Hello October!
The past couple of weekends have been relaxing, fun, and kind of uneventful ...which I guess is what happens when you put yourself in a mandatory recovery timeout to recuperate from the physical, mental, and emotional roller coaster of Ironman training. I was given the suggestion by an Ironman / BQ'er along with congratulations..."Take your recovery as seriously as you trained.". Between coach's feedback and those words, I decided they must know what they are doing! After two days of rest, the novelty of downtime wore off, but I saw the value of unplugging from the rut of "what workout do I NEED to do today?". Two weeks of total off time and a week of fun unstructured workouts and I feel like a million bucks! Definitely refreshed mentally and physically on track for targeting my BIG goals for 2012.
This past weekend wrapped up an awesome month of September and kicked off an exciting October! The three things that got me pumped: tattoos, 5ks, and the green light!
I got my tattoo...and still can visit the parents in NJ!
This past Tuesday I went to get my Ironman ankle tattoo and a phrase I wanted integrated, the artist couldn't figure how to get the spacing correct, so I decided to hold off. I added just the mileage numbers to my existing swim / bike / run tattoo on my wrist. If I couldn't get what I really wanted, then I wasn't going to do it.
So I kept looking at my wrist and I just love my wrist tattoo. I don't really see a reason of getting a tattoo if I can't see it all of the time, so I put my original design on hold - and decided to get the Ironman word logo on my wrist. Its my accomplishment and my motivation...next year I'm gonna ROCK! (and the IM's after that too!)
I just love it. I'm sure there are plenty that think I'm crazy for the location, or an idiot because I didn't do the world championship Kona, win an IM, or complete Wisconsin with a time of xx:xx...but whatever. (Obviously I won't post my pride and joy on slowtwitch, ha ha....). In the end..."Those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind." Its my journey and I can choose to express it anyway I want.
5k Sunday!
Sunday, Susan and I ran the Bucktown 5k for fun and the best news of the day was that my sister RAN her FIRST 5k in NJ! I'm so unbelievably proud of her. I LOVE hearing the excitement of the first race...the unknown and then the huge feeling of accomplishment crossing the finish line. Whether it's a 5k, 1/2 marathon, marathon, Ironman...whatever distance...it's all about M-O-V-I-N-G, setting a goal, and going after it. To make it even more special, she was running the Susan G. Komen race and raising money to fight breast cancer for people like our mom and so many others that we love. Congrats to the TEAM BFF! You girls R-O-C-K!
This group and so many others this past year have motivated me to start thinking about using my passion to some how help others. I'm not sure how I'm going to do it in 2012...it may not help a million people, but I'm going to make an effort to give back.
It's October! It's Green light time for 2012!
Game is back ON with training and I'm ready to go at it. October will be a little "Lori-structured" training... emphasis back on strength which I have not been able to do right over the past year and drilling down big time on the nutrition. I'll start back up with the JHC and be a lean-mean-racing-machine! (Ok, maybe I'll lay a little off the "mean"...) My strength workouts kick off this week with KRU in Andersonville and I'm really excited for the small gym atmosphere and I expect to net some big results over the next couple of months. The tattoo dictates a little more time off the swim routine, but I think the swim / bike / run / strength / nutrition wheels are in motion and synced up to start chasing some awesome goals for 2012!
Sunday, October 2nd was Livestrong Day and Bixby was kind enough to entertain me by wearing my Oakley Livestrong sunglasses for a couple minutes. Funny pup! If she could bark through the blog, she'd bark "Let's kick cancer's butt!". Live strong people.
And to wrap up....it's Chicago Marathon week!! To SusieQ and the Chicago marathon peeps - GOOD LUCK!!
