Sartwhat??

So in my searching for healing, we (and by we I mean me and my massage therapist) have found a new culprit!!!

I'm actually pretty excited about this one - the sartorius. And yes, it hurt to get worked on, but I already feel a lot looser, so I'm betting I'm going to be heading out on a run in the next few days...hehe I'm excited.

Yep, it was a good night.

Leg Issues

So my defunct leg - the left one - hasn't let me run in over a month. Not really, anyways. I tried running a few test runs, but really they ended up being 10 minute walk/runs. Now that finally seems to be changing. I've been going to a chiropractor to get the Active Release Technique done, which I've had before I moved here, but the problem has been that there hasn't been anyone listed in town that I could go to until recently. Well, there was one listed before but he was completely unreachable. So that obviously didn't work out. So the chiropractor I've been going to now has been helping loosen things up, and I haven't really had much progress until this last time - when he worked on my adductors. Now THAT hurt. That means that the adductors are REALLY pissed off. And guess what - today I ran for 15 minutes without having to stop!! So I suppose that means that we found the big culprit! Yay!

So I'm building on that progress by sitting here with my fabulous zapper zapping away at the bad spots. All while I work on those grad school applications. And the training plan for the winter. Yep I've decided that even though I've been completely burnt out from this year that I'm still not done doing this triathlete thing. What it was this year really was dealing with all the injuries that I've gotten. What it boils down to is that I didn't quite take it careful enough in adding more running to the plan and I didn't lift enough weights. I know that if I had been better at strengthening the things that needed to be stronger to prevent overuse injuries I would have been fine. And I wouldn't have pounded my legs into oblivion on frozen hard concrete all winter. Live and learn, right? Oh and I'm adding more aqua jogging to the plan this winter, too.

Better to work the muscles happily, my dear.

Oh and I discovered a hot tub I can use. Can you say SWEET???? I've always been a big fan of them but didn't discover the one in the gym I've been using until yesterday. Definitely gonna make a habit of that!

I'm still hoping to get some cross races in this fall though. The next cyclocross race that I'll be able to get to is maybe on October 9th - the Dan Ryan cyclocross in Chicago...dun dun duuuunnnnn.....so I may be heading up to Chicago for a visit and a hammerfest! I'm interested to see how I'll do against other Cat 4 women. You know, since I beat them by a fair margin at the small cross race I did before. But I don't know if that's representative of the Cat 4 women...probably not gonna worry about moving up till next year, when I'll be willing to pay for a cycling license for a full year instead of what's left of a year (when I'm going to be in Europe for two weeks here soon too - fun!). And hopefully I won't break anything mid season this next time around. Like my elbow. That kinda ruined things. Just a bit.

Things are looking up :)

Cross Race!

Ok, so yeah this is a bit late - like what isn't that I do? Right? I'm always doing stuff "on my own time"....yep.

Anyways the Patriot Cross race was a bit of a shocker for me. I didn't know what to expect, but I certainly didn't think I'd be off the front before the first half of lap was over haha. Ok ok it was a Cat 4 women's field and I know that I'm still crazy fit from my broken triathlon season. But still, I didn't expect THAT!

The girls started way faster than I expected them to; they just shot off the line! So, I just kinda did what they were doing and went with them thinking I'd just hang with them and see how I felt.

There was a line along the shore of lake this race went around that doubled over on itself not far from the start. That's where I went from 3rd or 4th to 1st.

The Master Plan at that point was to just be ahead of everyone at the logs we had to ride over since I was betting it'd be a bit of a bike-person clog. And I was right - one woman crashed out with a broken leg!!

So I just kinda kept going at it as fast as I could, rode the lines I'd practiced, and tried not to blow myself up until I saw the 1 lap to go sign. I was so glad to see that sign, too!

They had quite the series of down, turn, and up steep little hills. It was hard to make those, catch your breath and keep moving quick.

This little dip was crazy! It musta taken me ten tries to ride it on the practice runs, but I know making that hill made a huge difference on this race. It was fast at the bottom, and steep at the top, so it was super slow just as you got to the flat. Fun stuff!

The barriers were totally the thing that worried me the most, mostly because in practices I've kinda knocked them over with my bike...ooops. Got through them each time fine on the race though, so I guess when the pressure's on I can pick up my bike enough. Found out after the race that the barriers were 2 inches taller than they were supposed to be - makes the cat 4 girls all that much tougher!

Every time I hit the pavement, I took a deep breath before pushing it just a little harder.

I finished with a few minutes to spare ahead of the other women, but boy was I ready to be done.

Done For the Season

I didn't do my last two races :(

Got out to Burlington, Vermont and did my best to race, but my leg - that's right, leg - would have none of it. Maybe driving 20 hours one way ( 3 hours to Chicago, then 17 to Burlington with a trailer full of bikes ) wasn't such a good idea, after all. Of course, neither was the $550 plane ticket and $175 one way bike fee. Driving at least made the trip affordable for those on the bike shop budget. I was feeling overall fine until the run. Somehow even when I'm telling myself "I'm ok, I'm ok, I'm ok," my legs just refuse to agree. They were actually starting to feel good there for a bit, then the old IT band injury freaked out on me

and I found myself walking. A lot. I didn't even bother to look at my run time after the fact.

So I decided that when I got back I would do my massage and chiro and see if the next two races were even possible. No dice. So I'm done for the season. Just like that.

It's really disappointing. I'd been so looking forward to the races thinking I was in good shape and rested from having had down time from the broken elbow and all. So much for that. To be honest now I'm completely burnt out. I'm so tired of having to come back from injuries. It's been my whole year so far. The IT band was bugging me since February, then I was *thinking* I'd at least get it worked out soon when I broke my elbow. Soooooooo yeah. I'm mentally exhausted from trying to work around bad pain. Not the good pain of training, the bad pain of trying to ignore an injury. Dumb I know. So at this point I'm not running at all.

But I can bike.

So I finally finished my cyclocross bike that I've been building slowly. And I'm doing a race on Sunday. EEeeeeekk!! I'm going to be scrambling all over the place I'm sure! It's going to be a

blast. I'm still needing to practice the whole jump off/pick up/run with/jump back on bike as fast as possible thing. Good thing I'm racing Cat 4. Then maybe it's expected when I trip and fall flat on my face!

So here's my new baby: