem was that I still had about 40 miles to go in the ride. What hell was I to do? I had a plan. Keep my heart rate up and keep my cadence up. Stick to the plan and I'll get through the race. So, I stuck to the plan. I got out of my saddle and got my heart rate up. I also ate a Rice Krispie treat and that helped me stomach feel a lot better. I started to eat and drink again. Having a tailwind helped out as well. After a few miles, I felt a lot better. I pulled through the tough part and kept going. At around Mile 82, all of this suddenly hit me. I faced a challenge on the course and pulled through. And I lost it. I got completely emotional for a mile on Mile 82. I was just overjoyed being out there. I've sacrificed for months and I was right in the middle of becoming an Ironman.

Knowing this kept me going through the rest of the bike ride. I kept up with my nutrition plan fairly well, but I modified my hydration plan to where I was taking about 1-1.5 bottles of fluid per hour. I kept peeing a bit and whenever that happened, my hip flexor felt better that way. The straddling my bike relaxed my hip flexor and allowed me to get into the aero position again. Otherwise, I was up on the bullhorns because my hip felt better. I spent about 60% of the last 40 miles on them. The rest of the time, I was up out of the saddle pedaling. Very little time was spent in aero because it just hurt so badly being in that position. This is my biggest challenge for the next race that I do; I need to get my hip flexors fixed. At one point, I pulled like I was going to pee, but I didn't. My hip flexors just needed to be stretched. At this point, I saw the first paceline pack of the day. I was pissed at those cheaters! I made it my mission to pass all of these people and I did. By this point, we turned back to head into transition. I was very ready to get off the bike, I wasn't looking forward to the run, but I wanted off the bike. Someone told me that the last 6 miles were tough because of the wind. They were right. I struggled with the wind because I was tired. I finally caught up with the draft pack and passed them. Since they were riding together, they passed me pretty quickly afterwards. This stretch of the road was quite lonely. Actually, the last few miles were lonely. At this point, the bike field has spread out pretty quickly and there were fewer people since about Mile 70. So, fewer draft packs. Except this last one. I headed in and saw more people. I was getting happy. BTW, this was my longest ride ever by 5 miles.

I saw the dismount line and I got off the bike and crossed the timing matt. My bike time was 5:40:50 which is a pace of 19.7mph. I just missed 20mph, but considering the conditions, I'm very happy with that. I was 514th overall on the bike but 39th in my age group. I'm a faster swimmer than biker compared to the overall field, but slower swimmer than biker for my age group. Doesn't matter that my since my overall and division places were fairly close. It seems that my swimming and biking is pretty equal. My average heart rate was 141bpm. This wasn't my goal of 147bpm, but whenever I'm on the bike, my average HR tends to be a lot lower than what I see on the course. My max was only 164bpm. Here are the percentages of my HR that I was in.

<136: 1:14:10 - 20%
137-146: 3:24:59 - 59%
147-156: 1:02:18 - 20%
157-175: 0:02:37 - 0%

On to T2

T2

Fatigue. Wow. I was starting to hurt and wasn't looking forward to the run. Since I was going to be running enough, I decided to walk through T2 completely. Also, I hurt my 3rd met again a few months ago by running barefoot through transition. Not cool. I walked towards the bags and called out my number. I went to my spot and couldn't find my bag. My head was somewhere else and I went and got my own bag and the volunteer with my bag was where I should've been. Eh, oh well. He gave me the bag and I walked to the change tent. My plan was to take off everything and put on some new shorts for the run. I like the DeSoto 4-pocket Power Tri short. I like them because they have 4 pockets and fit tightly. I put on a navy blue loose fitting running shirt. Shoes and socks went on as well. I had my HRM taken off of my bike so I put it on my wrist. I don't like running with sunglasses so I put them in the bag. I grabbed my prepackaged baggie with nutritional needs (Crank eGels, more Thermolytes, etc). BTW, using empty Nuun containers is great for holding Thermolytes. I also put on some Chamois Butter to prevent chaffed nipples and walked out. Oh, I had a bottle with some fluids in it as well. I can't remember exactly what I had, but it felt like I had a ton of stuff in my hand. I walked across the matts and I was on the run. Total T2 time was 6:55.

The Run

I was not really looking forward to the run. I've been injured since Buffalo Springs and I've put a total of 37.5 miles in on the ground since July 23rd. I've been doing a lot of aquajogging lately. The last couple of weeks, I've been doing more and more land running though to try to get used to the impact of running. Also, I wanted to know what to expect from my body during the run. Like I said, I wasn't looking forward to the run.

I came out of T2 and just walked a bit. I had to take out all the nutrition in my ziploc baggie and put it in the pockets of my shorts. After about 200yds, I started running slowly. It hurt since I just rode 112 miles. I kept it up, though. I checked my heart rate and it was in the 130-135 range, but I HURT! I had a bottle of water with some Nuun it it, but at that point, I just didn't want it. I dumped it a little over a mile into the run. I found a trashcan to dump it in. Didn't want to litter on the course. At that point, I saw a kitty on the side of the road. I stopped and pet the kitty for a minute because it sounded like a good idea. Surprisingly, the kitten didn't run away. That brightened up Mile 2 for me.

I kept running, slowly, but I was running. Every aid station, I would walk it. I tried to take in some nutrition, but my stomach wasn't feel good at this point. Not horrible, but just a little funny. It cleared up at around Mile 5 and I was taking in more food. At about this time though, I started breaking down mentally. Everything was hurting. My bruised 3rd metatarsal was hurting again. My right foot was also hurting from the impact. My quads were on fire and felt really fatigued. My mile splits were getting slower, too. I just kept plugging along but kept getting down mentally. The finish line was just so far away at this point. I walked a lot more after Mile 5. That was the point that I felt like I hit the wall. At the turnaround in the park, I thought it was going to be a long day. The run back was more of the same. More pain, more mental and physical fatigue, and more walking. I saw a lot of people that I knew and I said hi to them. One thing that I do remember is that it seemed like there were no mile markers from Mile 7 to Mile 11. That made getting my splits difficult.

I hit the turnaround and clocked it at about 2:20ish. Usually, people slow down for the second half of a run and I expected it to hold true for me. IT was going to be long. I stopped in special needs and saw Sophie. She asked how I was doing and I told her not well. She talked to me for awhile while I changed shirts, changed out my socks, and got more nutrition stuff. She could tell that I wasn't doing well and told me to do mile repeats. I finished up and told her thanks. At that point, walking was the best option it seemed so I walked about the next 400 yards. Started running slowly after that. The next 1.5 miles were more walking and very little running, but I kept making forward progress. I was really struggling at this point because I had about 12 very painful miles ahead of me before becoming an Ironman. I even thought about walking the rest of the way, but I don't ever think that I even thought about quitting. However, I needed to do something differet. The pain relievers that I took at special needs were taking effect and took the edge off the pain in my legs and feet. However, I was still hurting badly. At that point, I said to myself "I hurt so badly now that I might as well run faster." and I ran faster.

I picked up the pace a decent amount. I wasn't running 7min miles, but I was moving a lot quicker than before. And it didn't really hurt that much more when I was walking or when I was just doing the death shuffle, but it got the pain over much quicker. My plan was to go from Mile 14.5 to a couple of miles after that. At Mile 16, I thought about going to Mile 18. At Mile 18, I decided that it would be much more fun to negative split the run than to walk the rest of the way. My mile splits were just under 10min/mile. This was good considering I was walking the aid stations and stopped to pee a lot. At least my hydration was doing well. At the aid stations, I just took in anything that I could take in. Cookies weren't good, but pretzels and fig newtons were good. I had chicken broth at one point but it was tough to drink on the run. Every aid station was a stop to a walk for me but after Mile 15, the stops were shorter. And I kept running forward. My heart rate was about 145bpm. I know my heart rate can go higher than that but I kept it there and that showed me that I had the cardio fitness, but I just had muscle fatigue from the pounding on the asphalt. Everything still hurt, but kept one foot in front of the other.

At one point, I felt a moment of elation and yelled out "Who's going to be an Ironman tonight?". All the other athletes around me in the park, some running, some walking, some stopped on the side of the road, yelled. It was a good moment. I hit the turnaround and was happy that I was now done with 75% of the course. I was almost there and I needed to get through the last bit. Running now was different. I was confident and happy to be out there, even with the pain. I was running and actually passing people. For the first loop, I passed maybe 5 people. Now, I was passing all kinds of people. Some may have been on their first loop, but many were on their second. And I just blew right by them. The park isn't lit very well so it was difficult to see the road and to see people. It was strange noticing that people were more quiet when in the dark parts on the course than on the lit parts. I almost ran into a couple of people and almost tripped on some holes in the road, too. I just kept plugging along though. I was expecting to hit "The Wall". Everyone talks about it and says it happens around Mile 20. That never happened because I wouldn't allow myself to hit the wall. I kept running and I actually kept passing more and more people. I stopped less at the aid stations because I didn't need that much nutrition to party after the race, but I took in just enough to get through the end of the race. There were mile markers on the course and I was able to get pretty accurate mile splits. I was just a few miles from becoming an Ironman and I wasn't going to stop now. I kept getting emotional because I pulled myself together when I thought I couldn't go any further. I dug deep and found out that I had another level of focus and discipline that I didn't know that I had. And I learned that Ironman isn't about the physical challenge, but about the mental challenge.


I cruised through the last few miles with no problems and there was only a single mile split over 10:00 after Mile 19. I turned back onto the main road and I could see it. I could see the end of the race for me and I didn't slow down at all. I was going to finish strong. I saw some Texas Iron people and my coaches, Jamie and Andrea, and I yelled to them "I'm going to be an Ironman!". They cheered and I kept going forward. I saw the lights of the finish line and I was getting excited. I was high fiving people and enjoying the moment. I'll never have another Mile 25 of my first Ironman again. I tried to smile the entire way, but it was an emotional smile as my finish line picture shows. I made the final turn into the parking lot and I was still going strong. I climbed that last hill like it was nothing and then I saw the Ironman banner and the clock. I never knew my total time on the run and was utterly shocked at the time that I saw on the clock. There was a person that just crossed about 25 yards in front of me. I don't really remember the last 25 yards but I just ran and finally crossed the finish line. It was over. My first Ironman was finished.

As I said, my finish line pic was an emotional smile. Actually, I look horrible but I felt so happy. The body catchers caught me and walked me over to get my medal. I also got one of those cool space blankets, but I don't think it helped much at all. About 60 seconds later, I lost it. I walked away from everyone and just sat down and cried. Why is a grow man crying for doing an Ironman? Because of where I came from. I never knew I had anything like this in me? I used to smoke 2 packs of cigarettes a day in high school. I worked at McDonald's and ate there twice a day. I couldn't run more than 50 yards without getting out of breath. And I just crossed the finish line of an Ironman. Some people are born with with confidence and discipline. I wasn't and I had to find it throughout my life and to this point, this was the culmination of it all. And I haven't had a moment like this since my first trathlon. As I sat on the curb "having a moment" several people came up to me and asked if I was OK. I was and they told me congratulations. After a few moments, I got up to get some victory pizza.

After about Mile 18, I thought it was very possible to negative split the run. Almost no one every does this. Most people are 10-30 minutes slower on the second half of the run. After the race, I checked my results:

1st half: 2:21:17 @ 10:47/mile
2nd half: 2:16:41 @ 10:26/mile
Total: 4:37:58 @ 10:36/mile

Holy shit, I actually did negative split the run! I kind of used that thought as motivation on the course, but I actually did it! I knew it was going to be close and I thought even just a few miles out that I could do it by 2 minutes, but not by over 4! I was completely stoked about that. Here are my splits for each mile:

Split Total Avg HR
Mile 1 0:10:48 0:10:48 134
Mile 2 0:10:08 0:20:56 137
Mile 3 0:10:16 0:31:12 137
Mile 4 0:10:50 0:42:02 136
Mile 5 0:09:45 0:51:47 140
Mile 6 0:11:02 1:02:49 136
Mile 7 0:11:10 1:13:59 134
Mile 8
Mile 9
Mile 10 0:33:38 1:47:37 135
Mile 11 0:12:12 1:59:49 130
Mile 12
Mile 13.1 0:21:16 2:21:06 136
Mile 14 0:15:45 2:36:51 124
Mile 15 0:10:32 2:47:23 136
Mile 16 0:10:05 2:57:29 141
Mile 17 0:10:58 3:08:27 138
Mile 18 0:10:00 3:18:27 142
Mile 19 0:10:07 3:28:34 139
Mile 20 0:09:38 3:38:12 145
Mile 21 0:09:59 3:48:10 142
Mile 22 0:09:41 3:57:51 142
Mile 23 0:10:31 4:08:23 140
Mile 24 0:09:54 4:18:17 141
Mile 25 0:09:18 4:27:35 144
Mile 26.2 0:10:23 4:37:58 142
Total 0:10:36 4:37:58 137

For the run, I finished 69th in my age group and 957th overall. I crossed the line in 561st place. My max heart rate was 158bpm. That's actually way low and based on that, I could've gone faster. Well, there's always the next race. I'm quite surprised to see that my fastest mile was from Mile 24 to Mile 25. I knew that Mile 22 was a good mile but I didn't think I could've had a faster mile after that. I guess the adrenaline was pumping. My mile splits also show how I had picked up the pace at the end. I'm just floored that I was able to pull it off and the numbers don't lie. This was also my first marathon as well. Before that day, I had never run more than 14.5 miles and not bad for running only a marathon and a half in the last 3 months. And now it was time to celebrate.

Post Race

I was done with the race. I was an Ironman, bitches! I was so happy which is good because it counteracted the pain in my legs. I picked myself up off the Curb of Tears and walked to get some Victory Pizza. The pizza was OK taste wise, but I earned it, damnit, and there isn't anything that I want more after a race than pizza. I sat down and ate a couple of slices. Got up and then headed back to the TexasIron people. Oh, and I made sure that my medal was showing the entire time. People congratulated me on the walk and I congratulated others as well. I finally found the other Texas Iron people and got emotional again. I just remember Andrea saying "There's no crying in triathlon!" Oh well. We exchanged congratulations and all that I know was that my feet hurt. And my legs. My 3rd met on my left foot was hurting as well as the 1st and 5th met on my right foot. The pain on my right foot was OK because it indicated that my met arch was properly shaped unlike my left met arch. My hamstrings were tight and my quads were sore. Both of my calves here in pain as well. But I felt great! I ended up getting a beer from Jamie and watched people. We were at like Mile 25.5 so we were near the finish. It was fun. At one point, I went back to my room and showered up. I had put on all my warm, clean clothes on too because it was cold outside.

I was torn from sitting down because my legs hurt and from walking around to keep my muscles from tightening up. I did a little of both and it hurt whenever I changed my mind. It was just awesome sitting out there cheering people on. A lot of them waived back at us but a lot just kept their heads down and kept going. I wanted to stay up and watch the last finisher, but that didn't happen. I had a couple of beers after the race and then a lot of the Texas Iron people went back to the trailer to hang out. I fell asleep on the couch. Everyone was sitting around talking and having a blast, and I just put my head back and fell asleep. I was kind of exhausted. At 11:20, I got up and went back to my room hoping that I wouldn't fall asleep while walking. Got to my room and crashed hard. I can't remember the last time that I slept that heavily.

The next day, everything hurt. I got up and got a massage in the morning. Later in the day, I took an ice bath and that helped a lot. Most importantly, I just kept moving to try to get the lactic acid flushed out of my body. My feet hurt and the biggest things that hurt was my left knee, my right 1st and 5th metatarsal and my right calf. All of these were new things and none of the old injuries hurt that bad. It would take a few days to sort out what was sore and what was injured. As I'm writing this a week later, the only things that hurt are my mets on my right foot and my right calf. After the race, I was sore the 1st day after the race and the 2nd day after the race. The 2nd day was tough because I was in the car a lot. Both days I could walk fine once I got warmed up, but hurt going up and down stairs or getting out of a chair. BTW, the cruelest thing is having about 8 standing ovations at the awards banquet after an Ironman. The 3rd day I was somewhat sore. On the 4th, nothing hurt to a light touch. I'm still taking it easy for now eating junk food, pizza, and beer. I haven't worked out since then and I'm getting a little bit antsy.

Final Thoughts

I'm glad that I did the race. I learned a lot about myself and what it takes to do an Ironman. I did sacrifice a lot though and I wouldn't want to do this ever year for the rest of my life. I do want to get faster though. Next year, I'm going back to shorter distance racing and build up slowly for a possible Iron distance race in 2008. From this race, I learned a lot. On the swim, I need to swim a little bit harder. T1 needs a bento box. For the bike, I can get more stuff from the course and I need to figure out what the hell happens with my hip flexor. T2 was really OK. The run needs me to actually run before the race and to stay more positive.

Thanks

Finally, I want to thank everyone that help me out. First of all, the volunteers were great and the organizers of the race put on a great race. Thanks to Jamie and Andrea for the coaching. Laurie and Richelle deserve thanks for letting me borrow a waterproof mp3 player and a aquajogging belt respectively that got me through the hours of mindnumbingly boring aquajogging. Thanks to Mark and Betsy for spectating and sherpaing at IMFL. Congrats to and thanks to the other Texas Iron athletes at IMFL, Jen, Danny, Glen, Eric, and Jose. All the people on Slowtwitch have been very helpful as well. Thanks to Rachel for putting my mind at ease the night before the race because I really needed it. I had a great time and this was a great journey but I'm sure that I'm missing out on people that need thanks individually, but to everyone, thank you very much.

I'm an Ironman

Not much to post but yesterday, I became an Ironman. I finished in a time of 11:43:48. All I have to say is that the run was absolutely one of the most difficult things that I have done in my entire life. I was falling apart, but I pulled it together and neg split the 2nd loop by over 4 minutes. I'll have a race report up in a few days, but I'm so happy that I actually finished. Thanks, everyone fo reading this and for your support.

Shoe mileage: 93 miles

Last Workout

I did my last workout today. The swim was fine. The water was really, really cold close to shore but was fine in deeper water. I need to make sure that I use a ton of body glide on my neck because the chaffing and salt water really tears it up. Going out was nice with a tailwind. Swimming across the wind was a little fun. I had to breathe on the right because of waves crashing over me. Going in was a lot more difficult but once I figured out to power through the waves, I was fine. I'm expecting a decent swim tomorrow.

I rode the bike for the first time with my kick ass race wheels. Don at Austin Tri Cyclist let me borrow a set of Zipp Z9's. Yes, those nice Z9's. The wheels that I'm riding are worth 2.5 times what I paid for the bike. I was really fast on the wheels and the wind wasn't a problem. The bike did get a little bit squirrely, but it isn't anything that I can't handle. Tomorrow's forecast is a headwind for about 30 miles of the bike, but it's mostly at the beginning of the bike and then a tailwind coming back. I prefer this instead of a headwind coming back in.

I ran briefly and I felt fine. My foot feels funny. It's like it's sore and the muscles are fatigued or something. Nothing I can do about it now. All that I have to do is turn in my bike and 2 of my bags and then eat.

Tomorrow morning, I'll attempt becoming an Ironman.

And thansk Jodi for your encouragement. I really, really appreciate it.

Shoe mileage (I haven't updated it in awhile): 66 miles

Side note, I've only ran 37.5 miles on the ground since July 28th.

Cold & Windy

It's cold and windy today. The projected low temp tomorrow morning is around 41 degrees with a high of 70. Cold in the morning, but nice throughout the day. There will be 15mph winds which won't be fun. I still have to get a short swim, bike, and run today and I'm not looking forward to that because of the weather. I have to do it though. I'm pretty much done carb loading as well because I'm letting my system clear itself out today in preparation for the race. Today, I have to drop off my bike and my T1 and T2 bags. I have everything laid out in my room so I'm pretty much ready to go. Also, as of right now, I'm really not that nervous. We'll see how I feel later tonight though. Tonight's plan is an early pasta dinner with some other Texas Iron folks and I may actually have a glass of wine tonight to help me relax a bit. I expect a near sleepless night with me getting up at 4:00 for the race.

Well, enough for now. Time to go get in my last few workouts.

I'm in Florida

I'm in Florida now. We got in at about 9pm and we left at about 7am. That's 14 hours of driving. We could've made it in about 13 hours, but here are the things that held us up:

1) Detour by following the HOV lane in Houston that put us downtown
2) Two spots of bad traffic
3) Ate dinner with Betsy at a sit down restaurant for about an hour

Betsy left about 30 minutes before us and at one point was 50 miles ahead of us. She got caught in traffic, called us, and we took an alternate route. We met up at an intersection where we were heading east and she was coming from the north and then turning east. Completely by coincidence, we were the 3rd car behind her after that stoplight. Crazy. Also, you know you've run out of things to talk about on a car trip when you start estimating how many miles wide the Central Time Zone is. And if you are wondering, at one point, the CTZ goes from the Arizona, New Mexico, Mexico border all the way to about 25 miles east of Panama City Beach. We think that's about 1500 miles wide. The car ride really wasn't that bad. We made great time. At one point, we went an entire tank of gas without stopping.

I almost hit two animals. There was a deer strolling across the road in Florida. It didn't even get the deer in headlights look, either. It just kind of looked at us like we were in it's territory and kept walking across the road. THen, I was about 1 mile from our condo and a cat ran in the road. I saw it go underneath my car. You know that feeling and you can tell when an animal runs in front of your car versus when an animal runs underneath your car. This little black kitten ran underneath my car. I thought that I had just killed a cat and that sucks since I have 2 cats of my own. When I slammed on my brakes, I was fully prepared to stop and and check on the cat and see if I killed it or if I had to put it outs of it's misery. As I was slowing down, I looked left and the cat was running away into the bushes. Holy shit, that cat freaking lived! I didn't even hit it. It must have run out in front of me, missed the front tires of my car, stopped in its tracks and froze, and when I slowed down, in ran between the front and the back tire on the driver side of the car. That was the luckiest cat in the world last night and it's really ironic that the cat was a black cat.

Today, I need to go for a swim with my coaches, check in for the race, and go to a meeting tonight for the race. I expect a lot of lounging around today as well. I'll probably get all of my gear out and ready to go as well. I actually have quite a lot of stuff to do and that isn't great because I also need to be doing a lot of nothing and sleeping, too. Speaking of, I actually slept last night as opposed to the previous 2 nights.

Well, time to go for a swim.

I'm off

The car is packed up with 2 bikes and 3 sets of wheels. There are two full bags of clothes, one for the race with enough stuff for conditions from 40 degrees and rainy all the way up to 95 and 95% humidity and another bag for the other 4 days of the trip. There's a cooler in the car full of stuff from my fridge. I have about 4 grocery bags of supplies for the race and other food. I could very possibly pull a Coker and just eat from the food that I have with me the entire weekend. I have my sunglasses, my cell phone, my money for the condo, and I can't think of anything else. The cats have food and water and they've been petted plenty this morning, but they still know that something is up. I didn't sleep hardly at all last night which isn't good for the car trip, but I do have company. All that I have to do is hit the Publish Post button, close my laptop, and throw it in the car.

Well, goodbye and the next time I post, I'll be in Florida.