We’ve all had them–I’ve certainly had my fair share, like when I set out to ride the Lake Stevens course a couple times and made it 10 miles. Or when I set out to ride 82 miles and made it about 30 and nearly froze to death. Sometimes you just have one of those days where you set out to do something and the forces combine to eff up your ess so that you have the worst day imaginable as one thing after another goes wrong. Yesterday was one of those days for me. I had a speed run workout scheduled, so Jas and I headed to the Greenlake track on our lunch break to bust it out. The plan was...

It’s been 44 days since I embarked on my quest for abs so that I won’t race Honu 70.3 in shame. Jas and I are progressing along nicely, and save for a gloriously unhealthy weekend in Portland a few days ago, we’ve managed to shed some poundage thanks to the combination of constant exercising and counting calories via the My Fitness Pal app. Right now I’m back to my Ironman Canada race weight. Huzzah! I’ve also noticed that my running has felt noticeably stronger, probably because I’m hauling less junk in the trunk. After this week’s track workout, Bridget and...

On Saturday Jason and I woke up early-ish to meet our teammates for a trail run over at Cougar Mountain. It was a nice sunny morning that gave way to thick fog and decreased temperatures as we puttered across I-90 to the park entrance, but by the time we arrived it was sunny again (albeit a bit humid). You gotta love Seattle and its schizophrenic weather. I had only done the Cougar Mountain trail workout once before and I was a lot chunkier and slower, so I was looking forward to attacking the trails in my leaner, meaner state. The last time I did the run, I wheezed my way up the hills feeling...

A couple days ago I had a hill repeat run workout scheduled in glorious 83 degree heat. My hamstrings were already screaming at me from a tough week of strength training so I wasn’t really looking forward to the run, but I knew it needed to get logged so I HTFU’d and pulled on my running shoes. After a 15 minute warm up that consisted of the shortest strides ever thanks to too-tight legs, I made it to the bottom of the hill I would climb six times. Jason had a hill repeat run too, only he had eight climbs because he’s more beastly than I am. We both started at the Volunteer Park Cafe...

Earlier this year I had been down in the dumps because I was injured and had gained all the weight I had lost training for Ironman Canada. I felt like a beached whale that has a family size bucket of Ezell’s fried chicken within fin’s reach. But now that my body is mostly on the mend, I’ve established a renewed interest in getting strong and fit for the remainder of the 2011 season and heading into the new year. I recently mentioned my goal of getting abs by the end of May so the bikini beach photos of me with my teammates won’t be profoundly embarrassing. With 262 days...

A good teammate pays it forward when her crew comes up to support and cheer for her as she’s dragging her tired legs 140.6 miles, so that’s exactly what I did the last Sunday in August in Penticton for my TN peeps. My Becca Sense had been tingling all summer thinking that the Ironman Canada athletes would have a hot race day since I got lucky last year with the weather (minus the pockets of rain and wind on the bike), and I was right. Of the five days I was up in Canada, the “coldest” day was in the mid-80s and race day crept up to the mid-90s. I tried to do some workouts while...