kure beach

there was much discussion as to the pronunciation of our destination. it was one of those weird NC places (i swear this state has more exceptions to every rule..)
for example:

Kerr lake. think it rhymes with fur? nope its CAR lake. wtf.
Corolla. think its pronounced like the car? nope its cor-ALL-a
and now KURE beach. one would think it to be like the indian spice, curry, but NO. its CURE.

whatever.

so a bunch of us went down for the long weekend, marty and his three wives, bobby and jimmy for the fun and carniage.

first weekend stop was brek-essert at this place:

i HIGHLY recommend the banana bread french toast. wow. bobby got it and i ate as much as possible.

afternoon spent at the beach. we "practiced" some beach starts, and i promptly realized i am not cut out for wave dodging. while kern was aptly dolphin diving i thought the crouch and let it pass approach best suited me. after swallowing a gallon of salty mess, i determined that sunday's race would be less fun than originally thought.

we went out for a good old italian dinner that night and while our waiter was young and hot, he was lacking in the brains category. more than a few times we found our selves saying "awwww, he's not so smart".

***here is the conversation*** note this was pilfered from another blog.. GASP!

Bobby: "Do you have any microbrews?"
Waiter: "Micro whats?"
Bobby: "Microbrews."
Waiter: "Uhhhhh. I've never heard of that."
Marty: "Small commerically made beer from the US..."
Waiter: "Huh! I don't know what that is and I'm a bartender!"
Me: "Craft beer?"
Waiter: "Draft beer! Yeah! We have draft beer!"


the boys hit the bar for some wings and beer and us girls went direclty to the squiggles ice cream shop.

sunday morning came early. but our hotel was right near the race start and we rode over in a few seconds. it was a bit weird for me, yea kinda confusing since this was the first time i did this race. here is the low down:

swim 400m in the ocean, run up the beach to T1, get your shoes (leave your goggles and cap), run 1.5 miles to T2, get on your bike and ride 12 miles, go back to T2, get your shoes and run 1.5 miles back to T1, get your goggles and cap and RUN DOWN THE BEACH (yes we had to run more down the beach to the swim start) and then swim 400m back to the finish.

there was some confusion. do i need to wear my race belt on the run? do i leave my shoes in the sugar sand or up on the road. how much time do i spend getting sand off my feet before putting on running shoes. all of these questions remained un answered for me and unfortunately i had to solicit advice MID RACE. ha. oh well.

here are some pics from the race.

swim start. this actually went some what smooth for me. i was of course trying to run as far as i could and the field got away from me. and my water exit was nothing out of bay watch. its freakin hard to high knee out of the ocean especially when you keep falling down.... i was for sure schooled by some steller exits.




this is how i felt after the swim.. very pouty!

off on the run. with sandy feet, and i swear i put my shoes on the wrong feet...stuck with the boys around me.



and went off on the bike. only passed by 2 AG guys so that is a win for me. second best bike split too. those IOS rides are starting to work. the best part of the bike (as least specator wise) was the 180 degree U turn at transition to go back out on the second loop. it was TIGHT, one lane to preform this balancing act. and so much pressure from the fans to NOT take a foot out to "tap, tap, tappy tap" on the ground. i came up here, slowed and took a foot out, BUT DID NOT TOUCH THE GROUND. HA. i could hear everyone (ok mainly bobby, bri and jimmy) saying OHHHHHHHHHHHHH watch that foot.. and i rode away in triumph with my fist pumping saying 'oh yea!'




second run was uneventful. we went thru a neighborhood and one guy and his daughter had turned on their hose and were spraying the competitors. oh man. that was likely the best feeling of the race.




i caught kern in T1 (or is it T3?) and we ran down the beach together. i totally hammed it up telling the crowd that i was going to take her in the water. that I GOT THIS. little did they know that we both knew she would of course out swim me.

it was a good day for the IOS team. us girls managed the top three spots. and we had some guys on the men's podium as well. marty took the masters win.



fun weeekend at the beach.

BOONE goes the dynamite

a bunch of us (does 19 constitute a bunch? or a gaggle) headed west to boone nc last weekend for a little riding, a little running and a lot of fun. kern and i left together early evening and managed to fill the entire back of my truck with stuff. there were a few essentials to bring- bikes, little debbie, vodka, clothes, gu, and heathers cooler. the same cooler i brought home from boone last year. the same cooler that made its way to neo, and then found heather only to be left once again with kern..and now finally is making the return journey to boone. funny how that sucker had to go three hours west to refind its owner.

the drive up was good. we always have tons to talk about. we stopped at subway for dinner and kern got into a rather legnthy discussion about the decision by corporate to discontinue the (i think) strawberry cheesecake cookies. i learned more about the inner workings of a subway franchise than maybe the average person should know. thanks for shedding so much light on that topic.

after a bout of heavy rain, we finally made it to the blue ridge parkway. only to find a blanket of fog had descended on the road. visability was about oh 4 inches and it was rather scary knowing that the road just kind of fell off on either side.

we finally found the house and discovered a party going on. i was shocked! (ok not really). lots of hellos and hugs and catch ups. finally to bed with strict orders for rolling out at 8 am.

waking up at camp to a full breakfast spread, including 2 kinds of eggs and pancakes is every girls dream. (errrr maybe just mine). we all fueled up and about 12 of us headed out on a ride toward the viaduct. we were lucky to have a great sag guy Andre, whos a cat 1 rider. serious stuff. we got some really good climbing in and an awesome ride over the viaduct.

there is a pretty sweet downhill coming off grandfather mountain. its just long and straight and goes on for about 4 miles.

back home to eat and get ready for a run. we managed about 5 miles on the greenway.

we loved lou (cari's husband) out riding and running with us. he jokes that he would be 4th over all elite female at the camp. great guy.

that night was more of the same crazy chaos. just a great dinner. lots of wine and some fun people to hang out with. oh and we went thru 2 tubs of ice cream faster than charlie sheen goes thru hookers. we also managed to spend a bit of time teaching some of our more "senior" campers how to actually use facebook.

friday morning brought another ride lead by 2 amazing collegiate cyclists. i spent some time watchign them, their cadence is always super high and they just look like the bikes are extensions of their bodies. so cool.



we hit the pool for a swim, a 25 m saline pool. god that felt good to get that workout over with!

friday night brought out the bartenders. baby guiness shots and purple hooters were on the menu. couple that with birthday cake and its a pretty darn good time.

sat we went out to bass lake to run up a pretty big hill. running a continuous 5 miles UP is not so easy. but the view at the top, where you can actally climb the fire tower is pretty awesome. the cruel part is that the hill gets steeper as you go up.



after a solid 11 mile run, we were down to four and one guy said - lets do strides. UMMM WTF. so in all my stupidity i followed him in 100m increments of trying to bust out to 5th gear. oh what a feeling.



follow that up with a little afternoon in blowing rock. ice cream, pizza, good coffee and soda. the perfect post run picnic.

we had planned a swim that afternoon but a huge storm blew thru and the pool closed. dang it. so not much choice but to start the festivities.

at some point it was decided we would hit this bar (i have no clue what its called) merely due to the fact it had a DJ. upon further investigation (thank you iphone) it was announced that tonight was roller derby night. oh lord. i will give a shout out to our DD, who i think was likely scared she was going to have to make a side trip to the ER when one of us shot our mouth off and ended up with a kicked ass... (didnt happen, phew!).

the night started out.... and then... well.... i cannot even begin to describe the craziness. the things that happened, the words that were said, the state we were in. i'm chalking this one up to a good time. if you DO want to hear the stories i'm more than happy to tell. just making them public might maybe not be in everyone's best interest! ha.

camp was awesome. i'm so lucky to have these amazing friends who also happen to like to run, bike and swim. there is nothing like knowing you have a solid group around you to make life pretty darn good.

weekend recap

phew!



maria's shower was amazing. straight out of real simple magazine. she's just the same sweet, funny, caring person she has always been, now just add mom to that list.

out that night to try to find the UFC fight, (obviously not my idea) and ended up at this fun bar in cary. and heard this guy. **sorry upload not working*** picture an old country dude singing acoustic... "its a great day to kick somebody's ass"

sunday early was the jordan lake one mile swim. then 60 miles on the bike. then bobby and i went out to blue hill farm for the afternoon with the dogs. they played in the lake while he harvested lavender. madison ate an entire bag of bacon treats because it was the only way i could keep her content and still and let me rest instead of running around the farm with 2 dumb dogs. note this lasted (ie the treats) for about 8 minutes. she doesnt chew.









now i'm tired.

Kerr Lake

i decided to jump in the kerr lake race. its a really great oly about an hour from home. even though BOTH times i've done it the swim has been long.....

they added an open wave to the race this year. i'm still not sure how i feel about this wave. depending on who and how many, you can be racing by yourself the entire time. thats NO fun. anyway on to the race...

the swim looked long to start with. turns out it was WAY long and getting longer as one of the buoys had come undone.

i love this picture for 2 reasons. first i (on the right)acutally look like a good swimmer. sweet. and second, i'm swimming right next to alicia parr. how often can i say that? :) my problem on the swim started when (according to bobby watching on shore) "you were swimming fine, a bee line to the first buoy when all of a sudden you took a hard right...". WTF. i need a black line in the lake...

i swam 90% of the race with the dude behind me and we finally caught no shirt guy around the last buoy.


here i am running by feeling good off the swim (had the stars aligned?) even though it was WAY longer than 1500.


i will say my transitions rocked. in and out. and off on the bike. i was testing out a new front 808.


i felt OK on the bike. a few guys passed me but other wise i was all alone. it started raining, like pelting drops, and i was actually shocked, having not looked at the weather i was not expecting that at all. oh yea, i almost got hit by a truck. the first big intersection was unmanned. our direction had stop signs and the cross traffic did not. i rolled up to the intersection expecting a volunteer or police. nada. good thing i slowed as a monster pickup was flying thru. i screached and nearly skidded to a stop. yikes.


heading out on the run i felt pretty good. it was nice to pass back a few of the guys who blew by me. nothing spectacular time wise, but a solid run. good enough to put me 2nd OA.


notice my horrific running form. perhaps i need to work on that chicken wing cross over a bit.. huh?


congrats to alicia - who KILLED it yesterday. she had the lead for the entire race. as in she beat all the men (well except one guy). awesome.


thanks sherpa.


and in "thats gross" news. i finally ordered one of those soft chip bands and will no longer be using the hog ties they give you. this is acually worse than it looks. and yes my feet are tore up from my flats.. but only in that one spot...

aqua-thon

The sport of aquathlon consists of a continuous, two-stage race involving swimming followed by running.

in otherwords: torture. especially when temps are topping out at 100 and the humidity level is fluctuating somewhere between gross and palpable.

i have been working hard on my swimming over the past say 7 months. its coming along. maybe not at mock speed, but more like lazy river speed. i thought i signed up for the overnight improvement program, but apparently that is only in session when hell freezes over.

the event was old school. and it was awesome. so laid back. what all races should be. instructions included - swim around the lake, put your shoes on, run on the trail, then turn around and run back. easy.

the question became do you warm up for this? being a newbie aqua-thon-er i just kinda did what others did. little jog. little swim.

the water by the way, was 90 degrees. not kidding. there were cool spots here and there that maybe some of us sort of slowed down to relish, but over all the kind of water you might enjoy on a cold winters night, not the beginning of June.

with 70+ racers at the start it was a bit chaotic. i dont have the speed to get out in front of everyone so i tend to get caught up quite a bit in arms and legs and inevitably end up trying to get a piggy back from some unfortunate person.

the swim was two loops (800m) and i swam ok. the first pack was way ahead. beat my by a solid 2-3 minutes. YIKES! grrrr.....

though i will say my transition rocked. up and out and shoes on and gone. makes it a whole lot easier when there is so little to do.

out on the run i felt like frying bacon. it was disgusting. but i wanted to try to push the pace to see how i could go. my heart rate must have been 200, i guess the bike can sometimes give you a bit of relief and allow you time to maybe calm down. but not tonight. no bike :( bad for me as i tend to use that as my catch up. i worked hard on the <3 mile run and passed a few girls.

bobby was working the water stop and when i went by him he didnt say anything to me (he claims different but um, i was there..). nice. so on the return i yelled "helloooooo bobby!" he was none too thrilled. just shakes his head and pretends not to know me. i kinda wish he would have thrown water at me or something...

anyway i ended up gettig my first ever swim (though sort of cheating as it was combined with a run) award. 4th OA, 1st AG and only about 90 seconds off the winner. decent.