Winter's last call

All tri and no play makes daddy a dull boy.

Okay, so I'm not quite fully into triathlon training mode yet (and it's already soooo late in the year!). But I just couldn't help take my last rides down the slopes before the snowboarding season officially closed in Jersey this past Sunday.

It's my first year in snowboarding (never skied either), thanks to an invite from my brother in December. We managed only a total of four trips to the local slopes this season. As a drunk would've said to his bottle, I say to my bindings: where've you been all my life!

If only I had taken up this glorious sport 15 years ago! Finally, a legitimate reason for keeping the family up north.

Back in business

My official workout season began March 20, 2006--4 days ago. Really, there shouldn't have been any beginning at all. It was suppose to be continuous from last year. But for some reason, I had gotten into a grand funk and let too much time pass and let too much weight accumulate. Nonetheless, I'm back in training for a new triathlon season.

Now being a stay-at-home daddy (SAHD) is a bit tricky when it comes to a training schedule. Well, that is, I don't really have any. Only the oldest of my three little toddlers is in school full time; the other two are just part time 2 1/2 hrs, 3 days a week, staggered so that I'm always with at least one of them. But if none of them are in the mood to hang with daddy, well then that's when the bike and boob tube get to tango.

I've set up my bike on a trainer near the TV so I get to watch the kiddies watching me while I workout. Vain? Of course not! They couldn't give a sh*t about me and instead would prefer to be enamored by the fingerless Powerpuff Girls on the tube (fingerless?! ewwww!). Still, my point was that I really need to keep an eye on them as a responsible daddy should; and perhaps my bike trainer in your face presence would eventually rub off on them so they could join me for a spin one day. Ahhh, what a physically fit family we may be.

And tonight's 55 minute workout was nice--interval training on the bike trainer, simulating hill climbing. I love my CycleOps. Yummy, yummy.

Oh, and my battlecry song of the season start: Unwritten, sung by Natasha Bedingfield.

I'm getting nowhere

I'm at a wall.

Goodness knows how long it's been since my last workout. I'm not even going to try and figure out when it was. It's been too long for my liking. And this daddio feels ashamed of himself.

Shame on you, daddy.

Okay, so there. I've just given myself a timeout and now it's time to move on. Here are my current stats as of this evening:

-- A naked 171lbs fellow
-- 37 years old. Tick tock, tick tock.
-- Sport sized at 5'5". Some things just never change.
-- Body fat percentage: okay, screw the calipers. Let's just say that this spare tube could've saved the passengers on the Titanic.
-- Max heart rate since I got my new HR monitor (Jan 06): 196 bpm. Most times, I forgot to put it on, so perhaps it could've even been higher. The traditional "220-age" formula doesn't seem to apply very well to me. Way back in '92, I'd taken that number up to 206 bpm.

Now for some body reference from the professionals: legendary triathlete Greg Welch (retired) stood at 5'6" (or 5'7") and weighed about 135 lbs in his hey day. He has been the only one to win the triathlon championships in all distances and simply sports one of the best attitudes I've seen in any professonal athlete. Now although I am my own me and results will surely vary, Greg is the inspiration guy that I'm gunning for in terms of a racing physique, finishing times and character. Good on ya, mate.

So I suppose it's best that I start climbing that wall now.

Ugggh.

Roadmap

It's almost spring and I need to lay down the plan for how to go about bettering myself. Most things are obvious and really don't need to be written out, but it gives me more incentive and clearer direction when I visually see it on paper. And thus my drawing above. Where to start, where to end and the mysterious cloud or 'black box' in between.

Now to fill in the little details.