For Sale QR Tequilo 57cm

Selling my beloved QR tequilo. Very Fast TT/triathlon bike. Great condition. This bike has been professionally maintained.

Dura Ace/Ultegra/FSA. Alex 320 wheelset (upgrade from stock)

There is a small area on the top tube where the paint was rubbed off during transport.

This bike will fit someone 6' to 6'4.

Asking $1500 bo. ($2800 new) (Make me an offer!)

Mentoring (coaching) an athlete

I've coached high school track and x-country for many years now, but only in the last year or two have I spent any real time coaching/mentoring adults. It is really a far different experience.

With kids, they are allways being taught, and expect to be taught in certain ways. They are also used to progressing with everything they do. So, while rewarding on some levels, they don't necessarily recognize the effect your role as a coach has played.

Recently one of my adult athletes has been experiencing some real success. I think I am more stoked about it than him! He is really appreciative of my assistance, but I am more awed by the effort that he is willing and able to put into reaching his goals.

I find many adults feel that at a certain point they have reached their physical peak, and it is all down hill from there. I know from personal experience that this is definetely not true. The cool thing as a coach is to be able to show these people that they are able to be fitter and faster than they ever where before at any age.

In triathlon and running this is a very prevalent revelation. Many people take to these sports later in life, and experience these changes. We hear so many stories on all of the forums and blogs of later life fitness and success in endurance racing.

There is the obvious maturity required to race multi-sport, and the help of the larger income! But it is neat to see all of these people going against what many parts of society lead us to believe is the inevitable decline into old age.

As far as I am concerned, we should all fight this! With everything we've got. My biggest hero's are those 70 and 80 year olds running marathons and finishing Ironman races. They show us that this is definetely possible.

So what I guess I am getting at here, is that it is never to late to try something new, and as representatives of this sport, I think it would be a neat goal to try and get one person involved in fitness. It is as simple as helping them set a goal and helping them achieve it. It is a rewarding and addicting experience for the coach and the athlete.

So give it a shot. Mentor someone and find out what the rewards can be!

Peterborough 1/2 IM

Wow, I don't know where that race came from, but I am not complaining. Training has evened out a bit lately, but I was not expecting to improve on last year when I was training hard.

The day started out OK. Got to the site in plenty of time and chatted with some friends.

The swim start. Seeded myself with the top guys, (where I should be swimming) but did not have a great swim. My warm-up was a bit rushed, and I wasn't feeling ready to race when the gun went.

Started off OK, but was feeling a bit lethargic. After about 300m I got hit on the side of the head which loosened my goggles and allowed them to fill up with water. I had to stop to fix them. This allowed the group I was swimming with to put a gap on me. I tried to make this up, but was unable to. Coming back to the beach we were swimming into the sun which made sighting tough. At the turn bouy I turned too much and got myself offline and didn't realize it (because the glare of the sun wasn't letting me see the buoys) until I was probably 30m too far to the left. I then tried to correct this and somehow ended up too far to the right! Not a good first lap.

Onto the second lap, the group ahead of me had about 30secs on me and I knew I couldn't catch them, and there was noone else near me. It was a long lonely second lap, but I sighted a bit better.

Out of the water in a little over 30 min. and into transition in just over 31min. About a minute slower than last year. I wasn't terribly happy with this since it was more just stupid mistakes than anything.

T1 - I took my time to put socks on here. A little slow with the wetsuit removal, but hey, it is a long race what is a few seconds!

Onto the bike. I was feeling OK, and eased into the bike. I was really careful to let my body settle in before I started pushing. Due to the lack of really long rides lately, I was weary of pushing to hard to early. After about 10km I started to feel good, and at about 25km I put the hammer down. I felt awesome throughout the entire bike. I was blowing by people on all of the hills and I didn't even feel like I was struggling! It was probably one of the best rides I have put in ever.

Off the bike in 2:28 (36.3 kmph) Very stoked with this.

T2 was uneventful.

Headed out onto the run. It loops around the soccer fields, and I really dislike this section. It is uneven, and really tough because it taxes all of your stabilizer muscles. I don't run on trails, so I am not used to this. That being said, I was still feeling really good. I had to hold myself back a fair bit at first because the body wanted to really go.

I was aiming for a 1:40 1/2marathon and I was holding this pace very well. It wasn't until the last 4km when I dropped off. Entering back into the park the body really decided it was about ready to finish. I really mentally had to battle to not really drop my pace to much here. I managed to do allright, but missed the 1:40 by a couple of minutes. Not suprised after the effort I put out on the bike, but all in all really pleased with the run.

Finish 4:45:15. Over 3 min. faster than last year on less training. I was not expecting this at all. I am pumped!!!

I now have a significant time off from racing. I don't race again until Steelhead at the beginning of August. This is a good thing. I am looking forward to relaxing and training well.

It is now the time of the year when I get to put in the big miles, and I am looking forward to this.

Wheels for sale.

I have three wheels for sale.

All are tubular and have newish rubber on them.

$250 unbranded American Classic Front. 40mm full carbon light and fast. Maybe has 400km on it. Continental podium tubular. used 3 times.

$150 Mavic Cosmic Carbon Rear. Very solid wheel 40mm carbon fering. Great shape recently trued. New conti podium tubular, used 3 times. Approx 3000km on it. Still great shape. Decals removed.

$100 Specialized/HED trispoke rear. Damaged, so I can't promise a whole lot. The breaking surface was damaged on a pothole before I got this. It has been repaired but is nowhere near perfect. The wheel is still very fast and true. Breaking is affected, but not to badly. I have raced this wheel a few times with no problems at all. New Tufo tubular on it which has never been ridden. Great second wheel if you don't want to risk your $2000 wheelset.

All wheels DON'T include skewers or cassettes.

I'm selling because I am going to be upgrading later this year.

contact me at

canadiantriathletes@hotmail.com

Muskoka Race Report

Muskoka is such a fun event. It has the atmosphere of a smaller race, but there are a ton of people there. Most of the best make it out for this one.

I wasn't expecting much out of this race as those of your who read this blog will probably realize. Training has been extremely sparse. I didn't taper at all and still did my long run/ride during the week so the legs were a bit tired.

Got to the venue nice and early this time, and had pick of the racks and parking which is allways nice. One neat thing was that there were less pro's this year, and as a result they moved one of our racks right next to theirs. Definetely cool to be suiting up next to these guys. It gives you a chance to chat with them, and more importantly check out their rides.

The race.

Swam down to the swim start which is so much nicer than walking. The pro's headed off and we watched the women fly by before we left. Got into a nice little pack off the gun, but lost them before the first buoy. I'm not sure if it was me or them, but I thought I had a good line to the buoy so I am thinking that they weren't sighting to well. It was hard into the sun.

Cruised the swim nicely. As usual with the longer swims I find a good rythym and can hold it well for the whole swim.

Out of the water I was feeling ok. From looking at the times of the pro's and myself, I think that the swim was about 100m long. Everybodies times seem a bit inflated.

T1 was relatively smooth.

The bike was the biggest x factor for me. I have been riding very little lately. Muskoka is a very tough and hilly course so I thought I would ease through it. I did ease through it, but the hills still smoked my legs pretty good. I had some GI issues about half way through the bike as well and my nutrition kept repeating itself on me. I had a very slow bike split. About 6 or 7 min. slower than last year.

T2. I knew I was going to be in trouble coming into transition. Had a slow transition removing a stone from my shoe. The first few steps were tough, and my abs were cramping really badly. I knew though, as a mature athlete :>, that if I just eased into it my running would come around. From experience it allways does.

Unfortunately today it took 8km to finally start feeling good. I got passed a lot in the first 7km, but I was determined not to walk. By the turn around the gut was starting to feel ok, and the legs were back on board, so I slowly ramped up the pace. I wanted to try and finish strong anyways.

I estimate that I was able to start running 4:20min. km's by the end, and I was feeling really good. To bad the race wasn't another 5km long I could have made up some time.

So that is the race. I know what I need to do to get back on the wagon. Bike, bike bike!!!

How to make life stressful 101.

Well. I think I am getting to be a pro at this. Not that I am overly stressed, but I definitely am making things harder than it could be.

So what do you do during the busiest month of the year to make it more difficult? The most stressful things you can think of!! Buying and selling a house! That's right! During exams/race season/ end of school year/ busy time at work for Jenn we go and buy a house. Of course buying the house is the easy part. Selling and packing our existing house is the hard part. Granted, most of it is now past us, but there are many niggly little things that go a long with it that take up a lot of time, and energy. I am more fatigued now than I was after Ironman, and I am not training that much at all!

So the closing is on the 26th of June for both houses. Jenn leaves for Newfoundland on the 22nd for 2 weeks. Yup, she won't be here for the move. That means that I will need to be power of attorney for her to sign the papers. This also means that I am going to have one less set of hands during the move. (This is part of the stress ) Thankfully, my wonderful parents will be there to help out. This day also happens to be the second last day of school, and our commencement. Which means that I will need to run to school for the ceremony during the move. Wow. I am getting an ulcer just thinking about it.

In the end I think this will work out fine, but June will be a blur that I don't remember. July and August will be full of doing all of those new house things that you are want to do. Painting/sanding/staining/tiling plus some minor carpentry. Luckily, I will still be able to get some quality training in during that time. Right now, I am lucky to hit 10 hrs a week. I am only managing onto the bike once or twice. Still, I should be in OK shape for Ironman. I am really lucky that I am doing florida and not Placid or Canada, because I would not be ready, or a total stresspot. It is also much easier the second time around. Unfortunately most of my season goals are being left out. No going pro next year, that is for sure.

So that is where things are at. It looks like I won't be able to make WIBA since it is the day after the move, but Peterborough and Steelhead still look like they will make the cut. After steelhead I may not race anymore until IMFLA. We'll see.

Milton Sprint Triathlon

Headed out into the day today wondering what the weather would hold for the first official triathlon of the season. It couldn’t come soon enough for me. Very anxious to see where the legs were at.
Recent life situations have made training difficult this year, so I was interested to see what would happen. It was a tough field with many athletes peaking for worlds next weekend. I knew this would be the case so expectations weren’t to high.
The race started with a splash into the frigid waters. I chose to start in my AG wave today as opposed to bumping myself to the elite wave. The confidence wasn’t flying to high today. I think this was a good choice overall, despite being held up a bit in the swim. Finished the swim in a respectable 11:10. I was hoping for a sub 11min. swim and would have probably done it in the elite wave. I didn’t really have anyone to draft off of in my wave, and the lappers quickly got in the way of that.
Into T1. I made sure to have sandals at the swim exit, as the parking lot at Milton is awful. Good choice. My transition was really slow. Had a bit of trouble getting out of my wetsuit. I need to practice this more. Normally I can get out in less than 1min, but I took 1:17 today. With the tight field this cost me a position in my AG and a few overall as well.
Onto the bike. I struggled on the bike at Victoria’s Du. I was going to make sure today that I eased into the ride, especially with “the hill” to contend with. Spun up the hill nicely, and passed a bunch of people who were really struggling. This was a moral boost for sure. Made sure to keep my cadence high and avoid mashing. This was my downfall in Kitchener. Managed to do this well while reaping the benefits of a second wave start. I mentally get a big boost from passing lots of people. So starting in the second wave allows me to do this. I only got passed once on the bike which is unusual. 51:03 for the bike, averaged 35.3.
I had a healthy gap over any riders coming into T2, and I knew that I was in contention. Another less than stellar transition had me onto the run course.
The run starts with a series of short punchy hills. These hurt while you are trying to get your legs under you. I made sure to give my legs some time to flush out today before I tried to start pushing. This was another mistake I made at Victoria’s. Milton is a tough run course. It is uphill almost the entire way to the turn around. My legs came under me around 2km, and I started picking off people. By the turnaround I was feeling very good and was holding a respectable pace. I started to cramp with about 2km to go, but I wasn’t going to let it slow me down at that point. I managed a little sprint into the line to finish in 1:35.55. A little slower than last year, but OK. Our AG was extremely competitive with only a little over a minute between first and fourth.
Overall I felt great about today, and I definetely have more confidence going into Muskoka in a few weeks. Should be fun!