Brisbane

Yesterday I came back to Surfers Paradise after spending 2 full days in Brisbane. I left early on Friday morning to catch the first express train at 5:20 am. It takes about 30 min by bus to get to the train station by bus and then 1:15 to get from Nerang to Brisbane downtown by train. I had a very nice map of the city that had a 20km city walk tour on it. I am not sure who it was designed for, but I believe most people will “screw that” when they see 20km on it. I went for it as it was taking me through pretty much all things to see around the city.

The walk started in Central station, then went by some typical neighborhoods were I could see the “typical house style” (see picture), then across a bridge to the West Bank area where most of the Museums, markets, etc are. In that area, there is a crazy beach/pool (see picture) in the middle of a park. You can see the river to the right, the pool and white fine sand, salt water, life guards, palm trees. I thought it was one of the coolest things I have seen in the middle of a city (with no ocean) so I decided to take lunch and watch people tan, swim, play, whatever. After that I kept walking along the river but on the cliff side. Brisbane is quite hilly and in one section they blew out some rocks to do rock climbing by the river, also pretty cool, it was a 100m drop I say.

In the afternoon I headed to downtown and walked around most of the main streets, pedestrian walks and parks. I found the area of hostels and without a reservation (there was 5 hostels all together so I thought I did not need one) there was only “expensive” rooms left. In the end the only one that had a cheaper room was kinda shitty and the room was absolutely covered in clothes and things on the floor. I did not care much as I was only going to go there at night, sleep, wake up and take off. There is a picture that shows what I am talking about. When the sun when down the streets downtown started to get busier and busier, live music and dancing going on in the streets, and outdoor bars everywhere. I walked through the city again (not the 20km, but probably another 5) to see everything at night. I really like taking night pictures…

On Sunday I woke up and went for a ferry ride in the river. The company that operates it is the same that operates the trains and the buses so it was pretty cheap (not like a tourist boat…) I got to sit and relax for 1hr while I was taken everywhere. I hit the Museums and Art Galleries from noon till 5pm as it was blazing hot. I am not sure how hot, but I say above 30 for sure. It was not so much the heat, but here the sun is pretty strong compared to Vancouver.

After a long long day I got back on the train and got home by 9pm ready for food and bed. Today the day was pretty easy with a swim in the morning and being lazy in the afternoon (which includes internet and writing this!)

Anyways, that is it for now. On Tuesday I am heading up north to Cairns for 5 days so I don’t think I will post anything from there, but there will be lots of pictures when I come back I am sure. I will be scuba diving/snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef, I cant wait!

Here are some of the pictures I got from the city (and random stuff I came across during the 2 days, some of them pretty weird!) Enjoy


Anyone wants to BBQ?


Sinks at the Moder Art Museum


Paradise in the City


I still dont get it...


Parklands at night


Cool Restaurant


River and Downtown at night


Maybe I will make reservations next time =S


Queen Street


hmmm very affordable...


The city from a bridge








Facundo

Indoors

The plan today was not to come to internet again; however weather changes made my plans change so here I am. It seems that pretty much all south eastern Australia (from Brisbane to Sydney at least) is going through a Red Dust Storm. It consists of very very windy conditions (up to 100kph gusts) and well, DUST. In the morning after yesterdays ride I did not feel like going swimming so instead I went for a 30 min ride to a triathlon shop to talk to the owner and see if he knew someone looking for a Cervelo bike (he is the only Cervelo dealer for a couple hundred Km). He did not but he got my info and if he knows someone he will let me know. He also told me to post it in a website and ebay Australia and I could get lucky.

Here are some pictures I got from the storm on the way here.




Facundo

Last couple of days

The last couple of days have been pretty relaxing. Last Friday I went to the Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary which is about 45 min away from Surfers Paradise (by bus). It was pretty cool as I got to see most of the typical Australian Wildlife including Koalas, Kangaroos, Dingos (wild dogs), Eagles, Wombats and many more. There is some pictures at the end of the post!

Saturday I went for a float to the pool and after I came back home for lunch. After lunch I went surfing (well… to try surfing) and fortunately there was a group of guys about 100m from the beach entrance (which allowed me to find a good spot with good surfing waves). It is not easy to see wave patterns, rips, currents, etc but I guess people in the sport know, so when I go to the beach I usually try to get in the water wherever there is more people surfing and usually is much better than just going in anywhere.

Saturday and Sunday there is a market that is very famous where there is fruits and veggies, toys, antiques, books, clothes, leather stuff, cheap electronics, EVERYTHING! So Sunday morning I headed over there to check it out. To be honest, I was not very surprised as I have seen exactly the same thing in Mexico or Argentina. However, it was kind of cool to see it in Australia and very very funny to see Australian tourists to bargain on stuff. Some of them were terrible, some of them pretty smart I must admit. I took a nap in the afternoon and then just felt like staying home and watching tv…

Monday morning again I went for a float. I am trying to go every second day and swim about 1-1.5hr but no times, just swim and take it easy. For lunch I cooked a delicious pasta sauce with all the fresh veggies I got at the market on Sunday. It was ssoooo good I stuffed myself until I could fit no more pasta and sauce in my bottomless tummy. After that I had no choice but to head to the beach (1.5 blocks away) to behave like an Iguana and try to get a nap. In the afternoon I decided to go for a walk to downtown Surfers (about 15-20 min walk) and get some presents for people, buy bread, try macadamias with chocolate at some gift shops, and so on. On my way back I went past 3 pizza places and got really temped so when I came home I made pizza from scratch. I made 2 dough so next time I just need to pull one out of the freezer and in 15 min I have home made pizza.

Today (Tuesday) I went on a cycling trip to Mt Tamborine. It was a long day on the bike but I took it very easy, although the 15% climbs were still there and a 34-23 gear ratio was still a little punishing. I will post more on that adventure when I post the pictures.

That is it for now; here are some pictures from Currumbin Wildlide Sanctuary, they are pretty much self explanatory so I will save myself some writing =)










Facundo

Insight

A week after my worst nightmare I believe I have some more insight of what could have happened last Saturday.

Initially I thought it could be dehydration the Thursday before, or maybe nutrition changes on the 10 days leading to the event (since I arrived to Australia). Nutrition I believed that changed a little in Australia, but could not possibly cause such affect on the legs (and legs only) on that Friday and Saturday. Hydration was what I leaned towards, I thought that maybe if I did dehydrate myself badly on Thursday, that Friday could have been bad, and maybe Saturday. I had about 8 liters of water on Friday since my initial symptom to Saturday morning. Likely it was not caused by dehydration… So what else changed? What did I do different from all other 16 races starting with the UBC triathlon in March? Mmm… rested?

For this race I actually tapered for about 2 weeks. For none of my other races excluding Nationals were I did a 5 day taper I rested at all. Maybe an easy long day on Friday and a shorter 2hr day on Saturdays, but that was it. After nationals I was feeling good and I put in an almost normal week (3 weeks between Nationals and Worlds). The week after the taper started, less volume, almost same intensity. I was feeling good and strong. The week after (week leading to Worlds) I decreased my volume to about ½ the usual, and kept key workouts in. Despite doing much less I did not feel I was recovering as fast as usual, but I believed that by the end of the week I would be good to go.

Thursday leading to the event I was supposed to do 1.5 hrs easy, but I decided to take it completely off (I posted about that on that day so I am not making stuff up). I felt I had many things to do that day but I also thought that I needed to recover. I was still not feeling as good as I believed I should have and doing 1.5 hrs easy was not going to be beneficial at all. Anyways, Friday came and pain. Saturday came and I had one of the biggest pains ever; mostly muscular but also to my soul/ego/whatever its called (I was sore going up and down the stairs for 3 days just from running from the water to my bike, no BS…) I took some time off, like 5 days off off (only rode my bike for <20min commuting). 2 days ago I decided to go for a 1.5 hrs self guided “tourist” bike tour of the city. I averaged 22kph, not really hard right? The following day I was quite sore again; same pain as the day of the race just not as bad. Yesterday I went for a swim and despite not having the same effect as the easy ride, it felt like I was in repair mode. Not that I could not push the pace, I just did not want to, and my body was very very happy with it.

Conclusion: I think I was wwwwaaaayyy overtrained at the end of the year. It was a tough training year; I worked hard and got faster than ever. Although through the year I did feel at some points that I was tired and sometimes fatigued, I was still able to push very hard when I wanted (either races or key workouts) and so things seemed to be coming along nicely. At nationals I tapered a few days and probably was not enough to shut my body down, but 2 weeks for Worlds did the trick.

Learning: Next training year I will make sure that this does not happen to me again (none of it: the overtraining, or the catastrophe at a key race) I will design a better plan, maybe add some easy weeks and do them as scheduled whether I feel I need them or not, maybe finally get a coach, maybe make sure that easy workouts are actually easy, maybe get a powertap to be able to use it together with a HRM and RPE to help catch any patterns before is too late (ie, fatigue).

For now I will keep resting. My body will tell me when its ready to start nice and easy again by not making me sore on a 22kph ride. Hopefully this is what happened a week ago, its theory number 3 already. Unless I come up with theory 4, and it makes even more sense, I will stick with this one (or unless I take 3 weeks off and it happens again, then there is something else wrong –fingers crossed).

Previous post has some pictures of the last couple of days including the 22kph ride!

Facundo

Random Pictures

Pimp my ride (I asked today and my bike retails for 9500 aus new as is)

Surfers paradise from far far away (the end of the spit if you google map it)

Surfers paradise main avenue (pedestrians only)

I have to learn how to surf, I am giving myself 1.5 months!

The living room/exercise storage facilities

Playing at the house

Setting up for failure ehem... sorry... for a pretty good swim =)

At the parade of nations with curtis and amy

The 2 olympic medals whitfield won (and trust me, they were not copies as every 2 minutes we had to point where in the room they were!)

Finish Line (Friday before the disaster watching the U23 race)

Good Days and Bad Days

I am not going to make it long, I dont really feel like it. Although I am not mad/pissed/depressed/frustrated I am not happy either about how things went today.

Wednesday (as posted before) was a good training day, everything felt right and getting ready to race. Thursday was a day off, and not much happened. Team lunch, photo, opening ceremony, athletes dinner for everyone racing, and home. Friday I woke up like any other day, things were feeling good. 20 minutes easy in each sport was all I needed to do just keep things moving...

Breakfast, cleaned a bit around the apartment and left for the 20 minutes jog. 10 minutes into it both of my legs simultaneously went rock solid in a matter of meters. I could not bend them past 90 degrees, I walked home. Weird huh? Nothing different, no training yesterday, coming from an easy week (can not be fatigue thats for sure...) Stretched and after hours it sort of went away, but deep inside I could still feel deep pain, like I just run a marathon kind of pain. In the afternoon I rode 20 minutes to drop off the bike and it seemed to be ok (not good but ok) and I stayed positive thinking that maybe there was something off. With Friday being another easy and relaxing day, Saturday I will be fine.

Today (Saturday/Race day) I woke up alright. Still a little pain deep inside the quads, but manageable (kind of felt like post race stiffness/muscle damage). I headed to transition, set everything up, went for a 15 min jog and 5 minutes after same thing happened, very very odd... At this point there was nothing I could do, but to hope that the swim and bike will loosen me up before the run. Went for swim warm up, and the race got underway.

The swim was tough, I have never ever got kicked, pushed, pulled (from the shoulder), swam over like this before, even in elite nationals which was pretty rough. Still, I managed a 19:30 swim which was up there with the main contenders. I exit the water, run 10 meters and as I am getting my wetsuit off the legs go rock solid again. I could only walk/limp to my bike, sit down and try to get my wetsuit off. Well, legs were rock solid so getting a wetsuit off without bending the legs was a 2 minute ordeal. I grabbed my bike and limped to the mount line hoping that it will go away, I could not believe this was happening. Really. I jumped on my bike and with my legs not bending past 90 degrees I could only manage to get my feet on top of my shoes and start riding slowly (~20kph), I never managed to get my shoes on in 5 minutes of riding and decided to DNF. It was a tough decision, I dont quit easily.

In many many years of swimming competitively and 5 years of triathlon (16 races this year alone) I have never quit in the middle of a race. Despite hip pain and injury this year I have run to the finish several times, I have run with shin splints, knee pain. I swam 25km in a week using a pullbuoy because of a sprained ankle last year, cycled up cypress/seymour 3 times in January (snowing at the top once), trained consistently despite road rash from 2 separate accidents at the beginning of the year, swam in kits pool at 5:45 am several times for 1.5hrs until I could not stop shivering (even after 20 minutes under the hot shower). I dont like quitting, but today I really really had no choice. Its 10 hours since my race start and I am still limping, pain had gone down from a 10 to an 8.

I said I was going to be short, but writing seems to sort of help. I am not mad, not frustrated, not dissapointed; what I am is clueless. I have no idea what happened, and most likely I never will. Maybe too much electrolytes, maybe too little, maybe I got dehydrated on Thursday, maybe nerves (although with so much racing this year including nationals I am ruling that out). I will now take some time to think and rest (well, rest for what? I have been resting for 2 weeks and only got to swim 19 minutes! kidding...)

By looking at the final times I think I had a decent shot at a medal, maybe not first but 2nd or 3rd. I still got a finishers medal, I limped after 40 minutes in the medical tent (which included 3 liters of water and 1 valium) to get one at the finish line. I will still hang it on my wall, I cant only be fueled by successes. This year was a great year, I have improved a lot, unfortunately the last triathlon of the season ended in such a low note. Regardless, every time I will come across that medal in my room it will give me something to look forward to and motivate me to work harder; probably even harder than if I got a 1st, 2nd or 3 place medal hanging.

Facundo

Ps: Dad, were you serious about Budapest 2010? I got a spot already at nationals, I just have to take it =)

Day Off

Today I was supposed to do a 1 hr easy easy ride and a 30 minutes easy easy swim, but instead I am giving myself a full day off. At this point (the race is less than 2 days away) I dont think things are going to change much if I do them or not. I did plenty of intensity on Tuesday and an easy day yesterday. Today off, tomorrow 1hr between the 3 sports just to keep moving, and Saturday Rock n Roll!

I am getting pretty pumped/anxious already -and as my parents and brother can certify I am eating "a bit" over the normal quota-. Today I wanted to write as I dont think I will want to come to McDonalds (the only place were you can get free internet in the whole city, even starbucks has password!) for internet tomorrow. After I am done I will go back to the apartment, change to the team canada uniform for the team lunch at 1pm (oohh lucky me, all you can eat italian food...), after that we hang out with the guys until 6 for the openining ceremony and parade of nations, and then there is an Australian BBQ (more free food for athletes) from 7 to 10. I am hoping to call it a day before 11 so I can get an early start tomorrow with 1hr of training and then dropping off the bike at transition. As you can see, they are keeping us plenty busy (mostly chewing, and I dont mind it) until Saturday...

I am feeling good for the race, it should be fun. As for now, the wetsuit call is going to be really close. Yesterday it was 22.1C at 3pm, so it can go either way. I think it will depend on what happens in the next 48 hrs. If the weather is like yesterday, sunny and no wind, its going to be no wetsuit, but 2 days ago it was very very windy and poured like I havent seen since a tropical storm in Mexico for 20 minutes (thats it, no rain, pours, no rain). So, talking about the wind, it will be a key component of the race. Being an out and back for the run and bike in the north south direction, should there be wind, its going to get you going out or coming back. Hopefully there is no wind and being flat I can get over the bike in 1hr, if there is wind I rather have it against me on the way out and flush my legs on the way back... Anyways, why do I care, if there is wind there is nothing I can do, and there will be the same wind speed and direction for everyone...

Thanks to everyone that posted comments or wrote me emails on the last couple of days, I would respond to everyone but time is limited and the connection works slower than dial up (I am not kidding, I write 3 or 4 lines in between loading emails on hotmail). Thanks mom, dad, alica, enej, jeremy h, doug, Sheryl, gerrett, Tyler, Christian, Kc and Eric, Ryan and whoever else I am forgetting. I will post again after the race, most likely Sunday or Monday as I don’t think that Saturday will be an internet day. My race is at 7am and then the elites races is at 3pm, that is a must watch with Simon, Gomez, Frodeno, Brownlee and company going all head to head for a LOT of money (250,000 US plus bonuses ~500,000).

That is it from here! I will be staying home tomorrow most of the day keeping myself relaxed, stretched/loose, focused, watching a couple of races I stole from our houses DVD collection (sorry eze, I have the HyVee cd…), and obviously eating –lots-. However I do on the race I will be happy, and I am sure all the training done is going to come through for me and I going to have a great race (the swim is feeling good and that is giving back confidence after nationals). Wish me luck!

Facundo

Missing in Action – Part 3 (Gold Coast, Thursday to Monday)

Thursday was a busy day, after arriving to the apartment I had to get things sorted out. I went to buy food, then made lunch, assembled my bike and went on the search for bike shops. Unfortunately, Australia is similar to Canada (actually a bit worse!) and all shops and stores close at 5:30pm. The only places open after 5:30 are supermarkets (and don’t get your hopes up) until 9pm and restaurants. Night time came and I convinced myself that was not even worth going for a run and I was better off to start Friday full on. Friday I went for a 1.5 hr ride to Rainbow bay (straight south), the place was awesome and you can pretty much ride along the beaches and towns the whole way! Here is a picture…

After that I went for a 30 min run close to the apartment, and a 1hr swim to Southport. Southport is about 5km north and the pool is right besides where transition will be set up. The pool is nice, 50m, outdoors, but the water is very very warm. I haven’t asked yet but closer to 29 than the 27 I am used to at VAC or the 25C at Kits pool. I finished off Saturday with a second large groceries purchase to get a good stock of things. By the way, yes, Kangaroo is available and is lean, tasty (I have already eaten quite a bit including sausages) and cheap (about 10$/Kg, same as chicken and ground beef).

On Sunday I went for a 2 hr ride to Hope Island/Helensvale/Coombabah reserve area. It was a nice ride and the first 20 km were part of the race course (out and back) so I got to confirm that is flat flat dead flat! After that I went for a 1hr run towards the Spit. This is a park that is very desert like looking, trails are with gravel, there is no shade anywhere. I truly felt empowered to be running ïn the “desert”. It was very different than trail running in Vancouver where you are in the rainforest. At night I went out to check Surfers Paradise downtown area as it was fathers day (happy fathers day dad!) and more people was out than usual. Dinner consisted of a nice Steak with mixed veggies, meat is pretty good around here and you can get a T-Bone steak for about 12/13$ per Kg when they are on sale! (yes, I already know the deals =)

Today (Monday) I went for a swim in the morning at 8am, first time with the team as it seems that most people arrived on the weekend. There was about 20 of us… I found out that not only Curtis and Kamal are here (which I knew) but also Cam and Kelly. Curtis is living about 10 blocks away from my place with his brother Neil; Cam and Kelly are living with another 7 people in a huge house about 8 blocks from my place. I am yet to find out where Kamal is staying and I will have my network of people complete =)

After the swim I biked ½ hr to get the feeling and then went for a 1/2hr run with some intervals. It might be the rest, but all 3 sports are feeling very good… Swimming is feeling easy and smooth, as opposed to how shitty it was feeling in Kits pool about 2 weeks ago (and Nationals 3 weeks ago). I have done 20x100, 10 with pullbuoy and band on 1:40 holding 1:21, and 10 swim on 1:30 holding 1:18 effortlessly… or 10x100 pullbuoy and paddles on 1:25 holding 1:15. Biking is feeling good also, speed is up, effort is down, and recovery is quick between hard rides. I am looking forward to a calm day (it can get quite windy here) to get the bike done under 1hr. Running is feeling the best all season. I am feeling smooth, quick, hip pain is gone, speed is up, shouders and back are more relaxed than ever.

I am off to buy food again, and to make thai chicken for dinner (I have been craving that for a while). Buying food and cooking are keeping me busy, happy, and relaxed during my time off. After the race I will try surfing, go out at night with Curtis (he has been going out pretty much every night!), go to some of the theme parks and so on; but until then, I am avoiding any risks and getting ready to rock. The race is in 5 days and I am really looking forward to doing well.

Until next time

Facundo

Missing in Action – Part 2 (Week before Australia and Trip)

My flight for Australia was leaving on Tuesday afternoon, and therefore I had from Wednesday night to Tuesday afternoon to plan and prepare everything for Australia. Thursday and Friday I went to work and the rest of the time I was either collecting things from the house and placing them in a corner in my room, training, spending time with the family, or eating… I also went to take my triathlon suit stamped with my Last name and sponsors (I finally found a place in Vancouver!). Saturday and Sunday I trained in the morning and in the afternoon I spent time with the family, saw Enej and Jason (they were going to kill me if I left without seeing them…), and spent time with Alica who is now back from Spain after spending almost a year there.

Friday at 3pm I had the vision that working Monday was going to be a bad bad idea. I was still going to have lots of things to do, including training and preparing things for the trip, and I wanted to spend some time with the family so I asked for Monday off at work. Lucky for me, I got my request (they have been great with that and I could not be happier) and therefore packed everything. Monday I trained in the morning, then had lunch with Alica at home, picked up my tri suit (looks awesome, pictures to come), and finished packing with the clothes mom washed and had ready for me! Thanks mom! Finally Tuesday came and after getting a ride and run in I went to Speed Theory to get my bike boxed. After that was lunch time and time to get to the airport!

The check in was easy, only 50$ for my bike all the way to Australia. My other bag was 2kg over so I took some multivitamins and powders out and saved 100$ overweight fee. I had a 3 hr flight to LA with Air Canada (got the emergency row, very nice), a 3hr transfer in LAX (boy I hate that airport, is huge and very very disorganized), a 14hr flight with Quantas (did not get the emergency row as they now charge 129$ at the counter for it, crrraaazzzyy!!!!), and a 1hr minibus ride from Brisbane to the Gold Coast. From door to door: 27 hrs… Needless to say, it was long. Fortunately I the following things were very good and made the trip better:

-Quantas gives lots of food on flights. A big dinner with fish, veggies, salad, bread, cake, etc. After that they give you a night back with snacks for the 6hr “night” period with cookies, candies, cereal bars, water, mixed nuts, etc. Breakfast was sausage with omelette, muffin, fruits, etc. I was not hungry =)

-I got an aisle, so I got up and stretched 2 times about 10 minutes and slept 3 hours in between for a grand total (and record on a plane) 6 hrs or so.

-Gold Coast time is +17 hrs Vancouver time, so basically I changed the clock back 7 hrs and added a day. Jet lag was completely inexistent. I went to sleep at 11pm Gold Coast time and slept 8hrs the first day, and have been sleeping normal

-The bus from the airport was 50$ instead of 30 that the train costs, but it was door to door service. It was great, after 27hrs I did not feel like taking a train and then 2 local busses and then walking 300m with a bag and a bike box.

The apartment I rented is awesome! Its pretty big, full kitchen, pretty new appliances, washer and drier in the washroom, tv, 1 block from the beach, swimming pool, pretty quiet at night (excluding wildlife, there is a freaking bird that makes a weird noise starting at 5am, pretty damn loud. I need to ask someone what it looks like and start getting rid of some when I see them =) The only thing missing is internet, so I have to go to the mall to get free wifi. I have 2 big malls 15 blocks away, one is 15 blocks south, the other 15 north. There are big supermarkets and lots of restaurants on both of them, and now that I got most of the start up groceries done I should not be walking 20 minutes loaded like a donkey (2 times) anymore! One of them is on Cavill Ave, the heart of Surfers Paradise (the town I am in). There is lots of entertainments, street performers, shops, boutiques, restaurants, cinemas, clubs, bars, chemists (pharmacies hahaha), and so on. It is pretty good place to hang out…

I am tired of writing, but on Part 3 I will post what I have been up to since I got here (other than shopping for food)… Its 10 pm and I am absolutely exhausted, today the sun was out all day and a 2hr ride at midday and a swim at 4pm really drained me.

Until the next one (I promise, now that I got up to date I will keep it that way…)

Facundo

Missing in Action – Part 1 (Nationals Race Report and Kelowna)

I know, I know… I have disappeared for quite a while. I am not going to make any excuses. I was busy and stressed getting things done before coming to Australia and when I finally got here there were also things that had to be done ASAP. Now finally I have an assembled bike, food, a routine, know where the pools are, how to get to them, know the public transit system, where the bike shops are, where to ride for 2 hrs, etc…

So… lets go back to Nationals

Nationals this year were crazzzy! Last year none of the big names showed up, they were at the Olympics, or exhausted from racing and trying to make the team, or backups, or just not up for it.... This year Simon W, Paul T, Kyle J, Brent M amongst others were in there ready to rock!

Because package pickup was on Friday at 4pm, we decided to leave in the morning when I came back from an easy swim from 6 to 7am. At 9:30 we were on the road to Kelowna, and on the way (Langley) we stopped to I could get a new pair of Adidas shoes before my race gift certificate expired at the end of the month… I am not sure what the model is, and I did not bring them here, so I will comment on that in 2 months =)

We got to Kelowna at 3pm with 1 hr until the Elite mandatory package pickup and briefing. Lucky for us (the family), our apartment was 2 blocks away from transition and therefore race briefings were only 3 minutes away (this is by far the closest I have slept to transition on a day before the race… it was awesome!) The race briefing was like any other briefing, only that 2 seats away Simon was seating with Groves and someone else I cant remember. I was sitting with Martina, Kamal and Mike Adams all doing the elite race.

Saturday was relatively relaxing. The whole family was up very early as my mom and dad were doing their first triathlon! It was very moving to see both of them back in action doing some real sport and going all out! (Not that you cant go all out in a yoga class, but…) Both of them finished the race with amazing performances, dad winning his age group and mom passing lots of people on the run and going strong! Congratulations! By they way, dad got so motivated after the race that registered for the Vancouver Sprint on Labour day (tomorrow), just great!

Sunday my race was at 1:30 pm so lots of time to get ready for it… I like and dislike having all this time before a race. Its nice to wake up a little later, get ready with time, have 2 breakfasts (wake up time and 3hrs before the race), but at the same time is also nice to get it over with. This year I have raced a lot and therefore its becoming more like a regular day than “5 times to the toilet in 2 hours race day”. I must admit that I was a little more nervous as it was one of my 2 key races in the year, but still did a good job to block out all insecurities and believe in myself.

Warm up was good and easy, went to transition, and set everything up. Transition is getting easier every time as I have less and less things every time. I used to have towel, water bottles, HRM, race belt, socks, gels and many more things when I started years ago. For this race I had my bike with shoes clipped on, helmet, and running shoes. That is it, no food, no socks, no belt, no towel, no nothing! After all formalities of the Elite race, we lined up on the beach and the race started…

Swim: First 300m I could only see bubbles and got bumped on the left and on the right (which kept me straight). After 300m I finally targeted some feet and followed for another 200m, until I decided to pass them. Once I passed I saw that there was a gap of 20m to the following pack (4 or 5 people) and unsuccessfully tried to catch them until the end of the first lap. The second lap I led my pack (3) most of the way until my zipper opened up and had to stop 1 or 2 seconds to zip it up. I was out of the water in 32^nd position or so, pretty bad... I don’t know what happened but I swam 1:25/100m, the slowest all season.

T1: Nice and easy

Bike: I was on my own for the first out of 6 laps. I caught a guy on the second lap and wanted to work together but he was happier sitting on my wheel, so I towed him a lap until we caught another guy. Good, now we are 3 to work together, right? Wrong! The other guy was on the same boat; we just caught him and did not feel like working. I towed them for laps 3 and 4. On the 5^th lap I dropped them on the hill (it was not as nasty as I thought… maybe I have been doing Cypress and Seymour way too much!) and worked very hard. On the last lap (6) I saw a group of 3 guys about 300m up on the hill, and I gave myself 8 minutes (the remainder of the lap) to catch them. I worked with an objective and literally caught them as we were taking off our shoes before the dismount line!

T2: Nice and easy. Shoe gave me a little trouble but after looking at a video I lost 2 seconds…

Run: First lap out of 4 was tough. Legs were very drained from pretty much a solo TT and did not want to let the 3 guys that I just caught get away. I managed to stay with them and second lap got easier. The 3 of us worked hard and passed a couple of people. Eventually I was able to drop them and on the last lap I was able to pass about 3 people. I was feeling strong, focused, smooth gait, and had lots of people cheering me on which kept me going hard. I had the fastest run split of the season, 35:25.

I was very happy with the results of the race, the swim was not the best, and I really need to work on that, but the bike was very good. Despite going pretty much alone the average was only 1.5kph slower than the fastest pack of 5 people. I would not have been dropped… The run as I said was the fastest of the season and first time under 36, I was smiling ear to ear (when I forgot about the swim…)

The family stayed in Kelowna until Wednesday, were we relaxed, swam in the lake, biked to Penticton (Eze and me), ate lots, and bragged about everyones accomplishments on the weekend, watched tv, and so on; Family holidays... Wednesday morning we headed back to Vancouver and I had a huge list of things to do before I left. More on that to come on Part 2…

Thanks for reading, and sorry for taking so long. Better now than never! Here are some photos

Kelowna to Penticton with Eze

Running Hard

Taking off to set up transition

The whole family and someone that clearly did not want to be in the picture after the Try a Tri

Family racing weekend!

No time

No time to post last week, no time to post today. Tomorrow I will be on my way to Australia for 2 months and I will have plenty of time to post on the plane and airports (24 hr trip from door to door).

Coming up:
-Kelowna Race Report (Nationals)
-Last week / prep for the trip

Facundo

Quick Update

Things are going well. I am literally smashed as I just put in the last 3 big days before a 6/7 day taper for Nationals… Today when I woke up I felt like I was hit by a truck (and the legs felt like I run a marathon) but this week is all about recovery.

Through the week I will be decreasing volume and maintaining speed by keeping intensity high. I am really looking forward to Sunday and what I can do when I am in near peak condition. Why near peak? Well, first of all because a 6 day taper is not going to be enough to repair 24hrs a week of training for the last 8 months non stop (except for those 3 days I was forced to take a couple of months ago!)

The plan is to peak for Worlds. Unfortunately Worlds are 3 weeks after nationals and therefore a balancing act had to be done. The 2 races are too close together to peak twice and have 2 good tapers, but too far apart to peak for nationals and stay in peak shape 3 weeks later… ohh well... I am doing what I think its best with the helpful insight of Alan (LETC Coach) and some other people.

My mom is getting here today, which means tomorrow I get home made food! Awesomeeeeee… Unfortunately I wont be able to go all out on her cooking as I have in the past (gaining 6lb in 3 weeks of her delicious cooking) because of both races, but I will make sure that I get most of my calories from her food and not other snacks =)

On another note, I was cleaning my bike yesterday and realized that a while ago I took a picture of my machine (I was also cleaning it then…) but never got a chance to post it. So here it is, race ready with all the help I can get =P

Facundo

HELP NEEDED

I am "desperately" looking for a place to stamp / press / heat transfer my last name and sponsor logos on my Triathlon Canada Trisuit. I have tried calling Justin Stitches (Granville Island) and Thiller Shop (Main and 22nd) and no luck. They either only do large orders (20+) or do not do them because it will melt the fabric (according to them, we all know its possible!)

So, anyone knows another place I could try in the lower mainland?

There is a place in Victoria that does it for the National Team, I think its called Out of the Blue Designs, but really do not feel like going to Victoria just for that.

Thanks all!

Start List

Well... about a week ago I received an email from my friend Martina to check out the start list for the Canadian National Championships Elite race in Kelowna (11 days from today). Despite knowing in the back of my mind that there will be really really fast people, despite knowing that it is a big race (ITU Kelowna Pan American Premium Cup), despite knowing that there is 10,000US on the line between men and women which makes even more people show up, IT NEVER REALLY HIT ME UNTIL I SAW THIS:



...mmm lets see… how about making this first serious elite race a learning experience huh? How about if I perform the best I can given the circumstances and the quality of the field? How about if I am happy to finish even if its last? This is the approach I will take for the race. I am just happy to be there, no matter the result.

Who would have thought 8 years ago when I hanged up my googles for 2 years that I would be racing 11 days from today against Olympic athletes -something I never accomplished in 12 years of competitive swimming?-. Who would have thought 5 years ago when I bought my first road bike and did my first Sprint triathlon that today I would be an “elite” athlete racing in my first ITU race? The answer is no one, not even myself.

People ask all the time if I have long term goals, and I do, just like 5 years ago I did. The plan was to do a Sprint in my first year, then an Olympic with a bunch of Sprints in my second year, then the following year move into the Half Ironman world, and 4 years later race Ironman Canada. One step up every year for 4 years, reasonable. By the way, following that plan it would have been Ironman Canada 2008. See, things kind of change… My plans and goals have been completely refurbished; I have no plans to do Ironman in the near future (but I will at some point), and I have not done a Half and have only contemplated it as a “fun” training day. I got stuck in Olympic distance (by will) 3 years ago, and every year I like it more and more. It has become “shorter” with training and experience, definitely faster, and it is now the plan for the next couple of years! Things change.

Every day I am getting a little bit more pumped for Kelowna. Tomorrow is my ½ day off, looking forward to rejuvenate the body (or the legs I should say). Friday starts my taper, I will start feeling better, stronger, faster (and I will have plenty of time to do something else other than training and working for a week!). Next Friday morning we are leaving town with my parents and brother, I can not wait… K-town, here I comeeeee!!!!!

I can only say one thing…

… I better start swimming =P

http://au.christiantoday.com/article/sydney-2009-world-masters-games-exceed-registrations-target/6803.htm

http://www.sa.baseball.com.au/default.asp?Page=56025

http://www.aapracing.com.au/sports/news/latest-sports-news/SNS-article50760

http://www.smh.com.au/news/sport/masters-tally-tops-29000/2009/08/05/1249350593219.html

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/sport/masters-tally-tops-29000-20090806-ea7u.html

Facundo

Back to normal

My friend Christian from Switzerland left on Monday morning with a Swiss friend in a road trip to Edmonton (I guess stopping in most towns since they will take about 8 days to get there…). We had a lot of fun together, went out a couple of times, had many amazing meals and dinners at home and in restaurants, saw the fireworks, went to the Caribbean day, Stanley Park and many other things. All of this combined with a 40hr work week and 23hrs of training to be precise turned out to be rather taxing on the body and mind.

The plan Monday afternoon was to put in 5hrs since Saturday and Sunday were easier than normal, however once Christian left all of a sudden my energy was zapped. I went for a 2.5hr bike ride and when I came home the only thing I could do was nap. I napped for 1 hr. When I woke up I was so groggy that the only thing I could do was eat and do laundry for the following 2 hrs. I finally got myself ready and run for 1:15 on the treadmill slightly increasing speed every 5 minutes, it was a good workout despite the fact that I did not feel like doing it from minute 1.

Tuesday was rather uneventful. Swim in the morning at Kits pool for 1.5 hrs (which was not pleasant as I woke up cold after so many days of 30+ degrees and the water felt cold for the whole workout), showered, and 30 min massage before work. At lunch time I went out for a jog in which I was completely useless, either due to the previous nights run or the energy zap I mentioned before. Got 1hr done, even though was garbage. After work I did 1.5hrs on the bike with an average cadence of 99. I was not caring about speed at all, just wanted to get the legs spinning fast as I noticed on the last couple of rides that I was inclined to push harder gears with 80-85cadence. Legs felt no better but no worse after the ride, which I guess it’s good.

Today the plan was to swim in the morning again, run track at lunchtime (there is a track 15 blocks from work), and TT 1hr in the afternoon. However, once again I found myself very very tired and decided to push the bike ride to tomorrow afternoon. I was supposed to do about 3.5hrs today and 1.5 easy day tomorrow. Now they just became 2x2.5hr days, I find this better than to have a crap workout on the bike today. Anyways, swimming in the morning got replaced with track as I woke up cold again and was not in the mood to get naked and jump in a pool (it doesn’t sound that unreasonable does it?). At lunch time I did errands and the afternoon will finally involve me getting naked and jumping in the pool (but now will be 21C sunny outside and not 15C, 30mins after waking up)

For the next 10 days I will be pushing hard in training, recovering on sleep, eating right, and working on staying injury free. After that its taper time for the national championships! It will be great to mini taper (finally) for the first time this year; have a little more time, feel strong and have to hold back to save it for the race. All previous races I went in with tired legs, arms, fatigued; I want to see what I can do feeling rested.

Mom and dad are coming before Kelowna and staying until September when I leave to Australia, it will be very nice and fun to see them (like always!). Also, the 4 of us are racing in Kelowna!!! They will be doing their first tri on Saturday (the Try a Tri with our training bikes =P), my brother will be doing the sprint on Sunday morning and I will be racing in the afternoon. It should be a fun / intense weekend for me followed by 3 relaxing days in the Okanagan, I am really looking forward to it…

Some pictures to come soon, hopefully this week I have more time to post than last week.

Thanks

Facundo

Hectic Weekend

Friday started off with the 4th swim in 4 days, however it was an easy 4k swim to “rest” before the 6km Open Water race on Saturday. After that I was off to work, 1hr run at lunch, and 1hr bike ride in the afternoon. Before going to sleep I prepared all my race gear (I was happy that for a swim race you need to prepare way less things than for a tri) and went to bed. I woke up 9.5 hrs later, yes, I was that tired…

The alarm went off on Saturday at 6:30, just 2 hrs before the race. I had my usual pre race breakfast, just a little toned down considering that it was 2hrs before the race (not 3) and that I was going to be swimming 99.5% of the time (the 0.5% will consist of 4x20m runs around a marker on every lap and to the finish). Definitely did not want to overeat! 1hr before the race I got to Kits beach and found Patrice, my swimming buddy, with who I constantly battle every morning workout. I knew he was racing and it was going to be fun! 5 minutes later I see a familiar face walk on the beach, wait, is that Jeff? Yup, Jeff Symonds was in town and now the race became that much more interesting! It was going to be a 3 way battle…

8:30 am the gun goes off and Ian Young (a pure swimmer) takes off in the lead, he was way too fast and from then on was a race for second place. The first lap was controlled and strong, I was “leading” the pack in second place and I could not tell who was / was not in the pack. After 1.5km we come out of the water, I look back. Its only 2 of us, a rematch of the previous weekend (well, on the swim portion only…), however this time he (Jeff) was on my feet. 2nd lap goes in cruise control, there was much more swimming to do to start burning precious fuel… 3rd lap starts, only half of the race left, Jeff still on my feet. What are my options?
A) Slow down and let him lead
B) Keep things the same as lap 1 and 2
C) Try to get rid of him and make him work alone (which will hopefully tire him a bit more than seating on my feet)

I quickly decided not to go for Option A, it was weak, slowing down? What? Also, I could not really tell where 4th place was. What if we both slowed down and then got caught? What if he was about to break down and I just helped him out? Option B was not an option either. I was in a disadvantageous position and I had to do something to revert it. Option C became the name of the game. 3rd lap consisted of about 4 or 5 100-200m attacks to drop him. Unfortunately I was unsuccessful, I redline a couple of times, and now I was out of gas for the 4th lap.

4th lap starts and this time I could only slow down, I was not towing him to the finish! We swam side by side, shoulder to shoulder, elbow to elbow bumping each other. I could tell we were both done, but none was going to give an inch. After 6000m of swimming, approximately 1hr 26minutes we stood up in the sand with water knee high at the same time and sprinted 20 m to the finish. The result was similar to cycling, we both got the same time, but he got the Green Jersey and the Sprinter points. Jeff: 1:26:03, Facundo: 1:26:03. This was a race for the books: I suffered, was exhausted, in pain, could not feel my triceps for a couple of minutes, got out sprinted, but loved it! (Thanks Jeff for the picture, I stole it from your blog)

So yeah, it was 10am, 15 minutes to eat at the food tent, home, change, and as if I didn’t have enough already at 10:45 I was in a 3hr ride including Cypress with the Leading Edge squad. I got home at 1:55pm, at 2:05 I was on my way to the airport to pick up my friend Christian from Switzerland. Get home at 4, do some stuff around the house, head to Patrices house where he and his wife Fred put out a great bbq. I was absolutely dead, exhausted, since 6:30am I did not stop for a minute, but hey, I had a great time and I would not have changed a single thing -except for the sprint finish =P.

8hr sleep and Sunday consisted of Gym and run in the morning. Lunch, Caribbean Festival at Longsdale Quay with Enej and Christian (it was so hot and sunny that I went through 1L of yoghurt icecream: literally). In the afternoon went for a 1hr TT, then had awesome BBQ brochettes made by my brother and chef Eze, and sleep time.

I said it was a hectic weekend… nonetheless it was FUN FUN FUN!

Facundo

World Master Games – Swimming

Yesterday I registered myself on the World Master Games. Swimming is one of the only sports where you can compete as being as “young” as 25 years old on the 25-29 age category. Most other sports, like running, start with the 30-34 age category.

The games start on October 10th, exactly one month after the World Championships. They take place in Sydney, about 800km south of the Gold Coast. It should be a fun fun event as I get to take place on the opening and closing ceremonies (same place as Sydney 2000) and will be swimming on the Olympic pool. How cool is that?

With your registration you are allowed 5 individual events + the 3K open water (the main reason I wanted to do the games). The decision was not easy, I knew I was doing the 800 and 400, but no idea what else. By process of elimination I got rid of all the backstroke and breaststroke events (which includes IM). Then I was left with 200, 100, 50 free, 200, 100, 50 fly. I went for the 100 free, I want so see if I can break a minute. 200 free was out as I will be doing 800 and 400, and in 50 free I would get my butt kicked. 50 fly I actually really like, and I am quite good at it (can almost swim 50 fly as fast as 50 free), so I went for it. Mmm… 100 fly or 200 fly…. Well, I would need to dope to last 200 fly, so I took the 100.

Goal Time and Pace:
800 free: 10:08, 1:16
400 free: 4:48, 1:12
100 free: 1:00
100 fly: 1:05
50 fly: 28
3K open water: 39:00, 1:18 (wetsuit-does not qualify for medal)/ 40:00, 1:20 (non wetsuit)

I am very excited about the games, its been a long time since I have been in a swimming competition. My start skills might be a quite a bit rusty, and the swim speed I had when I was 15-16 might not be there, but for sure I am going to take it easier and enjoy more than I did when I was younger. Good luck to me!

Hip Update: Its getting better SLOWLY, very slowly. Nationals being 4 weeks away I went to see another chiropractor today, and he seemed to have yet another different opinion. Lets try once again and see what happens... I am going back there on Tuesday and Friday next week for some adjustments. I also scrapped the Self Trascendence Tri in Victoria a week from now to be able to get 4 weeks of solid uninterrupted (injury free) training before Nationals...

Peach Classic Race Report – 19.07.09

[Rant deleted]

Choppy, Jeff and I left Vancouver on Friday at noon to avoid traveling Saturday morning, the day before the race. The trip was uneventful, the Motel turned out to be quite decent (AC, swimming pool, and full kitchen with new appliances).

Saturday morning we woke up and went for a ride in the morning on the race course, and a short run right after. This turned out to be a great idea because by noon the heat was already way past pleasant levels. Thanks to the AC we took a 1hr powernap and headed to the lake in the afternoon for a 30min swim. After that we went back to the motel, took Ryan in with us for the night, had 1.2kg of pasta amongst the 4 of us, and went to bed at 8pm to get the ideal 8hrs of sleep.

The night was longer than expected, and it was not because we over slept but because I was awake at least 1/1.5 hrs courtesy of the AC noise, being hot/cold, sleeping with another men in a double bed, 4 people constantly going to the washroom (staying hydrated has some downsides), and so on. Still, I was really looking forward to racing in the Okanagan, and when all the alarms went off at the same time, I was ready to give it a go.

Breakfast was as usual, with the small exception of having the cereal and the chocolate milk combined into one (we decided against of regular milk this weekend). Bagel with PB and banana, instant coffee, get in the car, get to transition by 5am (7am race start).

Warm up: 30 min bike ride on the run course (we had not seen yet the 2km hill everyone was scaring us about), 20 min jog with some pickups, 10 min swim. The warm up was anticipating how things were going to turn out, I was feeling good, but conditions were tough. It was windy, we water was very choppy, the race buoys were getting blown all over the place, the bike was going to have a headwind on the way out (which is mostly uphill/rollers), and tailwind on the way back (rollers and downhill into transition). At least it was not going to be THAT hot.

Swim: After warm up I found Jeff Symonds, Jordan Rapp and Jason Shortis and lined up with them at the start. I knew one of them was going to be out of the water in the top places so I wanted to stick with them. The swim start was rough, lots of hitting and swimming over people for the first 300m until we started dropping people. 600m into the swim I found myself in 3rd place and 1st guy was getting away, so I bridged the gap and identified Jeff. Conditions were tough, hard to keep a straight line, sighting meant drinking gulps of lake water, and therefore stuck behind him and followed the bubbles. We exited the swim together with a 20-30 seconds lead on 3rd place.
T1: Uneventful, exited transition 20m behind Jeff.

Bike: Quickly came to the realization that despite feeling good on the warm up it was not going to be my day on the bike. I usually feel good right away but today I was loosing ground quickly. A couple of km into the ride we hit the Vancouver Hill, and run out of gears. How could that happen? I did not run out of gears the day before, hmmm, maybe I just went too hard out of T1… Now past the hill we start hitting the rollers and the wind head on. 10km into the ride I hear Jordans disc FLY by, hmmm, maybe its because he is a rocket on the bike, nothing I can do… Turnaround comes around and I have lost 4 minutes on Jeff and 2 minutes on Jordan already, hmmm… maybe I am just having a shitty day on the bike! The ride back into transition was a little better thanks to the tailwind and downhills, but still every single uphill hurt, legs were burning and power was just not there.

T2: Uneventful, exited transition 5 minutes behind Jeff, 3 behind Jordan, and 50 seconds ahead of Jason.

Run: The day before the race we went to the Bike Barn to check it out, and I got a chance to chat with Jeff about the course. He warned me to take it easy on the uphill to avoid putting myself in a hole and have a decent last 5km, so I listened. Who else better than last years winner to give you advice? Out of transition I run strong, but holding back just a little bit. I heard Steve King announcing Jason out on the run course within my first 200m so I knew I was in “danger”. Still stuck to the plan and did not look back until the turnaround point. The climb was strong, smooth and very steady, I was feeling well. Still 50 seconds ahead, and with Jeff and Jordan way out of sight, it was a matter of holding on to 3rd place. 50 seconds in 5km are a lot of time, however I am not characteristic for having strong last 5km, neither for running downhill. The next 3km downhill I focused on turnover and stride length, and surprisingly found myself running well and feeling relatively fresh legs (thanks Jeff!). Into the flats, 1.5km straight to the finish I look back, and see Jason much closer than I remembered… not good, time to step on the gas. I was caught and quickly dopped by Olly about 2 weeks ago in Squamish, and that hurt psychologically, I was not going to let that happen again. I run hard, run for my life, wishing I had a HRM on to see what ridiculous number I was putting out. 200m to go, I look back again, he is as far as he was last time: I think I am safe.

This race was tough. The bike and run are tough every year, but wind made them a bit harder this year and complicated the swim as well. It was not too hot but still hot enough that I poured 6 cups of water on me during the run, and drank to full bottles on the bike. I was not pleased with my swim (technique felt very off), not pleased with my bike split (I know I can do much better), but very very pleased with my run. After a rough day I still pulled myself together and had a very good run to hold on to 3rd place, with a run split only 2 minutes slower than Jeff.

What is next? Kits challenge on Saturday, a 40km TTT on Sunday. I might skip the Self Transcendence Tri in 2 weeks in Victoria as my hip is still not 100% and Nationals are getting closer.

Pictures from the trip to come, thanks for reading!

PS: It was very nice to hang out with all the guys at some point on the weekend: Choppy, Jeff (tall), Ryan, Anthony, Jeff S, Justine, and Mark S amongst others

Off to Penticton

I knowI have not posted a race report for the race last weekend, but I am afraid it will never happen... (and somehow I knew it already Monday when I posted quickly how the race went)

This week was busy with work, training, preparing a presentation about myself and triathlons at work for sponsorhip purposes (more on that to come later), and preparing all stuff for the trip to Penticton.

I am about to leave work, in 2hrs we will be on the road. This should be a fun race however though. I hear the bike course is hard, the run is hard, and according to the canadian weather office today to monday will be between 30-34C... Looking forward to consuming lots of salt tablets hehe

Lots of people racing this weekend: Anthony, Ryan, Dave, Choppy and Jeff (tall) to name a few. Everyone have a safe trip and I shall see you in Penticton -you will find me under a tree eating peaches until I feel like exploding-.

Good luck to me!