Why Is The Adventurous Life Important?

Recently I have listened to a few podcasts which have led me to 2 self-reflective questions: 1. Am I living an Adventurous Life 2. Why is living an Adventurous Life Important?

As I have reflected on these questions, my thoughts go back to when I was growing up as a kid. My family watched more than enough TV and played more video games than what could possibly be considered healthy. In Retrospect, this seems like such a waste of time that could have been spent on an adventure. As a family we had 1-2 adventures a year, we called vacation. Early on these would entail 5-7 hour car trip to the beach for a week. 7 days was the sum of our adventure for the year….

Sometime during college I decided that I would seek out adventurous opportunities. I think this began with “collecting barrels” before the first home football game of the season or playing paintball in the quad during the middle of the night. A group of us during our Sophomore year decided to go on a camping trip during spring break, which became an annual event for the better part of 6 years, actually surviving past college. I loved being one with nature, using the fire to heat our camp site as well as to cook on. I remember as a Senior there were 5 weeks in a row in which I traveled to watch the football team play (D3 has an actual playoff bracket). I went to Abilene, San Antonio, Washington, PA, Mount Union, Ohio, and Winston-Salem, VA. I traveled to the first 2 on my own. The last 3 I traveled to by bus, 24 hours there, watch a 3 hour game and travel 24 hours back. Talk about an experience and an adventure! I’d never been to Ohio, Pennsylvania, or Virginia.

Am I living a Life Full of Adventure now? Since I graduated college I have had 5 different jobs. I moved from a teaching career into sales, and from inside sales to outside sales. 90% of the time I take my bike with me and get in at least 1 ride while I’m traveling. This past summer my wife and I traveled to Albuquerque, NM, Miami, FL, and to Yellowstone National Park. We started a small business in August with airbnb.com renting out an extra room in our house. Seeing the last 4-5 months out on paper I would say, yes my life is full of adventure.

As I planned to write this blog I also began to reflect on Why is an Adventurous Life Important to me?

1. Adventure enables me to “feel life” almost as if I’m pulsing with the rhythm of myself and the world around me.
2. Adventure means that plans could change in an instant.
3. Adventure is experiencing something new. As I write this I’m in Colorado and the mountains have snow on them this trip, which makes them look breathtakingly beautiful in a different way than in the summer time when they are bare.
4. Adventure allows my creative side to come out as I search for a new cycling route, new places to eat, and new ways to get in touch with nature.

Here are a few Take-Aways

• We all need to experience adventure.
• Adventure needs to be planned as there are logistics and financial plans that need to be made.
• Check out Local Adventures that may be close to home.- My wife and I were at a local park and saw a snake crawling across the sidewalk. It was a baby and did not threaten us in any way, but it sure made for an interesting walk…
• Remember sometimes the Adventures that have the most obstacles are the most well remembered.- Think of your grandfather’s story-telling.

Where should you go if you crave more information about Living an Adventurous Life?

1. Rich Roll Podcast- I literally listened to his podcast today titled Jedidiah Jenkins: The Pursuit of Wonder, The Power of Story and Finding Truth in Adventure. You can check this out at RichRoll.com
2. Rhett Smith Podcast- Are you Living a Good Story; How Comfort, Anxiety, and the American Dream can keep us from Living a Compelling Life with Scott McClellan. You can check this out at Rhett Smtih Podcast

Take Control of Your Life, Allow Yourself to Experience Life, and Live Adventurously

Shoes Shoes Shoes

3 weeks ago my foot was sore and a little swollen after an 8 mile run. I took that week easy to let it heal up, not wanting to cause a stress fracture. Last Weekend I completed a 3 mile run and I could still feel that my foot was getting sore. While still on this run I began to look at how my foot was landing and noticed that I was actually landing to one side of my foot. I proceded to take a look at a couple of you tube videos….

Underpronation

Overpronation

Normal Pronation

 

After viewing each of the above I began to believe that I was underpronating. Being the amateur runner that I am I wanted to get a professional’s opinion and headed up to Luke’s Locker (my local running store). I met one of their staff members who immediately began to evaluate how my foot naturally hit the ground. I started by walking in a straight line away from him and then walking back. Next I jogged away from him and back.

I sat back down and he explained to me that my Asics Kayano’s that I had been training in were a stability shoe made for overpronators. The interesting thing is that in 2007 and 2008 I wore Kayano’s for marathon training and half ironman training. I never had any foot pain or noticed an uneven foot strike.

Immediately I had a couple of thoughts: Oh great how much is this going to cost and will I be able to find a shoe that I am happy with. Those of you that are runners know that a shoe must fit even better than a pair of gloves. The salesman did tell me that the price would range from $80-$140. He did believe that the lower end shoes would last only a couple of months.

My options right now include the Brooks Ghost or the Asics Gel Nimbus. I have yet to actually try either of them on, but will plan to next weekend.

I also had the opportunity to talk with 2 different friends who touted the theory of 0 drop shoes. The idea that if a shoe has less padding, especially in the heal that a runner will change their gate to land more towards the forefoot. This reduces the amount of force to the ankles, knees, hips, and lower back while increasing the stregnth of the foot. If you are already running it may be a wise decision to work your way down to 0. If you are interested and would like more information there are several videos on youtube.

Training completed This Week

Tuesday: Yoga

Wednesday: 3 Mile Run (10 minute mile average 🙂 )

Thursday: Yoga

Saturday: 21 Mile ride (Found some Hills and Rode with a Friend. Just under 15 mph avg)

Sunday: 6.25 Mile Run

Family

This week I read an article in triathlete magazine titled “It Takes a Team” by Chris McCormack or “Macca” as he is referred to across the triathlon world. The article discussed how he included his family when setting up his race season. He even let his girls decide which races he should do. As I read this I beagan to think about what it would be like if my wife was more included in my training, so we sat down to talk about it.

As my wife and I were discussing training for the Ironman this week some concerns came up including: my true reason for wanting to complete it and because we are thinking about having kids in the next year or two and we want to be able to enjoy as much time together as we can. As we addressed these concerns we agreed that I would do a few Half Ironman events instead of doing a full ironman this year. I also believe that in order to include her as much as possible, that I will post my weekly training schedule on the fridge allowing her to hold me accountable. Below is a picture of me and my teammate/ best cheerleader ever at a halloween party we went as American Gothic.

Right now I am looking at the Memorial Hermann 70.3 Half Ironman in Galveston on April 6 a flat and fast course similar to Ironman Florida, Buffalo Springs Lake 70.3 Half Ironman in Lubbock on June 29th a hot, hilly, and challenging course, and the Austin 70.3 Half Ironman in Austin on Oct. 27th a hilly course but hey who doesn’t love to go to Austin. The only Half Iron distance course that I have done is Buffalo Springs.

Training Issues- Last week after an 8 mile run my left foot had some swelling onthe top of it. It also was sore through Wednesday this week and I did not run during the middle of the week. I was hoping that my foot would have time to heal.  Today during my 3 mile run I noticed that it may be due to how my foot is striking the ground. I may need to look into getting some new running shoes that help with stability

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Building to the Half Marathon

This week was mostly rainy in North Texas, which was great because we can definitely use it. However, it did put a small damper on my midweek run. This week I did feel much better.

I am finely finding a rhythm and am learning to enjoy triathlon training. It is so easy to get bogged down by the numbers: Number of miles, number of minutes, number of calories, and mph. I have heard it said that triathlon is more than training, it is a lifestyle. I can only assume that they mean their training takes up so much of their time that it would be considered dumming it down to call it a hobby. 

This weekend I completed a 10 mile run as I edge closer to the half marathon distance. I took O2 Gold from Advocare again and was still amazed at how it kept my heart rate aerobic for most of the run. I was excited as I crossed the 9 mile mark and was actually 3 minutes faster than last week. It was still around a 13 minute/mile pace, but hey we get excited about the little things right? I am still working through which type of gear I need as it starts to cool down. Luckily, my wife picked up the dog around mile 5 and I was able to give her all of the clothes I didn’t need. 

Goals for this week:

1. Get back to swim training up to 3 times this week.

2. Get in a mid-week bike and run

Training this past week:

Saturday: 20 mile ride

Sunday: 10 mile run

Training upcoming week:

Monday- Swim- Recovery- 2000

Tuesday- Run- 4 miles

Wednesday- AM Swim, PM 1 mile repeats at the track

Thursday- Bike Ride- Recovery

Friday- Endurance Swim- 3200

Saturday- Bike Ride- 25-30 miles

Sunday- Run 8 miles

By mid- November, less than a month away I should be able to complete a 13 mile run. While I do not have a half marathon scheduled, it is exciting to see my body adapting. 

Ironman Hawaii

This week I was finally feeling better and began to get back into a normal training schedule with the exception to swimming. I will start back to swimming next Monday. 

Running: This week I got in a 4 mile run on Tuesday and a 9 miler on Sunday. During both runs I am working on slowing my pace or walking once my heart rate gets up to 163 or higher. Saturday I took advocare’s O2 Gold and it was amazing how my heart rate stayed around 150-160. I did sitll walk a few minutes of each mile as I get used to doing longer distances. Plus the last marathon I did the run/walkers did better than me as I ran. 

Biking: This week I finally got a ride in after over a month off. You might remember that I had a blowout at the Hotter Than Hell at the end of August. New tire ran great and it felt great to spin the legs around. 

While I still would like to get in 1-2 more runs during the week and at least 1 more bike ride, this was a solid week to get back into the rhythm of triathlon training. 

Saturday morning I felt like I was treated as I watched the World Championship Hawaii Ironman Live. I started watching as the Pros were about 20 minutes into the swim. To see these guys finish off 2.4 miles in 52 minutes… wow! Now I’m sure that’s the same pace that they swim every week. Also to note, Hines Ward (former professional football player for the pittsburgh steelers) and Gordon Ramsay (Think Hell’s Kitchen) competed and completed the race. Also of note was Gordon Haller who won the 1st Ironman. He completed the race in 15 hours and 37 min. You have to wonder if he ever thought that triathlon would turn in to the sport it is today. Watching the hawaii ironman live is a great motivator and I highly recommend everyone to watch at least one. 

 

One other question has come up. I am planning on doing Ironman Florida next November and was thinking about renting a tri bike for the race. I have a Scott CR1 Pro Road bike, which is great, but I’m looking for something with aero bars and aero wheels. If you know of a good place to rent a bike from let me know. Also, if you have had any experience going from a road bike to a tri bike let me know how it was. 

Until Next week…

 

Sickness

After attending the UMHB football game almost 2 weeks ago I got a sinus infection. This is no bueno as it has put a pause on training through all of last week and probably most of this week.

My hope is that I will be good to go this weekend. The weather is just about perfect to do anything outdoors right now. I do not plan on swimming this week or a mid-week run either. Will pick up training completely this weekend.

The rest of you, have a good week of training!

Reflection

I spent this week reflecting back on where I came from and how it has made me who I am. This has had a large impact on my life.

I spent 8 years at Garland Christian Academy as a student (4th-12th grade) and this campus memorialized one of its teachers on Tuesday night. While I did not personally have her as a teacher, it felt like a distant family member had passed. Out of respect for her and her family I attended the service. While there I was able to see many of my own teachers and coaches who meant so much in my life. I spent much of the week reflecting back on my time in school there and the amazing people that were in my life. A big thanks goes out to Larry Horner, John Keyes, Coach Farley, Ronnie and Vernon Littleton. Thank you for your relentless service to Christian Education.

Most people have these moments a few times in their life, I had the blessing of having 2 this week.

I had Sept. 21st circled on my calendar. It was the date of the first ever on-campus football game for my alma mater the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor. The Cru have setup a football tradition of winning. They have won 11 of the last 12 conference championships, made several playoff appearances, and even an appearance in the D3 national Championship. In other words they are a damn good football team. It was only fitting that after 14 seasons that they would finally play in their own on-campus stadium.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvtZ-KsETyM

Alumni that I hadn’t seen in several years showed up. It was a walk down memory lane that reminded me of what a great place for all around student development UMHB is. It is where I became a fan of college football, where I ran my first 5 miles, where I started riding my cheap mountain bike from campus out to Fort Hood and back, and where I was encouraged to compete in my first triathlon. I learned to love people, to stick through friendships through good and bad times. Essentially I grew up and matured. Just like the school song says, “we are thankful for our past and into the future we will go with thankfulness boldness and loyalty to our purple white an gold.”

Run Training Begins

This week was a really good one. Monday was a holiday, so there was no swimming.

Tuesday I ran for the first time in a year or two. I completed 3 miles. I was around a mile in before my first walk break. I then made it to the turnaround and walked for a couple of minutes to allow my heart rate to recover. Then picked up the pace until a quarter of a mile to go and walked again for a minute or two. I finished in around 45 min. Not a great time but its done.

Wednesday The pool was finally open after being closed the last 2 weeks. I covered 2300 meters in around an hour. I tried to recover throughout the day because that evening I had my speed workout at the track. I did an 800 mete warmup, 4 X 400s in 1:50 interval with a 400 meter walk between. This was a tough workout but felt that I got better as I went through the workout.

Thursday, Friday, and Saturday were both off days. I missed the swim on Friday because I lost my goggles somewhere between the locker room and the car on Monday. Thursday and Saturday are both cycling days and as you guys know my bike needs a new tire.

Sunday I completed a 3 mile run. I uses the same route as Tuesday. Heart rate stayed lower. I still had to walk some but managed to finish 5 minutes faster.

Still checking out the advocate products. Like the VO2 bars and the spark.

Last 2 Weeks

I’m sorry that I didn’t get to post last week, no worries I will get you all caught up on how training is going.

The first week of September I started running again, after taking off several years. My legs were very sore the day after my long run. I also worked in a speed training session, which went better than expected. I did 4X400’s in a 1:50 split. Now, I know for those of you that are elite and pure runners that’s a long time, more than double what it would take any elite level runner. Nonetheless, I was excited making 3 out of the 4 on time (Still some work to do). 

Last Sunday was my 2nd long run and felt really good. It was faster than the first and my legs were not as sore afterwards. Last week on Tuesday and Wednesday I was very tired and not feeling very good. Knowing that I could be getting sick, I decided to stay in and get a few good nights of rest. Today I finished my 3rd long run, completing 5 miles in  slow and steady 1 hr. 12 min. During this run I paid close attention to my heart rate. During the first 2 miles if it went above 145 i walked for 45-60 seconds. During the next 2 miles I allowed it to go up to 155 before walking long enough to allow my heart rate to recover to 130. I have been taking my dog, Maddie on runs with me. 

 

 

Swim training has been going great. This week was my first full week back in the pool and I swam 2 miles on 2 of the days. The best day was Friday, I swam 2 miles in an hour…. Not sure how this happened, but was excited to swim 2 mph for the first time ever in my life. Coach has me working on my rotation to increase the power in my stroke. This is taking some getting used to, but I am starting to see a difference. 

I am still working on getting the bike ready to go. I went to get a tire and both bike shops in Frisco did not have the Continental Gatorskins that I was looking for. I have my name on the next set that comes in to Sun and Ski. I did have a friend come by last weekend to true the wheels, so they are good to go.

Supplements- I have been using some advocare samples the past 2 weeks and really like a few of them. 

Spark- Love the taste of this and feel like I get the same feel of energy as I do with a cup of coffee. Plus it has alot of vitamins, that I probably don’t ever get enough of. 

VO2 Bars- Thes are probably the best tasting fitness bar that I have tasted. 

My goal is to find a group of supplements that will fuel and hydrate me during long workouts, help me recover after, gives me a natural energy boost, and even a good pre-workout snack. I have also been looking at the Hammer products this week.

 

Perpetuem, gells, sustained energy, Hammer bars, Heed, EndurOmega, and Recoverite. I like that they have the Perpetuem, sustained energy and gells. I could use these all together in the Ironman. Still thinking about what I’m going to do and trying to do a little more research. I know I will need to take in up to 300 calories or more each hour. 

If any one has any thoughts on any products that they have used successfully to get through an ironman event feel free to post. Let me know how much of which products you used. 

Foundation

This week was very busy and stressful. My wife started back to school as she is a teacher and I was in training all week for my new job, resulting in a multiple late nights. The plan is to use this long weekend to get all of my gear cleaned and ready to go.

The first cleaning will be my bike. I currently use Finish Line Super Bike Wash. This does a really good job at getting the grime off of the bike. If you are like me and don’t clean your bike as much as you should, you know how hard it can be to cut through the collection of road grim.  I will scrub down the bike, starting with the top tube, down tube and seat tube and ending with the chain.

Most of the bike was fairly easy to clean. However, as I took a closer look at my chain, I decided that I could keep it and just give it a deep clean. I don’t have a chain cleaning tool, so I took q-tips and cleaned each section of the chain. This allowed me to get out all of the gunk that had built up. I also used to qtips in hard to reach places around the bottom bracket and the front gears.

Due to the blowout last Saturday, I will be adding a new front tire and tube. I will go with the Continental Gatorskin 700 X 32 C. This will match the tire on the back. I’m hoping that a wider tire will last longer and hold up under my 240 lbs. The Gatorskin tires have great reviews and should outlast any other tire on the market. We will see just how man miles they can take as I should put well over 5000 miles on the bike during training.

After cleaning the bike, I noticed both front and back wheels were not rolling straight. I’m going to first check to make sure they are true. If they are, I may be in the market for a new wheelset, that’s gonna hurt the pocket book.  

I will start running this week and will get back into the pool. Over the next few months I’m going to be trying different types of recovery drinks and supplements. This weekend I met with a friend who is using advocare and received some samples. I will let you know how I feel with these and how they taste.

My training schedule until November will be as follows:

Monday Morning- Swim easy around 1500-2500- this will be a recovery from the weekend,

Tuesday Morning- Run- focusing on easy mileage.

Tuesday Afternoon- 20-30 mile Bike.

Wednesday Morning- Swim- Distance day around 3000-3500,

Wednesday Afternoon- Run: Speed work at the track. Rotating each week between 400’s, 800’s, 1200’s, and mile repeats.

Thursday Morning- Run focusing every other week on Hills and tempo

Thursday Afternoon- Bike Ride 20-30 miles

Friday Morning- Swim- focus on building strength and power around 2000-2500

Saturday Morning- Long bike rides from 45 miles up to 100 miles and back down to 40 through the winter.

Sunday Morning- Long run starting at 3 miles and ending at 20. In January I will begin to combine the long run and long bike day.

Until next week Ironheads