PNW Tri Novices

[salsabike]

Jocelynlf and Teigyr and I drove down together on Friday. Just getting ourselves out of town was an adventure. I put my bike rack and bike on my car. Picked up J, added her bike to my rack and put HER 3-bike rack in the back seat. Picked up T. Took off MY 2-bike rack, left it in T’s kitchen for the weekend, and put on J’s 3-bike rack. Then we spent, oh, about 30 minutes or so trying to figure out how to get J’s bike on the last position on the bike rack---we just couldn’t get it all the way on without some other bike appendage getting in its way. Then she had an inspiration, took off her rear wheel, put the bike on the rack, put the rear wheel back on. We bungeed where necessary. Left Seattle at 3 pm, an hour later than we’d wanted to.

We were planning to meet Wahine for dinner at 6:30. Hahahahaha. It took us THREE hours to drive the first 60 miles, stop and go allllllllllll the way to Olympia. Ugh. Friday, nice weekend, rush hour—which starts at, like, 2:00-3:00 pm on Fridays in Seattle summertime. Whoof. So, dinner, instead of a nice bistro meal in Hood River, was a 6” Subway on the road. We finally got to Wahine’s at 9:30.

Here are the things that stand out in my memory:

Saturday: A bit into the bike ride, Wahine offered us a hill to go up if we wanted to, probably a mile and a half long at a steady 6% grade. We all tried it, came close to finishing it, and some of us then obsessed for the rest of the weekend about going back and doing it again since we were so close to finishing it. We didn’t, but we WANTED to. We still do...

The post-lunch wetsuit-donning party at her house. It takes a certain amount of guts to put on and swim in a wetsuit for the first time, which was the case for some (I’ve been doing it for a few weeks), and/or to do the wetsuit thing if you’re, like, a lot bigger than you used to be and want to be, like me. And...you do it anyway, because you WANT to do a tri and you think you really can. “Slow Fat Triathlete” is my bible for this year. Do it no matter how you look...laughing all the way...so that’s what I’m doing, dammit. No matter what. Trudge. Trudge. Trudge.

Sunday:

Doing the full sprint-sized OWS. It was nice to confirm that I can do this—I was pretty sure I could, but hadn’t done the full length yet—and also nice to know that it won’t take me, like, 45 minutes to do it, which was sort of my little nightmarish fear. I’m not positive about this, but I think it took us about 18 minutes, maybe? For me, one of the “just want to finish my first tri” folks, that’s okay with me. This time, anyway.

“Where the hell is that damn BUOY????”

Getting to run through transition stuff for the first time and realizing how logical and sorta easy it is if you just set it all up right.

Zipping around the parking lot on the little bike loops we were doing on Sunday. The Gorge is a windy place, so you get to work yourself on the headwinds and fly on the tailwinds. Yeah!!!

Marching into the restroom after the OWS and little bike loop, on my “run” (which for me is just a walk this time), putting my water bottle on the sink, doing the restroom thing, washing my hands, and trying to pull off the oblong soap dispenser attached (firmly, I might add) to the wall because I thought it was my water bottle. Proof that this kind of activity can make you a little addled in the head, or anyway, more addled than your previous addlement threshold.

The Pansy starter kit story. Pansy Palmetto is a Bike Journal person. Last year, she and Raleighdon (Mimitabby’s husband) got into this nutty competition to see who could make 8000 miles first (he did, but only because her knee blew out a few hundred miles short of 8000, I believe). They spent the whole year trash-talking at each other on Bike Journal and were pretty funny to read. Pansy: 1) has a lot of guts, for reasons you’ll instantly grasp if you visit her page (http://www.bikejournal.com/profiles....=PansyPalmetto), and 2) she likes red lipstick and wild cycling costumes a LOT. So, since Wahine asked us not to bring any serious thank you presents, and she really meant that, instead we brought her a little Pansy starter kit so she could be well dressed at her next Ironman. You’ll see a pic of that too.

Wahine and spouse’s house---beautiful, intelligently designed, just wonderful. Even got to see the red Chinese tables she talked about last year!

Wahine---so really good to give us this weekend out of her life. Teigyr, Dex, Jocelyn, Teigyr and Wahine spouses---good company.

And then.... some of us went swimming today, just for a bit, and practiced the sighting technique Wahine showed us--which, by the way, is really useful and very do-able.

Wonder if I might want to do ANOTHER tri after Danskin??