Home!

A week ago, I rolled off the Dartmouth Coach in the midst of a trans-Pacific, jet-lag stupor and the post-DNF funk. WIthin 24 hours, however, I was already feeling revived and looking forward to getting back to training in Hanover. The Upper Valley is, without a doubt, one of the best places in the world to train this time of year. Cool, but not cold, temperatures, and the springtime reawakening of the landscape make this hilly, rural area an invigorating training base. Add the favorable conditions to the incredible network of seemingly endless trails and backroads and you can see why I was so excited to return home for a training block!

I freely admit that I am a bit biased in thinking that New Hampshire surpasses Colorado and Australia, two places I’ve been fortunate enough to live and train, for a training environment. As a small-town girl from the day I was born (in Hanover!), rural, close-knit Northeastern communities will always resonate with me in a more profound way. Quite simply, I feel more settled and complete here than I do anywhere else in the world. As someone who spends most of the year on the road, this sense of belonging is incredibly important. When you live out of a suitcase in a high-pressure environment, you need to stay grounded in some way. For me, having a strong sense of where I am from and knowing that I have a solid, supportive network keeps me on track.

Over the next month, I have a lot of work to do. In a sense, I have to play catch-up, trying to gain back some of the fitness that I lost with my injury. As long as I can resist the siren song of Vermont cheese and ice cream, I can’t imagine a better place to regroup and move forward into part 2 of my season.

Looking forward (and not behind... too much)

In triathlon racing and training, like in life, you have good periods where everything is going well and the pieces just fall into place. Naturally, you also have "bad" periods where it feels as though you are fighting the current to no avail. The past couple of months I've been in a bit of a rough patch, but rather than feel too sorry for myself or bemoan my bad luck, I'm looking forward and ahead and hoping that these challenges will make me a stronger athlete and person. After all, what choice do you have? Either you: a) wallow in self-pity or b) be proactive and "get on with it", as Coach Daz would say.

I'm currently writing from Seoul, South Korea, where I experienced the most disappointing of a series of three disappointing races (Mooloolaba World Cup, Sydney WCS and Seoul WCS). Starting the race, we knew that it was a crapshoot as to whether or not I'd be able to race well. The odds were stacked against me, but there was a chance that I might be able to pull out something special. It was a "big ask" , as they say in Australia, as I had fractured my sacrum 7 weeks ago in a little bike crash (only a couple of weeks after a sinus infection and unintentionally running over an innocent pigeon on the bike path- all bad things come in threes!) and have since had to deal with serious back pain. Considering the fact the bike course was highly technical and accelerations on the bike tend to cause my back to painfully spasm, essentially locking it down, it was a gamble. Unfortunately, I did spasm on the bike and had to pull out- a DNF result is always a bummer, but this one was particularly so.

So where does that leave me? Obviously I am a bit frustrated and sad. When you picture your season, you never take setbacks like this into account. All I can do is look forward, get in a good block of training to catch up a bit after losing fitness and persist. It won't be easy, but nobody ever said that the occupation that I chose was an easy one. Actually, to be more accurate, the good periods are easy and the bad period stink, but it is our reaction to the hard ones that define us.

Off to get some kimchi and bulgogi. Maybe chili, garlic and fermented cabbage is the secret cure for an aching back...