Kona weekend

Yesterday was the big Ironman in Hawaii. I would never want to race there (not my ideal weather conditions) but I enjoy watching the pro's race there. Julie Dibens was making her Ironman debut. She's an incredible swimmer and can crush it on the bike, but Mirinda Carfrae is just too strong on the run. Wingman and I watched the footage live on the Universal Sports website. They did a nice job with the live coverage. Watching Mirinda run was truly amazing. She can fly and make it look effortless. I can only dream of being half the runner she is.

Before the race started, Wingman and I met his cousin to go mountain bike riding. We hit the trails again in Rocky Point. The main loop is 12 miles. We planned on doing the main loop and then heading back in to tack on the "West Loop"for another 4+ miles. I lead the way into the trails and it was tough to see. The angle of the sun coming through the trees made the trail hard to see. We were going through at a nice speed and just past mile 7 I heard a bang/snap sound and then "Uh oh."  I knew it wasn't me but I stopped to look back. Wingman's cousin's chain broke. We didn't have a chain tool and asked a rider passing by if he had one. No luck. We couldn't fix the chain so we started to hike it back to the car. At one point we told Tom to wait in the parking lot and we'd ride back and get the cars. It was ~4.5 miles on the road back to where the cars were parked. We loaded the bikes up and then went back to get Tom.

I spent the rest of the afternoon reading my notes for school. Then in the evening we took a ride up island to Trader Joe's. We then stopped into the mall. While walking around, Wingman stopped at Starbucks and gave me the "I really, really, really want a coffee" look and the "can we please, please, please go in" look. I couldn't say no. I'm not a coffee drinker (I HATE coffee) but I was looking over the drink menu and found something that looked interesting. It's a Vivanno Smoothie. It has no coffee in it. I picked the chocolate smoothie. It has chocolate, banana, milk and whey protein in it. When I took my first sip, I knew I made a good choice. Problem now is I might be an addict!! Thank goodness there are no Starbucks near us!

This morning I went out for my run. With the weather cooling off, I am running better. What is also helping me is I have a nice offseason now. The Army 10 Miler is coming up, but after that, I don't have any big race scheduled. It's nice to get out there and run because I want to, and not because I have to. Mentally, it makes such a huge difference. I run with such ease compared to just a few weeks ago. I'm looking forward to the short races in the fall. Wingman and I already have November planned out!!

I'm currently planning my 2011 race season. I'm always looking for new challenges to push myself.