Tuesday, July 7, 2009

I'm outta here...

Well this is my last post before I leave on Thursday so I thought I'd do a quick update.

Erik did his amazing solo ride on Monday, June 29. Overall, he rode 292 km in 12:25 with over 8000' of climbing!

For more info about Erik's ride, you'll have to listen to episode #28 of my podcast (see link on the right). You can also go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ih76L24XBh8 to see a 2 1/2 minutes slideshow of the highlights.

One picture I forgot to include in the slideshow was a close up pictures of a wolf that I saw walking alongside the road on the Bow Valley Parkway. At the time I thought it was a coyote. I was looking out my car window by the way. :)






Training and the Trip


Well, life continues to be hectic and I've found it hard to fit in all the training I wanted to do. :( I've been swimming twice, had a couple of rides, and been on 4 runs in the past 10 days or so.

My main focus continues to be on running. I've been trying to stick mostly to the hills behind my house so my time hasn't been fast but I'm really enjoying it and so far, my shins haven't been complaining. I've also been running further partly because my runs include a 1 km hike up to the flatter area. So far I've run 6km, 6km, 7km, and 8.25km. I am really loving it!

I've had some ITB/knee pain off and on lately - that's what slowed me down on the 5k race with my daughter - bu I've been stretching and using the foam roller and my last two runs have been pain-free.

Much of this week however, has involved shopping, cleaning, running errands, and packing. We leave Kelowna at 11:30 on Thursday and leave Vancouver at 7:30pm. We will be home on July 26th. There will not be a podcast episode during that time.

My son will be staying with his Dad and I have house sitters looking after the dogs and the cat and generally holding down the fort at home.

When I get back, I'm going to have to kick my training into high gear if I want to be ready to the Apple Sprint Triathlon on August 23rd. (I'm starting to feel more than a little nervous about being ready with my messed up training schedule....)

However, I will be riding (not seriously) for 9 days on my trip (20-50km per day) and will try hard to fit in a few early morning runs before it gets too hot. Most places we're staying at will have swimming pools although it's hard to imagine that I"ll be swimming sets... ;)

So - in the meantime, I'm going to put serious training aside and just enjoy my vacation!

I will have my (Erik's) itouch so when I have access to wifi, I will tweet a bit and I will try sending a few email blog updates. Unfortunately, I have no way to send pictures until I get back.

Thanks for all the well-wishes!

A bientot!

3 comments:

elementsoferin337 said...

Something for you to read when you get back. I listened to the podcast and looked at the photos of Erik's ride. Amazing! Having been to Banff and Lake Louise before I know how POWERFUL the environment there. Watching the photos made me want to do the same ride. Altought 12+ hours on a bike seems crazy...but look who is talking. LOL.

Erin

Jamie said...

Yeah, that is DEFINITELY too big to be a coyote! Crazy! Glad you were safely in the car.

Paul said...

Way to go Eric! Man that's an epic ride! 12 hrs. in the saddle is serious riding and you have my ut most respect for pulling it off.