Boots, Rattlesnakes, Hills and more

Well, the bad news is that Brooke's foot is in a boot. She's broken a bone, but tough-nut that she is, she is determined to compete. We have a plan to do a mock-tri two weeks before the real race, and Brooke intends to do it with us. Remember, this is the woman who had only just completed chemo when she competed the first time. Where there's a will...

Meanwhile, our training continues. I took a few days of vacation in Stehekin with friends and while hiking there, we saw a rattlesnake - photos to prove it. Meanwhile, Laurie (who is also somewhat of an animal) did a nine-hour hike to Camp Muir, base camp for climbers who want to summit Rainier. The day before I headed off on vacation, in a fit of madness Laurie and I did a whole triathlon after work. We swam 1/2 a mile in the pool, hopped on our bikes and headed to the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, across and back home (about 10 miles we think), then parked our bikes and jogged over to the track where we propped each other up as we completed 12 laps of the track - it took us quite a while to complete it, but the important thing is we did it. Now we know that we can complete the whole race. The most amazing thing to me was the amount of food I consumed the next day - I could not stop eating.

So last week, we did two-thirds of a tri - swam 1/2 mile in the pool, then rode our bikes over to Pt. Defiance Park and around the 5-mile loop and back. Laurie set the pace and we peddled harder than either of us have ridden before. Had a great ride! It was good practice for the long Vashon ride we planned for the weekend. So last week's training was perhaps the most ambitious for me yet: biked 53 miles; ran 3; swam 1-1/2 miles; did three yoga sessions; and one steep hill walk. I need to give Mark credit for accompanying me on a freezing cold open water swim in American Lake on Friday. As far as I know, he didn't really have hypothermia.

We finished the week's training with the Vashon bikeride. We met up at 8:30 a.m., rode our bikes about 4 miles to catch the ferry to Vashon Island and rode 32 of the hilliest miles around the island. The guidebook said the route followed the Murphy's Law of Bicycling - all uphill and into the wind. It was a tough ride with a few beautiful spots ( but not quite enough to attract me to ever want to do it again). We made it back to the ferry in a reasonable 4 hours with stops for coffee and lunch, and collapsed on the beach while we waited for the ferry. The only flaw in our plan was we then had to ride home from the ferry once back in Tacoma. Aaagh. The photo is of our bikes on the ferry. If you look carefully, you'll see us swimming alongside .....