Love the Hurt: Memorial Day weekend

Last week was definitely one of my more favorites weeks of the year. It included a lot of family time, training, racing, a video shoot, dodge ball and some fun times with friends/family! After capping off a fun race at Encinitas the next day I was set up for a video shoot with EZIA. They are making a triathlon video and I was stoked to throw on the Wattie Ink colors which they loved since it's their same colors and also give a big shout out to The Bike Shop. I arrived and realized this was a much bigger deal than I had anticipated. $100k+ camera's, video crew and I brought them a sore body from the race to do strength and mobility exercises! It actually ended up being a lot of fun and I went through everything pretty smoothly. I'm excited and a little nervous to see how it turns out, especially since we are talking full HD! If you live in the area be sure to check them out, they have a really cool thing going on there and I'm hoping to make it a part of my weekly training too.

The bet is on!

Two days later I entered the TCSD Aquathon. I've always wanted to check it out to do a little recon for the Temecula Valley Triathlon club so that maybe we could incorporate one at Vail lake sometime this summer. It ended up being a blast. It was a 1000 meter ocean entry swim followed by a 5k run on the beach, like literally in the sand with waves coming in at you. To make it even more entertaining by buddy and I placed a wager on who would get out of the water first. Last time we did a triathlon together he came out about 5 seconds ahead of me - so I figured with all of my swimming I've been doing, he'd be mine for the taking. The wager was a delicious IPA of the winners choosing. Even more motivation to swim fast! The Aquathon was set to go off at 6pm after work so I met up with Ryan and we headed down. After a tough few days of recovering from smashing a 5k at Encinitas and then hitting up a hard masters session the night before I wasn't expecting anything spectacular - just more of "racing" experience in the open water, something that is killing me. Over 100 people showed up for the race! I guess it was a large turnout and with it being one mass start into a pretty big swell, it was about to get interesting. At the pre race briefing they recommended that you just do the 5k if you're not a strong swimmer because of the swells that were coming in. It wasn't necessarily huge waves, but a lot of chop on top of it.

Running through the sand

Before I knew it the siren went off and we plunged through the waves out towards the first buoy. I did a lot better job diving under the waves and getting through the sets coming in than I did in Encinitas. After getting knocked around a bit we made that first turn and I just went all out to the next buoy...In this case the buoy floated to shore so it was a kayak we were spotting which was kinda tough. I just followed some feet and swam as hard as I could. I make it to the kayak and who do I run into? Ryan! Damn, I thought I'd lost him. I can tell he spotted me too because he just took off in an all out sprint to shore! I tried to body surf some waves in, but no dice. I sucked at surfing anyways...Sure enough I see Ryan go through transition with me about 10 seconds behind him. My cool sister came down and watched us and said we went through at 12:30ish which is flying (1:09/100) so I imagine the kayak er/buoy was cut off short - either way it was probably my best swim to date because I almost swam 15 minutes for 750 at Encinitas! We set transition right next to each other and when I saw him he was hardly moving and a little wobbly..haha. He earned that beer! I left him in transition and set out for the 5k. I've never run hard in the sand before and it was pretty brutal. Water was coming in so we were dodging that and at one point it was at my shins. It was a 2 loop course and we had a tail wind on the way out, headwind coming in. I passed a bunch of people but the fatigue was there and I definitely didn't dig deep. I just kinda put it in cruise control on the 2nd lap and I think I placed top 10 with a 5k in the 17's and a total time of 31:01. There was a potluck afterwards, fun atmosphere and a fun race. Definitely will be back for more and hope to create something like that for TVTC!

Amy and Vanessa getting ready!

Saturday it was all about Amy at the Foam Fest 5k. Her and a friend got together and raced a 5k out in Vail lake which included a bunch of obstacles, mud, bubbles, foam and fun! The kids and I along with our neighbors had a lot of fun watch the moms go out there and crush the course. They had a good vibe going on at the race - and the vibe got even more fun at the beer garden afterwards! Music, swag, mud and beer - what else can you ask for? I limited myself to two beers since I had a 4 hr intense hill repeat bike ride later...haha. It was only Shocktop so that really only counts as one :) The ride ended up being pretty fun actually. I rode hard for 2 hours to load up the legs a bit and then hit 90 mins of gradual hill climbing. After about 80 minutes of climbing I felt a sharp knee pain that seemed to go all the way down my shin. I tried to ignore it at first but every single time I climbed in the saddle the pain just worsened. I called the ride a bit short and headed home, skipped my t-run, iced and called it a day.

Dodge ball time!

The next morning I also called off my runs for the day. The knee was still sore and I actually woke up in the middle of the night freaked out about it, googling my symptoms and ended up sleeping on the couch because I couldn't sleep...oye. Amy saw all of the screens on the computer the next day and thought I was a little bit nuts and told me to relax about it...That's why I need her in my life! I got over it and we had a community block party to attend which included good ole fashion BBQ and of course Dodge ball! It was fun to take the kids out, let them run around and even watch Amy kill it at dodge ball. She says she isn't competitive, but I saw the look in her eye. Fierce! I even jumped in a bit and the knee actually felt ok. After throwing my arm out after like 2 throws, we just kicked back - drank some Dales Pale Ale and ate some good food. I felt like summer officially arrived that day.

Finally, Memorial day arrived. My wife and I love throwing parties but we haven't done much since our house is pretty small. Even though it's a 3BR/2BA house with a backyard, it feels very small and it can seem crowded very fast! So we invited a few friends and family (mostly local peeps) and had a blongo ball tournament (kinda like horseshoes) and an IPA tasting along with the kids in the kiddie pool and plenty of BBQ and beer to go around! I ended up making it to the finals against my lil bro (of all people) and he took me down! The reward? Rogue Voodoo Donut Maple Bacon Ale. Oh yes, it tastes exactly like it sounds. Not sure how I'd like it with a clean palate but after a pretty brutal (as in...strong) IPA tasting the bacon tasted pretty damn good...although I love me some bacon. The IPA tasting was pretty good, just went from the lighter IPA's to the Doubles, to the Imperials and polished it off with the Rogue. Back when I used to brew beer we'd have beer tastings all the time at the house but hadn't done it in a long time. Just a fun way for people to try new beers and appreciate it like fine wine (as it should be). My favorite was definitely the HoptologistDIPA. Try it!

That's it. A few more pics: