I hate these things...

I do really...hate blogs. They've always seemed so much mental masturbation as anything else....yet here I am doing it again. My issue is that I don't have an outlet for the voices (or ideas) in my head, and unless I get them out in some semblance of order, they roll around like so many nuts and bolts....always noisy, never creating any value. So that's what this will serve to do.....make order out of chaos.

A few things to make note of..

1. As of today I'm 2 weeks gluten free. This has been a much easier transition than I imagined and I'm going to stick with it for the foreseeable future. I don't know that it's helping....but it sure ain't hurting.

2. I set a new 5K PR on a "walk up" race on Sunday. I decided that morning to do the Doggie Dash 5K and ran 22:11.....a 19 second PR. My 22:30 was run in 2006 or so....so it's been awhile since I've had some speed. I was 4th of 20 in my AG and 19th overall out of about 270. I know, I know...a lot of people were running with their dogs...hey, I'll take it.

3. I'm totally conflicted on signing up for Ironman Arizona 2013. I'm guaranteed a slot since I'm volunteering this year while my wife Michi does the race. After Louisville this year I figured I'd just lay off IM...because the burn wasn't there. Then we had to watch that f'ing IM World Championships on the DVR....and it lit some of the fire again. Louisville this year was my slowest ever IM....16 hours. Not sure I want to go out like that.

4. I set two running PRs this year...half marathon and 5K. Next year the 10K record falls.....and the Olympic distance tri too.

5. I'm in love and in hate with endurance sports. I love the challenge, the feeling of satisfaction at completing an event....yet I hate the regimen of having to train constantly. I'm playing with some ideas by Troy Jacobson about training for older athletes. His take is that the older you get, the shorter your long workouts should become. Accumulated stress is just as good as singular stress, by his model. So a couple of shorter workouts per day stacked day after day is just as good as that 100 mile ride. This is much more in tune with my desire for training......and if the last couple months have any say, it might just work. I've been pretty loose with training after the SOMA half IM....but still I ran well this weekend.

6. I've been diagnosed with exercise induced asthma at my annual physical. This is on the heels of being unable to draw a deep breath on the run at SOMA. I thought I might be having a heart attack but the restriction wasn't in the chest...but in the diaphragm. I've got my first inhaler...

7. I really want to be a better man.....not kidding. My anger has faded as I've aged....but I still make the wrong call too many times. I don't want to wind up as some smiling, simpleton pussy.....but I also don't want to wind up dead in a dumpster either. The middle ground is very narrow and quite hard to find.

8. For all the challenges I face....I'm one of the most fortunate guys that I know. Great wife and kids, good job, nice house, couple of toys, good friends....and the ability to go 140.6 miles with nothing but a pair of goggles, a bike and some running shoes. Seriously, I'm not sure I deserve this....but I'm not giving it back.

9. I'll be 49 years old in a couple of months....and this truly is the best time of my life. You couldn't convince me to go back and be 20 again. It hurts just to think about that guy...

10. I'm not afraid of growing old and I'm not afraid of dying. I just don't want to do either of those right now...

Nite....