The Dump

So there I was, singing karaoke in a dive biker bar that was in a bowling alley parking lot.  That happened.  I have been so busy this post will be a dumping point for everything I haven't had the chance to blog about.

March Totals
Swim: 28,400 meters, 10 swims
Bike: 311.75 miles, 16 rides
Run: 80.6 miles, 12 runs
Strength: 6 times
Yoga: 7 times

Who's glad to be back swimming with the RAM team?  This guy.  holy smokes 28k in the pool?  That's unheard of.  Last ironman cycle I usually got around 20k per month in the pool. so I'd call this a roaring start.  311 miles is nice bike month too.  Last time I averaged around 300 miles a month when it got long.  This time it's a starting point, so I like where this is going.  And soon enough I'll be back running over 100 miles a month.

In fact, this week is a bumping point.  The midweek rides go up to 20 miles from 15 and the midweek runs are going from 5 to 6 miles.  Wednesday I did 20 on the bike before work and bumped up the resistance another notch, and after getting the kids down I ran 6 in 46 minutes flat.  Nice long and fast.  Last week was another story.

The week was fine, except for that crushing start to the work week.  Easter weekend was great, we went to SC to enjoy the holiday with my parents. I had a great run saturday morning, 8.5 miles around the neighborhood.  Felt great, very very hilly, and stayed pretty fast.  Totals for the week had 46 bike miles, 16.5 miles running, and 2953 yards in the pool. Total time was 5:33, just a bit lighter than the 10.5 hours last week.

Cast Iron Club: Through 4/3, I'm at 10.93 iron swims, 6.74 iron bikes, and 6.74 iron runs.  This is through only 2 months of base training in the Ironman training plan.  Goal is 30 iron distances.  I'm feeling comfortable in this goal for the year.  Really glad to see the swim number get over 10.

I'm still kind of blown away by discovering that I swam 28,400 meters in March.

The Pics
The long weekend workouts are the important part of an ironman training plan, so I feel guilty about not doing more last weekend.  But the good news is that all of this happened instead:

Evil Genius asleep and about to work herself out of the bottom of her bed

The kids dying easter eggs with Grandma

Ready for some color!

These were eggs dyed with shaving cream and neon food coloring.  Make your own jokes, but it actually turned out pretty cool.  youtube it if you don't believe me.

all the love

For a while now EG has been saying she wants to let her hair grow as long as Tangled's hair.  She means Rapunzel, but that's cute.  Now it's gotten long enough so she's tired of dealing with the tangles, and wanted to get it cut.  So of course I made an appointment while we were in Greenville to get her hair cut by the same barber who has been cutting my hair since I was 5.  Her mind was sufficiently blown when she made the connection that she is still 5 years old and Kevin has been cutting my hair since I was 5 years old.  Now she wants to go see Kevin every time we go to Greenville.  This could get expensive.

That is some long hair.

and she got a lot cut off!  maybe about 8 inches?

Almost there

All finished up!  so cute!

There's the end of an era in Greenville.  The Clock is a drive in restaurant on Wade Hampton Blvd.  My parents used to go on dates there while they were in college.  It's closing the doors after more than 60 years in business over a real estate problem.  Bob Jones University has been wanting to get the land for years now, and they are finally getting it.  The Clock is a greasy spoon place, my favorite meal there was a double chili cheeseburger with half & half (fries and onion rings).  Kelley and I got to have lunch there saturday, but I did not get the double chili parts.  This Greenville landmark closed down on Sunday, and will be greatly missed.

 

So long familiar landmark

EG got apples from the Easter Bunny and loved it.  She digs the honeycrisp!

Bigun digs all the Reece's

Showing off my mad yo-yo skillz

Making yeast rolls with Grandma - always one of EG's highlights

Hunting for easter eggs in the garden

Morgan got in on the action too

 That's a fun weekend in SC.  Saturday night Morgan's girlfriend wanted to go sing karaoke, so the 4 of us went out.  This biker bar was near his house, and they knew the dj.  I sang a Black Crowe's song and the Bartender Song from Rehab.  Morg did a few, and Martha sang a bunch but we couldn't get Kelley up there.

Sunday's ride back was pretty tough.  Usually it's about a 4 hour drive, but we had to stop a bunch of times, including picking up our niece.  Kaileigh is always glad to get some time in Raleigh, and we're always glad to have her.  She's on spring break all this week.

April Fool's!
Monday the kids went nuts over April Fool's day.  You can imagine the corny stuff that a 5 and 7 year old can come up with, and they did it all.  Kelley got in the shower to find that all of the soap had been hidden.  Bigun switched the bags of Frosted Flakes and Fruit loops, then asked for the loopies for breakfast and got Frosties instead.  Evil Genius called me at work to tell me that my pants were on fire.  The creativity those two can put out there is pretty impressive.

When we switched back onto daylight savings time I made a joke on facebook about moving to Indiana because most of the state doesn't observe DST.  So for April Fool's I put that same joke out there with a more serious tone.  I don't think anybody believed me.

Not April Fool's!
Monday night I got accepted onto the AAA Carolinas Triathlon Team!  I am incredibly excited about this.  It's a regional team, not national like Rev3 or Wattie Ink.  But they sponsor a the NCTS and SCTS series of Setup Events races.  So I get a racing kit and a few other perks, and have to do a Setup Events race this year which is not a big deal.  I'm very excited and will do another full post about the team once the profiles come up.

MMNW
Monday morning's naked weight was pretty bad this week.  184.8 lbs and 21.2% body fat.  I should be closer to 175 after 2 months of Ironman training.  You can't out train a bad diet, and with all of this traveling and hectic scheduling and high stress work stuff going on, it's water weight or stress eating?  I can tell I'm making some great strides in strength and conditioning already, and don't need to sabotage that with poor food choices.  I think the quantities have gotten a bit out of hand too. Time to reign it all in!

This week has been much better, and I got on the scale at 180.6 thursday morning.  so that's progress.  I've been working the portion controls this week and the quality pretty hard.  And managing my stress levels better, I think.

Coming up this weekend, Bigun and I are heading back here for more fun in the camp sun.  Let's hope it is sunny and warm this year?  please?

That should have been like 6 blog posts.  That's how busy and stressed I've been lately.  More campy fun pics next week!