Points & Volunteers

First XTERRA of the season is in the bag. Race Revolutions put on a great weekend of events this year. Saturday, April 17 had 2 trail run races (11K & 22K) and an off-road duathlon. Sunday was the Mata La Mula (To Kill a Mule) XTERRA triathlon. The 1st 10 min of the bike sue did make me fell like an ass ;-)

My Mountain Bike skills are improving but I still have a ways to go. That said, I was steady and stayed upright and even had this dude on my wheel for the entire race. My race goal was to maximize points at a local event and see where my race fitness is before the regional championship in Waco May 23. 75 points in the bag and I felt solid. Goals accomplished.

I also had the opportunity to be the volunteer coordinator for this weekend's events. I don't know where my volunteering 'bug' got started but I've never been able to shake it. I love working at races as much as I love participating in them. Here I am doing my best 'Volunteer Coordinator' demonstration of 'the racers will be running up this trail here before they cross the road.'

Volunteers are an essential part of every event. They are responsible for everything from setting up the race start to tearing down transition. There are needs as diverse as cutting up fruit to stripping wetsuits and as traditional as passing out water and directing athletes to the finish.

The sports that we participate in can become so self-centered and, dare I say it, selfish, it is good for the soul to get out there and give back to something we take so much from. My challenge to you my readers, all 3 of you, is to volunteer at 2 events this year. If you need ideas for races, RaceRevolutions has 6 more on their calendar for 2010. Check us out at http://www.racerevolutions.com/.

See you all on the roads and the trails.

Vicki

Oh, and one big shout out to photog extraordinaire Jake North. I don't feel bad about using his photos on my blog since I bought them ;-) His work is outstanding! He also gave me my biggest motivation during the race by telling me I was 'running like a girl' Thanks Jake.

well...maybe I was going 8 miles an hour

This past weekend I competed in the Enchanted Rock Duathlon near Llano, TX, deep in the hill county of Texas, with my Texas Iron teammates and Team Galaxy teammate, Susan. It is a fun race, kind of quirky, and defiantly not your typical swimbikerun that triathletes are use to.

First run is about 5 miles around 'the rock' followed by an 18 or so miles bike ride on the road. The last run is UP the rock.

The 1st run was not flat, go figure, but not technical. Just 3 or 4 water crossings where your feet get wet. The bike was hilly, windy, chip sealed and cattle guarded. Everything I love about hill country riding. I took a slight wrong turn on the wrong trail to start the 2nd run up the rock (that's trail running) and added about 2 min to my time. Did not make a difference in overall placement but I had to push it to keep my age group 2nd.

The best event of the day was when I made Susan laugh out loud when I said I looked down at my cycle computer on some windy, uphill, chip sealed, cattle guarded section of the bike and noticed my speed was in the SINGLE DIGITS. I said, 'how on earth am I going to do RAAM if I'm only going 7 miles an hour!!!'

Susan said, 'but you were making forward progress.'

That's it folks, one pedal stroke at a time.

Vicki

Weather in Texas

I'm sure everyone has heard the saying that if you don't like the weather in Texas just wait a bit...look at these photos.

The first is the temperature at the start of the Austin Marathon, February 15. Unfortunatley for the runners the temp went up quite a bit and the humidity stayed high. Carole Pope, Team Galixy member, ran the full marathon and Mandy Jerllerich, also Team Galixy member, rna the half. I ran 8.2 miles 'supporting' my teammembers.

The next photo is of the 'snow' we had in Austin on February 23. The neighborhood kids had a great time raking the snow to make these sculputres.

Finally, you've got the temp at the start of this year's Frost Your Fanny duathlon in Houston, Texas. 1st race of the year for me.

Check back soon for pictures of the leaves comming out on the trees. Spring is right around the corner.

road warrior

I work for what I consider to be THE BEST team within Oracle. We are a part of the Public Sector (generally these are government accounts like Cities, Counties, States and K12) Enterprise Performance Management group and are responsible for preparing and presenting software demonstrations during a sales cycle. I have completed on-site demos to customers in all 50 states. This means that I travel, a lot.

So, folks frequently ask how do I balance athletic demands and a professional workload? Well, there is no easy answer. First, I do have a coach and a schedule and he does a great job at scheduling a rest day on a travel day and putting together workouts that maintain my fitness. I have found that most hotels have at least a treadmill and more often not an elliptical machine and lifecycle and an assortment of weights.

Second, I have learned that I have to get my workouts done in the morning. If I wait till after the work day is over I find to many excuses to bail out. I have also learned to be flexible with my workout options and not let the loss of an interval, or even the loss of a workout, ruin my day.

All this has served me well for running and triathlon but I'm sure there will be some modifications as we gear up for RAAM 2011. Over the next 15 months I'm sure there will be some posts about various spin classes I've taken across the country and how much I really hate Life cycles

However, I have to remember that it is hard to balance all that I take on. I stared this post by trying to answer peoples' inquiries about 'how I do it...' and I can give you pages of workouts, motivation tips, time management skills, etc. In reality it is very hard to find any balance and, guareteed that as soon as you do, it will be wripped out from under you. So, ride the highs, manages the lows, stick to the schedule as best as you can, and continue to chase that carrott on the end of a stick.

oh my...I'm blogging

Now what...? I guess I could start by explaining the name. I am part of Team Galaxy. A team of 4 women who are competing in the 2011 RAAM. Our 1st meeting was at the Galaxy Cafe in Austin, TX to brainstorm and decide on our team name. Someone said doing RAAM make them feel like a 'Rock Star', I think I said something about we will all be 'Seeing Stars,' Susan had some childhood story about a 'Stinky Star' and, well, we were at the Galaxy Cafe. The rest as they say, is history.