Thank you everyone!

I've had some very kind emails and comments on my race day blog. Thank you everyone who took the time to write a few words. It means a lot to hear encouragement from other people that have been in the same place. I'm normally a pretty positive, forward looking person, so being that down is a very unusual experience for me. I am feeling much better now. Really.

Well, except for one thing I want to get off my chest. I understand that the volunteers and spectators want to cheer on the athletes, and encourage them. The races are impossible to put on without the volunteers and I certainly appreciate their efforts. I've sent a thank you email to Mike Bock to pass onto his volunteers; they did a great job. But why do they say "Good Job!" or "Good Work!"? I was very grumpy about this during the race. I get paid at my job to do work. I get told what to do, I do it, and I get paid regardless of how I feel about it. I do triathlon because it's fun. Almost all the time I enjoy it. Certainly I'm doing work, in the physicist sense, that much is true. But I'm not 'working.' And telling me I'm looking great, what's that about? I'm reasonably certain I looked like a zombie last weekend. I saw a photo of me getting out of the water at a tri last year, and I've seen corpses that look better. Or is this something about triathlon that I don't know yet, that there is a conspiracy to lie to the athletes to help them through? (And yes, this para should be read in an Andy Rooney voice.)

No, really, I am feeling better. It still isn't a good race, but I'm not so down about it. I've started to think about what happened in a more analytical way, rather than just an emotional way. It's been suggested to me the whole day was one long semi-bonk. If my breakfast didn't get digested I was behind the nutritional 8 ball right from the start. After some reading I found this on bonking. "You become irritable, lose focus, and find it difficult to concentrate. You feel dizzy, disoriented, and may even hallucinate. Your vision closes in, and it may be difficult to keep your balance." That certainly describes some of what I was feeling.

The training front has been pretty quiet. I've been trying to get some good sleep and mostly succeeding. My wonderful massage therapist worked me over Monday afternoon, and it felt great! Lots of time spent on my legs, of course, but also my shoulders, and believe it or not, my jaw. She thought from the way I was carrying my head and periodically clicking my teeth that there was some tension there, and by golly, she was right.

My thought for this week is to get my legs back to 100% through some rest, a bit of stretching, some yoga, and maybe walking. Some of that walking is going to be pushing a lawn mower; the lawn has turned into a jungle. No running, though oddly enough, when I was doing some BBQ on Sunday night I was watching someone run by, and knew that if I changed my shoes, I could run faster and smoother than I ran during the race. I didn't, of course. I've been invited to ride the 70.3 course again next weekend, and I'm going to have to see how I feel. That might be too much too soon.

Congrats to Shannon on his great race! He's such a modest guy he only said he had a good day, and it's only when I saw the results that I realized he'd placed second in his age group. Susi and Lori had tough races, but gutted it out and finished. I haven't seen Chad's blog, but his time looks super! Amy and KK had a great race. I was thinking it must be super to race with someone you know that well.