Before yesterday I had never actually run the Seattle marathon or the half marathon. I had tried to convince Jas that we should sign up in previous years, but he never wanted to because it sounded terribly unappealing to him. I don’t blame the guy; the race is three days after Thanksgiving during a supremely shitty time of the year to be running outside in Seattle. Despite his yearly disinterest, however, this time he finally agreed to sign up for the marathon since he cut his triathlon season short and wanted something to train for before diving into Ironman training. Meanwhile, since I was...

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...

The rain gods must have read my post about crappy Seattle weather and decided to troll the entire city by unleashing torrential downpours and strong winds for the past few days. Good thing I live on a hill; otherwise, I could be running into flooding problems that are plaguing many of the city’s residents right now. I’m also finally happy to be on coach’s and doctor’s orders not to run until the Achilles tendinitis heals, because there’s no way in hell I’d want to run in the kraken-summoning tsunamis unfurling outside. No running, unfortunately, means that Teresa has...

You gotta love living and training in Seattle. I always defend the city I’ve lived in for the past 9 years whenever people go “Herp derp doesn’t it rain there all the time?” by saying that it’s more gray days and occasional rain vs. nonstop downpours. Then I feel like a jackass whenever I strap on my running shoes and look woefully out the window as the cold rain splashes against the glass. Sad trombone. Nonetheless, it’s Seattle, and you gotta put up with some shitty weather if you want to stick to your running regime and are absolutely useless on a treadmill...

On Wednesday I participated in the Swim for Life swim across Lake Washington. Teresa wanted me to do it last year, but they always do the event on a Wednesday morning and I couldn’t get off work…plus I hate swimming. This year, I figured it’d be a good confidence booster before Ironman Canada so I begrudgingly plunked down coinage to swim 2.5 miles from Medina to Madison Park. I told myself it’d be for a good cause (the Puget Sound Blood Center) and for swimming peace of mind leading into Canada. Well, it was for a good cause, but the swim was sucktacular. Sigh. I woke up at...