Last Race of the Season

Back in March, I (Reed) was playing basketball when I felt my achilles tendon hurting. Well, it turns out I had tendonitis and could barely walk for the next week. I wasn't sure what I could do for exercise, so I turned to swimming being that there was an indoor pool at work. Learning to swim was hard. At first I was gasping for air and couldn't even make it across the pool. After a couple weeks of working really hard at it, I was soon swimming half a mile without having to do the backstroke to rest in between laps. Hmmm... maybe I can finally do a triathlon now that I know how to swim. Thanks to the encouragement of my boss who is an avid biker and triathlete, I dove right in and started working towards doing an olympic distance triathlon. I remember my first bike ride on my new bike. I came home feeling extremely nauseous for going too hard, but I couldn't help it, it was too much fun. After months of biking a funny thing happened, I no longer felt any pain in my knees while I ran which I had always experienced. Five days a week I did something: run, swim, or bike, and I never dreaded it or skipped a morning it seems - weird, I know. Often the highlight of the week was a long bike ride or a swim in the lake. For anyone wanting to get into them, watch out, they might turn into an obsession and just make you want to go farther and faster with each one. Something like this might come as a challenge to a young mommy of 4 active and mostly disobedient kids (sorry kids, but it's true, we were all like that), but Sara has handled my new hobby like a champ and never complained except when she did (only about once a month, which really isn't very much if you think about it).

Sadly I had my last event of the summer this past Saturday completing the Grand Columbain Triathlon. Unlike the last two, this one was a half-ironman distance consisting of a 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, and 13 mile run. My boss, John Hunter, also did the half-iron distance (his first) while his wife and her best friend who happens to be my 2nd cousin, Jen Wagstaff Christensen, did the olympic distance.

It was a really well done event with plenty of support during all facets. The run was incredibly hot (86 degree) so I lived and died by the aid stations (ice and pepsi never tasted so good, it was the only thing keeping me going on the last 6 miles). I would pour water all over me and then a mile down the road be completely dry again - disaster for a fat guy who always seems to feel hot anyway. The bike ride was by far the most challenging ride I've been on - 4,000 ft. of climbing plus battling dust devils and that hot sun. I had some little pebbles in my shoes which I turned into a motivation to keep running (you have to play games with your mind at times, weird I know). I limped across the finish line in 6 hours and 9 minutes, so not bad. I think the next one I do will have a flat bike course though - the hills were just too much at times, but all in all, fun times fun times.

Of course the best thing about finishing such an event is pigging out on whatever you want afterwards and not feeling guilty about it.

(Sorry not more pictures, Sara wasn't there. they would bore you anyway)

I'm looking forward to next summer, maybe I'll see some of you out on the course coughing up a lung with me!