Early in my first triathlon season back in 2008, I attended a transition clinic to learn about how triathlon transitions work. For those of you not in the know, a triathlon has two transitions, one from the swim to the bike and one from the bike to the run. The transition area is where you run into when you emerge from the swim and store items like your wetsuit, bike, bike gear, running shoes, extra water bottles, a large pepperoni pizza, one of those “Hang in there” inspirational posters, etc. Since I didn’t know anything about transitions (or triathlons, for that matter), I went to the clinic to learn how to ease from one sport into the next without looking like a complete asstard.

Every month or so I head to Colorado for work. This time around, I brought Jason with me so we could attend my boss’s housewarming party (I use the word “house” loosely, as 12,000 sq. ft is less of a “house” and more of a “Xanadu”). We spent the 4th of July hiking and trail running in Colorado Springs. That may sound impressive at first until I tell you that I both fell on my ass in true Mediocre Athlete fashion and we got horribly lost and ended up going twice as far as intended. Never go hiking with us unless you want people to stumble across your squirrel-eaten carcass months later. Jason and I drove over to Colorado Springs (we held our breaths as we passed the Focus on the Family Visitor Center exit so we wouldn’t get our souls stolen) and parked at a 6.5 mile trail head so we could do a hike/trail run. We had an 18 mile run scheduled for that day but figured we could manage to do a 3 hour hike/jog in the high elevation (around 7,000 feet) and trail terrain and call it good. It was a hot, sunny day and the trail was virtually deserted. We ran when we could and walked when we felt like our hearts would explode. I snapped a picture of Jason as he tried not to look like he was drenched in sweat: I made him take a picture of me before we ventured on: After a little bit, we stopped so I could do the requisite “self-portrait attempt” with my long monkey arms. 10 times out of 10 this results in me cutting off the top of Jason’s head in the photo (stupid 11″ height differential). Here’s attempt #3: We ran a bit further and came across a little foot bridge that took us over a tiny stream trickle and some rocks: Since it was so hot outside, I splashed some of the cold water on my arms and neck. When I turned around, I saw a little butterfly. “OMG, NATURE! MUST TAKE PICTURE!” Jason patiently waited for his dorky girlfriend. When I was ready to leave, he jokingly said, “Don’t slip and get swept away by the strong current.” I was like, “Hurr durr, I won’t,” and then promptly slipped on the rocks, fell on my ass, and slid a few feet down towards the foot bridge. It was so ridiculously inept that I couldn’t help but laugh: Then: “Wait a sec, I didn’t sit on the butterfly, did I?” Thankfully, I did not have a squished butterfly corpse smeared across my ass. After laughing heartily at me for a few minutes, Jason helped me up, cleaned me off, and we finished our trail run. From that trail head we drove over to the Garden of the Gods, a park that has a bunch of cool rock formations and lots of intersecting trails. We got a map at the gift shop and decided to do a 4 mile loop. While running, we came across a couple who offered to take a picture of us in front of some rocks. It turned out pretty ridiculous: We had to dodge a ton of horse crap on the trails because a bunch of dooshers were riding horses and couldn’t be bothered to clean up the giant dung piles their animals left behind. Running amidst steaming horse shit on a hot, sunny day aren’t my ideal hiking conditions, but to each his own. Jas and I tried to head back to the car to complete our 4 mile loop, but since all of the trains intersect and...

Or, as Sir Mix-a-lot would say, “My chir-o-prac-tor don’t want none unless he cracks bones, hon!” And to Nathan, my Magnolia Seattle chiropractor, I’m probably the Mack Daddy or Swass of patients. You see, I visit a chiropractor and a physical therapist for various maladies, and both of them have pretty harsh things to say about my neck and back. In their words, working on my back is like “pressing down on concrete.” While a healthy back, muscles and joints should have a bit of spongy give to them, my back is as hard as Sharon Stone’s face in Catwoman (I apologize for the terrible movie reference). Both the chiro and the PT recommended I get massage therapy at least once a month to help loosen my tight muscles. I’ve previously gotten three massages in my life. Here’s a brief drill down of each one: Massage #1 was given to me by my triathlete coach’s massage therapist, Richard. She referred me to him after I was complaining of pain near my right shoulder blade. He’s a pleasant, calm Asian man who works out of his house. I spent an hour laying face-down listening to Jack Johnson while Richard worked on my shoulder (at one point, he took what felt like a running start and leaned all of his body weight onto my back, which I found pretty amusing). I liked Richard a lot but found him to be a bit out of my price range for regular visits. Massage #2 was courtesy of a no-nonsense woman I tried out for a session. Her hands were brutally magical (I’m a fan of deep, hard massages to the point of being unbearable — the harder, the better) but she talked non-stop and complained about how expensive it is to travel nowadays. I don’t particularly care to have conversations with surly masseuses, so I ruled her out for subsequent visits. Massage #3 was in Cancun, Mexico, after the Ironman Cancun 70.3 (I’ll write a separate post about that race soon). Jason and I booked a couple’s massage at our resort, and two Mexican masseuses poked and prodded at us for what was probably ninety minutes but seemed like an eternity. The whole ordeal was uncomfortable for both of us. Jason was uneasy because it was his first ever massage, and he was paranoid about virtually everything the woman did. When she rubbed some aromatic cream on her hands and stuck them under his nose, instructing him to “Breathe deep,” he wondered if he was going to get knocked out and wake up in a bathtub full of ice with a kidney missing. Also, he put up a stink about having to get nekkid. I, meanwhile, had the pleasure of my masseuse giving me a long, grueling massage all over my horribly sunburned back (that deserves its own post as well), which felt more like I was being viciously tenderized for a lavish cannibal buffet. I don’t particularly like getting massages, but since my doctors urged me to consider them for health purposes I booked an appointment with a massage therapy facility for Attempt #4. The massage was good timing since my back and neck had been bothering me recently and I had been having frustrating workouts. It also doesn’t help that I get paid to hunch in front of a computer all day. The fact that I don’t have a Quasimodo hump yet is astounding. Anyway, I booked a massage at a new place in Capitol Hill. After filling out a rough approximation of my medical history, I met with a woman who looked vaguely like tailie Ana Lucia from Lost but...

My friend Lauren (who as of now I shall dub “L2” because I have another friend named Lauren whom I met before this one, and I don’t want to confuse all ten of you Mediocre Athlete readers whenever I talk about the other one) had taken a ballet Pilates class in the fall and urged me to take it again with her this winter. I had mentioned in my yoga post how I had tried Pilates once before and thought it was lame, but I’m generally a good sport about trying new things (plus I need blogging material for this site), so I agreed to take the class with her and her friend. The class is supposed to be a mix of basic ballet and Pilates stretches, so I went in with the expectation that I’d be a wobbly, awkward mess since I am extremely clumsy and uncoordinated. (Seriously, ask Jason how often I drop something, spill on myself, run into things and trip over imaginary objects on a daily basis. The answer is “often.” The other day he just about died laughing after I squirted butterscotch all over my pants.) I arrived to class and saw that, unsurprisingly, the group of girls who were signed up were all wearing either yoga pants or ballet leotards, tights and ballet shoes. I, of course, was wearing a muddy pair of running shoes, athletic socks, running shorts and a sleeveless shirt. I dejectedly peeled my shoes and socks off, sighing about how sticky the worn wood floors felt under my bare feet. The instructor began the class by having us all hold onto the bar and do little squat thingies down towards the ground. We were supposed to stand with the heels of our feet pointed towards each other and our toes in opposite directions, kind of like Charlie Chaplin. Or a penguin. I dunno. We then did a series of awkward ballet stretches that were in 2nd position or something. I didn’t know what any of these ballet terms were. The only French I know is whatever I can remember from ten weeks of seventh grade foreign language class and that one song from The Little Mermaid. Anyway, the rest of the class pretty much consisted of the teacher explaining something for thirty seconds and then making us do some ridiculous ten step process immediately afterwards. Remember that episode of I Love Lucy where Lucy’s assembling chocolates on a conveyor belt, but then the belt speeds up so she can’t keep up? That’s pretty much how I felt trying to follow the teacher’s directions. It was a lot of “point your toes, pull in your stomach, straighten your leg.” Every so often I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror, and I often looked bewildered and vaguely irritated, and the stuffy studio and piano player weren’t helping. (Yes, a woman plays piano next to us during class while the instructor tries to talk over her. No, she wasn’t playing ragtime. Yes, I wish she were.) L2 and Chelsea asked me how I liked ballet Pilates after our first class finished up. They seemed amused with my reluctance and told me that they felt equally clunky and awkward when they took it in the fall. However, apparently they became much more flexible at the end of the class, so hopefully I’ll at least get some benefit out of skipping across the room and pretending to feel graceful. At the very least, my favorite falafel place is right across the street so I can always reward my efforts with a jumbo gyro and rice (which I did...