The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

~ meh ~ Leave a comment

Last weekend, after the inferno bike ride, temperatures PLUMMETED to the mid-50s at night with highs of 65 during the day.  And it started raining.

And just like that–BOOM–it’s fall.


Jersey’s back on devil dog.  You know what this means.

Tailgating.  Cornhole.  Campers.  Wildcat blue mini dresses with big belts and cowboy boots.

First homegame of the season.   And absolutely beautiful weather.

We can hear the whole game announced from our house.  Louisville is next weekend.

Go Cats.

Happy Labor Day!

~ meh ~ 1 Comment

Late, I know.

Lexington has been making an effort to do more community events, and the Friday of Labor Day weekend was a good one.  Welcome to the Fest of Ales.

Look at all those beer pourers.  For $25 you got a mini glass and 20 tickets (about 7 beers, if you used them all…which no one did) to try out a whole bunch of different brews.  The whole town was out, it was great.  And people wore great shirts.

Unfortunately, the Fest underestimated how many people would partake (and how many of their pourers would adopt a “one for you, one for me” policy) and ran out of beer a little early.  So a group of us headed to a bar for one more drink.

It was there that I witnessed one of the more amazing mobile apps currently on the market: Roqbot.  For a fee, it lets you re-arrange the order of the queue on the jukebox in a bar.  So obviously Paul’s friend who had the app started playing “Who Let the Dogs Out” every other song.  He is already responsible for having the app banned in 3 bars in town.

Anyway, it was there that things degenerated pretty quickly.

We left before it got too ugly.

The previous week I had told a friend that I would join her on a bike ride Saturday morning with the Bluegrass Cycling Club.  BCC was offering a 10 mile (family ride), 30 mile, and 56 mile option.  My friend and I were doing the 56 mile ride (even though I hadn’t been on my bike since Steelhead, it got a little jacked up on the trip home and I just got it tuned up last week).

Paul was going to do the 30 mile option, since he hadn’t ridden his bike in like 5 months, but after some mild harassment he gave into the 56 miler too.  So we pulled our not-unhungover selves out of bed at 7:30 and headed out to the country.

The weather was gorgeous.

…but then it got hot.  Really hot.  And the shade disappeared.

We were getting baked.  Paul started to suffer.  The last 15 miles weren’t pretty.  The rest of the weekend was recovery.

Oh, and I came in from my run today and decided to turn on the local news while I stretched and this was on TV.

Apparently I’ve been away from local TV for too long, I had NO IDEA stuff like this was seriously still on.  The soundtrack was amazing.

Oh HECK yeah

~ meh ~ Leave a comment

A group of friends needed anther person to complete their team for the 2011 Bourbon Chase in October, and guess who they invited to join?

That’s right!  The Bourbon Chase is a relay race across Kentucky through all of the major bourbon distilleries, starting at Jim Beam and ending in Lexington with a bourbon celebration.  Score.  It’s almost like an urban hike…but running and in rural Kentucky.  Right?

Time to fire up the running shoes again…

Update: Our team name is Jim Beam Me Up.

Time’s a Goon

~ meh ~ Leave a comment

I LOVE SUMMER SO MUCH.  Even when I get tangled up in the pool vacuum hose.  (and no, I don’t know where my bellybutton went in that picture…maybe the whiteness ate it.)

It doesn’t hurt that Paul’s sister’s boyfriend’s mother (did you get that?) has a house with a pool around the corner from where we live.  And she lets us use it pretty much whenever we want.  She even brings us lemonade and pretzels while we float around in the sun, which reminds me of summers in high school when we lived at Emily’s pool and her mom would bring us popcorn.  And now that I’m not doing 3 hour bike rides every weekend, this is what I do instead: lie on my floatie reading my book, drinking lemonade, getting sunburned, and dreading the end of August.  It’s amazing.

Anyway, the book I’m reading above is A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan, and I thought it was pretty phenomenal.  Different format than most novels, almost a series of short stories, very fragmented and unconventional in both the narrative and the actual visual presentation.  Really good.  Recommend.

Steelhead 69.1

~ meh ~ 1 Comment

I’m thinking of getting this tattoo.

So yes, the swim was cancelled.  Which generally means I am completely screwed, because that’s the only part of the race that I’m remotely good at.

BUT!  I did get in to test out the water the day before the race…

…and after a short bike/run actually got in to splash around with Paul.  The water temp was in the high 70s, and the waves were juuust big enough to do some body surfing, which I did quite a bit of.  Probably not the best pre-race activity, but I couldn’t help myself, the water felt so good.  I miss the ocean.

Our hotel was in South Haven, about 30 miles north of Benton Harbor, and our stay coincided with the National Blueberry Festival.    We just missed the parade where the National Blueberry Queen made her debut, which was a shame.  But we did catch the South Haven Vintage Baseball Club baseball game in full swing.  They even played without gloves.

The weather that day was completely erratic, going from severe thunderstorms to sun all day long (we left the beach just in time to see a major storm rolling in), which wasn’t super promising for the race.

Woke up on race day with serious winds, and upon entering transition the first thing they announced was that the swim had been cancelled, there was a small craft advisory, and winds of up to 25 mph were predicted for the day.  Boo.

So we did a time trial start on the bike, going two at a time by bib number.  My bike was solid, I think…never raced 56 miles for time before and wasn’t sure what to expect…but I averaged significantly faster than I did in the 14-mile bike leg of the Markey Race (yes, for reals) and came in a solid 10 minutes under my goal time of 3 hours.

My run was GREAT…for the first 8ish miles.  My 10K split was right around 51:00.  I was on pace to easily break 2 hours, no problem, and was running at a totally comfortable pace.  Then suddenly, this happened:

Bonk.

It was ugly.  I walked for about a minute.  The next 2.5 miles were a combo of walk/run, and I grabbed a gel, some coke, and Gatorade from the aid stations as I went.  I finally got my legs back and was able to jog the last few miles to the finish line.  But it wasn’t pretty.

Final run time: 1:59:34.  Just squeaked in.  Paul met my semi-coherent self at the finish line, and helped me find my way back to transition to get my stuff.  I also had  knots the size of watermelons on my neck/shoulders from the new aerobars, which I rode on for almost the entire race.

Oh, and apparently I’m from Lexington, CA.

BUT!  I finished, didn’t die, broke 5 hours, and learned that I need to eat or drink more earlier on in the run.

More on the race (if you actually want to hear any more) to be posted here shortly.