She came, she saw, she conquered

I support smoking, i race fast myself. At this first race of the year I totally smoked them. I even smoked the guys, comming in 3rd overall (men and women). If they would have let the women start with the men, i would have won the whole thing. Read on!
I did my first race of the year, the HQBN Sprint Triathlon on the Marine Corp Base in Hawaii. I want to start telling about it the day before. I went to meet my coach Mike, because he has aero wheels that I could race on. I love aerowheels. Alone the summing sound of it makes me want to go fast. As we put the bike together, the moon rose up from the ocean. Mike is the house care taker or a multimillion dollar house project on the secluded side of Kailua beach. It was fantastic!
Race morning was unspectacular. As long as I can hit the potty before race start, I am happy. That is usually sort of a problem. Oftentimes I need to go when the run starts. And that is no fun; seriously. It sucks, actually. I went to the race withoug knowing how I will feel. I have been training a lot, but not as intense as last year. I am also still not running a whole lot because of my lingering hip/hamstring/wherever-it-is injury. I wanted to get a hard effort session in by racing and I wanted to smoke the swim and especially the bike. Whatever would happen on the run, was fine with me. The swim was great until the 2nd turnaround, where it started to become a battlefield of fast women against slow guys. I need to say that the mass start at the xterra world’s is by far the best idea. If I had no “traffic” blockage, I would have won the whole thing, men and women together. And that would have been history! The bike was fast, hard and in the zone, meaninig I don’t remember what was happening or how I felt. Just as it should be. The first 500m into the run felt heavy and stiff, but then I actually got speedier than I thought I can push. And there was a little hill as well! I love hills! So that definitely made my day- I finished with a pace of 5:41 min/mi.

Back in Hawaii
The first thing I did when I was back on Oahu was go to the ocean at Kailua Beach and listen to the waves. I now frequently visit The Sky Tonight at the Bishop Museum to learn star constellations. So that became a frequent as well, looking up to the stars and the moon. The second thing I did was riding Tantalus the next morning. I love riding Tantalus. It’s like meditation. Last year I could not do any workout without my i-pod; this season it is so easy to zoom in, get in the zone and be in the nirvana or wherever you might call it. Feels damn good. Power bar fruit smoothie tastes damn good when riding Tantalus. The third thing after the workout was getting Starbuck’s. I am a Starbuck’s addict. Venti decaf with ½ inch of steamed soy, foam on the side. If you want make me happy get me a Starbuck’s gift certificate! Or surprise me with Business Cards (that’s you Blair)!! Then I felt really flat. The best thing to do for acclimatizing when I am traveling is to force myself to get up as sunrise, take a 1 hour nap at noon and go to bed around 9:30pm. The rest of the week was spent cleaning the Kailuana Cottage, which is usually a 4 day project. The cottage is part of a multi million dollar beach front property. Don Eovino (www.eovino.net) is a friend of mine; if you would like to invest in his projects, please contact them! The cottage is for vacation rent and needs to be cleaned meticulously. I love it though, because the location is just insane-ly beautiful. I went to an interval swim in the ocean and my buddy Jimmy took the kayak out to take pictures of me. I love side of the island the most. Fantastic!