Recently I did the Issaquah sprint for the first time since 2008. It was my first triathlon of the season and the first race I was doing without my Big Friendly Giant racing alongside (meaning ahead) of me. Jason had signed up to do the Boise 70.3, which was a week after Issaquah, so he served as my cheering squad and gear sherpa for the day. I signed up for the event when I arrived, so no awesome shwag for me. Oh well, I have enough crappy finisher’s t-shirts to last me a while. I puttered over to my transition spot to set up my crap while the race organizers blasted the sleepiest “pump...

On Monday I went to dryland strength conditioning, and that day Bridget decided to get cute with us and change up the routine a bit. She did a 30 seconds on/30 seconds rest/30 seconds on workout where we’d be at a station doing reps for half a minute before getting a break. That’s all well and good if the person running the workout is paying attention to the clock and timing everything properly; unfortunately, a couple times Bridget would get too caught up in watching everyone’s form to remember to check her watch and realize that she had been punishing us well past the :30 mark. (She...

Before I put up my Issaquah sprint triathlon race recap, I thought I’d crank out a delayed recap of the Mt. Rainier Duathlon, which I did on May 1st. Enjoy! Until recently, I haven’t been focused on races and have instead been trying to get my right Achilles tendon healthy. Now that it finally seems as if it’s mostly on the mend, Teresa has taken advantage of my newfound health and has been bugging me about my 2011 race season. First up was the Mt. Rainier duathlon, which I wasn’t thrilled about because I wasn’t optimistic about how well I’d do (especially since I...

Tomorrow I’m doing the Issaquah sprint triathlon. Fun fact: the Issaquah sprint was my first-ever triathlon three years ago. In typical Mediocre Athlete fashion, my first race didn’t go so well. Basically, I should be able to PR tomorrow by about 45 minutes unless my leg falls off or I get abducted. I thought I’d offer up an exceptionally belated race report so you have an idea of how my first-ever triathlon went way back in 2008 — enjoy! Back in 2008, I was training for my first half Ironman, the not-quite-half-Ironman-distance New Balance race in Victoria. I was a sorry sight,...

Last week I checked my training workouts and saw that Teresa was seemingly intent on turning my taint into a giant callus on which I could strike matches by scheduling me four bike workouts: one tempo/strength ride, a recovery ride, a 3 hour interval workout, and the 7 Hills of Kirkland metric century ride on Memorial Day. She emailed me and asked if I was doing the ride. I responded with a “Maybe…who else is doing it?” Teresa directed me to our Yahoo! group forum so I could coordinate with some teammates and have someone to ride with. I, of course, was too lazy to do that so I ended...

For me, the first open water swim of the season is always incredibly crappy. No matter how much pool swimming I do, once my toes touch lake water for the first time in several months, what little swim ability and athleticism I had is left on the shore alongside a fresh little pile of grassy-colored duck poop. Last week was no exception; in fact, throw in some shitty weather along with the customary flailing and you’ve got what (I dearly hope) will be my worst open water swim of the year. I checked my workout schedule and saw that Teresa assigned me a 2,000 yd swim or the option of swimming with...