Because my Husband is a Sadist

Here's the video!

I know that I haven't posted in a while (that seems to be a refrain here- sorry), and a lot has happened since I last wrote. I got married (see title of post and notice that I said "husband" instead of fiance- fancy!), and did some fun trail marathons and things. My tri season was, admittedly, a huge disaster (huge disaster here being synonymous with non existent), so I decided that since I didn't want to do triathlon at all last year, that the best thing to do to fix that would be to sign up for another Ironman this year.  (I didn't say that my logic actually makes any sense). So, that means, that being that this is an Ironman blog, and I'm doing another Ironman, I am back full-time (you're welcome! I know some of you have desk jobs and feel like you reach the ends of the Internet on a daily basis- fret not!).
Anyway, that is all well and good, but the REAL point of this post is to tell you about the most (ahem) interesting thing that I did athletically this summer (or in general).
After I did Ironman, Brian got a little athletically antsy. He decided that he needed some sort of new challenge and that it needed to involve running because "who has time to do all that biking anyway"? So, instead of doing something normal like a run through Death Valley, he decided that he wanted to run down the Grand Canyon and up it again. and then back down. and then back up. all in one day. And since there was a very good likelihood that he would die, he wanted to drag others down with him. Since there was a very good likelihood that it would be awesome, he wanted to share that with his friends (love you Brian! Thanks for reading!). I was a little convinced that he actually trying to kill me before our impending nuptials. And since I was about to be his wife, he obviously also wanted to share the experience with me. He also invited some of the other biggest suckers we know. Since we know a large community of runners, it wasn't hard finding other people to join us. I thought that this was a horrible idea from the start. I was really excited to get started on this adventure. Well, the summer flew by, and before we knew it (after countless planning meetings- which mostly involved drinking and calling ourselves "badass"), it was time to fly to the Grand Canyon.
The morning of Rim to Rim to Rim, we woke up around 3am, packed the car and drove as close as we could get to South Kaibob Trail. After a few potty breaks, Jeff, Jessica, Tim, Brian, Monika, and I started down the trail. We had headlamps, but I think it was darker and harder to navigate than we all thought that it would be at the start. We didn't run much at that point, not for fear of wasting our legs going downhill (oh no, that would come later), but because it was really just that hard to see and navigate the trail properly. We hiked/jogged in almost complete darkness (save for the moon) for over an hour (as you will see from the beginning of the video, which I suggest that you watch). We were getting close to the bottom and the river (Phantom Ranch) by the time that we could actually turn off our headlamps and see the trail properly. At this point, we all refilled our water, took another bathroom break and got ready to go up the North Rim. We were all together and all felt pretty good. It was starting to warm up, but there was a cloud cover (which in the end pretty much saved our asses).
We took off from Phantom Ranch at a pretty decent clip (we had been jogging down to Phantom Ranch and across the more flat areas as the light had gone up) and still all together. After a while of running with some other R3ers that we had met, a few of us started to fall behind the pack a little bit. I started to hike a little bit on a flat and Brian (who was behind me) told me to pick it up. I did and started to run again. And then hit the gravel...hard. And skidded. I fell on one of my hands and my arm/elbow. It was bloody and filled with gravel. Brian was the only one who saw me fall and therefore who stopped when I fell. I had a first aid kit and I wasn't dead, so I told him to go on and catch up to the others (Implied message here: go catch up to the others, and tell them to slow down so that they can wait for me to catch up-I'm scraped and bleeding! Message Brian heard: go catch up to the others and continue running with them without telling them anything. It's fine to leave me bleeding and alone at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.). So I cleaned myself up and I ran. and ran. and ran. I ran by myself for just over an hour. In that time, I got plenty worked up. Luckily, Jeff was nice enough to cut the part where I met up with everyone again out of the video or I would be unable to send it to my family (um, or anyone else for that matter- Thanks Jeff!).
Up until I caught up to everyone we had had sort of undulating hills. After this, we started going UP. At this point, I wasn't sure that I was even really interested in making it to the top. It was getting warmer, the sun had peeked out a little bit and frankly, I wasn't really that interested in telling people that I had completed R3. But, as we went up, Brian started looking really shaky. He was pale and his shirt was all caked with salt. He wasn't keeping pace with everyone else and was falling behind. So I decided to stay with him to make sure that he was okay. So, slowly, and behind everyone else, we hiked up to the North Rim together. At this point, I was fine. I wasn't really in any pain. I had been keeping up with my hydration (we were all carrying camel backs) and salt intake. I hadn't really overheated. I was actually having to stop and wait for Brian quite a bit on the way up. We finally got up to the top (20 some miles later) and took a short break and some pictures (notice how happy we both look).
On the way down, Brian started feeling much better. We weren't exactly bombing down the trail (because you couldn't or you would fall) but we were going at a pretty steady pace. For awhile. While we were going downhill, I kept having to stop and empty out my shoes. The vents in them were filling with dirt and sand (which I assume was there to reduce erosion). I'm not sure if it was the sand or the downward motion or both, but after a while going down my feet started to blister. badly. By the time we got halfway down the North Rim, I was hobbling. Every step in a downward motion caused my feet to slide forward and rub every single blister.  It was unbearable. Ironically, my legs felt fine at this point. When we hit the flat part near where I had fallen, and I realized that at the speed that we were going it was going to be awhile (read: an hour) before we got to Phantom Ranch, I cried. Tears. For about an hour. While hobbling. To his credit, Brian stayed with me the whole time and just let me limp behind and cry while feeding me shot blocks and letting me drink his Gatorade.
When we finally got to Phantom Ranch, realizing that we had at least another 6 hours of hiking left (We had been moving pretty much non-stop for 11 hours at this point), I tried to bargain with the woman running the kitchen for a burro ride back up the South Rim (seriously. I did this). No luck. So, Brian and I refilled our packs, ate the sack lunch that we were very late to pick up (as it was dinner time) and I sat down and popped the horrible blisters on both feet with the post of one of my diamond earrings (diamonds truly are a girl's best friend).
The way up, to be honest is a blur. My feet felt better as we hiked up and with my blisters popped. We met a few gentlemen who were coming up from Phantom ranch and talked to them several times as we leap-frogged back and forth. I counted down the hours until we could stop hiking. We turned on our headlamps again as we saw darkness again. We got our feet wet in rock run off. I counted down the hours until we could stop hiking. My hands swelled up into sausages. We took turns feeling nauseous and being cheerful. We told stories and were silent. It. was. dark. We hiked. I counted down the hours until we could stop hiking. We stopped and refilled water and talked to the two other guys who were hiking. They were from Jersey. Their wives thought they were nuts. I started a running commentary on how much longer we had with two hours left to go in 15 minute intervals. I ended up being off by about a minute and a half. Brian used a bathroom 4 miles from the top and had a mouse run out of the trash can at him. A mile from the top we ran into really stoned kids who were "super hungry" and Brian unloaded what he didn't need from his pack with them. And then, all of a sudden, we saw the lodge and the huts and we were at the top. And that was it. We hobbled to the lodge and ate around all the normal people (and the rest of our friends) who weren't covered in blood and dirt and caked in salt and who had normal-people fingers and weren't limping around. And that was it.

I was going to post a cellphone picture of the one blister that I got a shot of that was on my big toe but about the size of my little toe, but I'm technologically challenged. Lucky you.  I had five blisters that size on each foot. Ow.

On Joy...

I know that I promised that I'd start writing again and haven't, but I've been running around like a chicken with my head cut off lately. Everything has had that sort of rushed, joyless feeling that you get from eating fast food in the car...you don't really have time to taste anything and the whole ordeal just makes you feel nauseous about an hour later.
Unfortunately, this is sort of where I am with my training right now too. I'm not sure what it is, but I just don't really have any motivation. I haven't been enjoying training at all lately; it's just another one of those things to fit into an already too-packed schedule. I'm not sure what it is that's doing it, but I've been thinking about it a lot lately. Perhaps it is that too-packed schedule that is making everything seem like a chore; Perhaps I should have realized that with everything that is going on (wedding, moving, work, etc) that it would be hard to make training seem like a priority; Perhaps it is that I'm not exactly sure what I'm training for right now (I'm running a marathon in three weeks, but I'm doing a whole lot of swimming and biking that don't relate, I'm doing a couple Olympics, but those are too short for me to compete...I'm doing a 70.3 at some point...I guess that's my "A" race?); Perhaps it is the lack of spontaneity that is ruining it. Maybe it's a combination of all of the above.
Although I guess I might sound like I'm complaining, that isn't really the intention. I guess I'm just trying to work through my motivation issues a bit, trying to find a solution because I miss the joy that comes with training and competing. I miss the joy the rest of the week that I feel when finishing a CARA long run. I guess I just am trying to figure out how to make it fun again.

I'm back...sort of.

As this blog was originally intended to encompass all things Ironman and I am no longer training for an Ironman, I took a little break from updating it. However, I realized that tri season is quickly approaching and I need a good kick in the ass to get going again. Perhaps updating my blog more frequently might be that kick in the ass I need. Don't worry...I have plenty of masochistic things planned this season to detail (some perhaps even stupider than Ironman...yes, a Grand Canyon run falls into that category).
While I'm not doing an Ironman this year, in addition to tri training and a race schedule that is quickly turning insane, I'm planning a wedding. Which, in a lot of ways, is just as masochistic (some might say more) as Ironman, but far less badass (you only get a medal at the end of one. And no one gets "just married" tattoos. I'm just sayin'...); however, there are myriad similarities between the two:
1. Everything is overpriced. Fact. $50 for a race shirt made in Taiwan in a sweatshop? $200 for a veil made of a cheap comb, fake pearls, and some fabric made in Indonesia? Plenty of people willing to pay regardless? Yes.
2. Once people find out you are doing it, it's all they ask you about. "How far did you run today?" " Do you have a photographer yet?" I do like to pretend that I have other interests. Like watching old Kona reruns on my DVR on the trainer while flipping through bridal magazines...
3. You find, after awhile, that it is all you CAN talk about. "OMG, my quads are killing me". "So...I've decided on save the dates, but not on invitations..."
4. There is a lot of technical terminology that I still don't understand. Seriously. I still don't know the difference between a Zipp 400 and 800 (those are the right sizes right?). I still don't know what "picking your colors" means. What exactly is supposed to be this color? Is EVERYTHING supposed to be the same color? And what everything does this encompass? Seriously, if anyone has an answer to either, please post in comments. I'm so confused.
5. What you wear doesn't really matter all that much, but people act like it's the most important decision you're going to make. I mean, tri shorts are tri shorts are tri shorts, right? and a dress is a dress is a dress. Both are made in China in mass production. Let's be real. And let's also be real that by the end of the event, you are going to be none too comfortable anyway...something will be cutting in somewhere unpleasant, you will most likely have chafe marks no matter what, and damn it, your feet are going to HURT.
6. You have to drop weight and obsess about food to do either. Brides-to-be and triathletes are perhaps the two most weight obsessed groups of people on the planet. Somehow both getting married and being a recreational athlete gives people the idea that they can talk about weight ad nauseum and have it be socially acceptable. "race weight", "dress weight", I don't really see that much of a difference.

There are more, but I'll stop here. I mean, there are other things to think about other than tris and wedding stuff. Like yoga. And dropping this last five pounds before the (wedding, tri) season starts.