Snail walking

While watching t.v. with my housemates in the evenings, I’ll sometimes use the opportunity to multi-task and do some of my rehab exercises. One of my exercises, a slow side-to-side walk with resistance, invariably elicits a giggle from the Kiwi, who deems it the “snail walk”.

My training these days has a lot in common with the snail walk, involving gradual progression with a focus on technique, definitely not on speed. Although I’m moving somewhere, my trajectory is more of a linear one. Not necessarily a bad thing in the long run, but an approach that requires patience...

I’m two weeks into my camp in Canberra and I’m just starting to feel settled. It helps returning to a familiar training plan and group in a town that I know well. To go from freezing temperatures and solo rehab to a searing heat and a structured group training environment is challenging enough! I’m gradually doing training that resembles “real” work and am starting to think that I might actually be fit enough at some point in 2011. While a snail walk is a bit tedious, I know that I’ll get to my destination eventually. Plus, I’m running with a huge grin on my face and that can’t be a bad thing! After months of no running, my short jaunts make me feel like a kid on Christmas.

As a totally unrelated aside, we saw a wombat that was the size of a small bear, about double the size of any wombat that I’d ever seen previously. Granted, it was dead in the middle of the road and may have been a bit bloated, but is was still huuuuuge. I was impressed.

Happy training!

Groffy

Running on air

Hubris, it turns out, has a way of catching up with you.

When I fractured my sacrum last spring, I thought that I could continue racing and training and that the bone would heal. Even though the pain abated over time, I never healed completely and a minor trauma caused the bone to refracture. This time around, however, my body is ensuring that I keep my need to train (and ego) in check by permitting only the most gradual progression of training. After weeks of water running, I’ve progressed to the point where I can run on the Alter-G (seen above). My rate of increase of body weight has been slow, but I am pretty excited to be running again. Plus, it gives me insight into how much easier it is to run at 70% of your body weight (oh, Barbara Riveros and Emma Snowsill- it is so much easier for you pixies!).

While I’m trying to be patient and gradually build back fitness, my training partners are getting in some great training in Canberra, Australia. Among their ranks is my buddy, Lauren Campbell, who is returning to racing after a difficult, injury-fraught 2010. While the road to recovery is at times frustrating and disheartening, athletes like Lauren prove that you can come back. When you do, it is that much sweeter.

Before too long, I’ll be healthy enough to handle “real” running and hard riding. I’ll show up in Australia as the palest person on the continent (until fellow gimp Bryan Keane shows up), but I’ll also be armed with a bit more gratitude and little less hubris concerning injury. It has been a tough lesson to learn, but one that almost all successful athletes learn at some point.

Whether at 50 or 100% body weight, I wish you happy training!

Sarah

African Adventures (Part 3): Training Campus interruptus

A training camp where you can’t train is like a long-awaited beach vacation where it rains the entire time. Sure, it is nice to get away and relax, but it is disappointing nonetheless. You make the most of it, staying busy playing scrabble and watching movies, but you can’t help but dwell on what could (should?) have been.

My time at Kenya, while a nice life experience, didn’t quite pan out as the training camp for which we had hoped. Instead of logging in some great miles in Iten, I spent my time trying to minimize pain and trying to stay busy. In the end, coach and I decided that I was probably better off heading home early to get medical treatment. And so I packed up my gear, said goodbye to training partners and new friends alike and made the 36 hour trek home to Hanover. My search for a diagnosis has most recently brought me to the US Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs. Fingers crossed!

While it was a bit disheartening to travel so far to get injured and head home early, this is part of the job that chose. At the very worst, I had the opportunity to go to an amazing country, meet some inspiring people, spend time with my lovely training partners and have an incredible life experience. Sure, I didn’t get much training in (and didn’t see any critters beyond livestock!), but I feel fortunate that my job allows me to travel to and spend time in Kenya. I guess that it is best to have the perspective that, when it rains on your beach vacation, at least you aren’t at the office and stuck to your desk!

African Adventures (Part 2): Polépolé

In Kenya, I’ve had to embrace the concept of Polépolé, Swahili for “take it easy”. We joke about things happening on Kenyan time: relaxed, late (according to us), and predictably unpredictable. After a series of injuries, illnesses and mishaps, 2010 has been a year of learning patience; a lesson that is being reinforced by my experience thus far in Kenya. Like a good little student, I’m trying to learn from the relaxed culture here and let things happen in their own time.

The latest lesson in patience has been dealing with a glute injury sustained last Sunday, our first full day in Iten. Part of me appreciates the irony in being unable to run (or even bike *sigh*) in one of the most famous running towns in the world. For the time being, I can only watch runners instead of running myself. Although I can’t do much on land, I have picked up some running tips and am getting to be a pretty good water runner, perfecting the worst tan lines of all time in the process! I’m also trying to be supportive to my training partners Andi, Vicky and Lisa, who are getting in some seriously good training. Watch out for these three in 2011!

My injury is taking a while to heal (at least far longer than the two or three days that I would have preferred), but it is happening on its own time. Polépolé. Until then, I’m just trying to stay relaxed, I’m meeting some cool runners and I’m unsuccessfully avoiding having my swimsuit lines permanently etched into my skin. Hopefully my next post will have me back running side-by-side with some fast runners!

Kwa herini!

African Adventures (Part 1): New York to Nairobi

I’m one lucky chick. Sometimes I lose sight of the incredible opportunities that I have by being an athlete. This morning, however, I spent 30 minutes chatting with NBA legend Bill Walton in the NYAC hot tub after getting in a nice swim workout. Life doesn’t get much better than that.

Last night, Bill served as keynote speaker for the New York Athletic Club’s All Sports Dinner, where I was fortunate enough to rub elbows with some of the best athletes in the country. NYAC has a tremendous tradition of supporting athletes in Olympic sports and Jarrod Shoemaker, Kevin Collington and I are fortunate members of their triathlon team. The club is an incredible place, located next to Central Park, with a rich and impressive history of Olympic athlete support. I hope to represent the club well for years to come.

I’m still scratching my head about how I can be so fortunate. I sat and talked with one of the greatest basketball players of all time in one of the most prestigious clubs in the world. These experiences just don’t seem as though they should happen to a goofball triathlete from New Hampshire. While they last, however, I’m just enjoying the ride. I think that my new buddy Bill, with his big heart and infectious passion for life, would approve.

I’m off to Kenya tonight (currently in the lounge- hence the rushed blog post) for a month of running in the Rift Valley. Like I said, I’m pretty darn lucky. From New Hampshire to New York, New York to Nairobi, this is one crazy journey... I can’t wait to see what comes next!

Down(ward Dog)time

After a tough season of training, racing and travel, some athletes opt for a beach holiday to relax on the sand. Other athletes may jet off to Vegas for a few days of debauchery. I, on the other hand, embraced my inner granola-eating hippie and tried to be a Zen Master at the Kripalu Center for Yoga & Health.

Following a few days of paperwork, hanging out with friends and family and one bike ride with Lance (Yes, that Lance. Good namedrop, right? Am I cooler now?), I headed down to Kripalu. Situated in Lenox, Massachusetts, the Kripalu property (summer estate turned Jesuit novitiate turned ashram) overlooks Laurel Lake and the Berkshire Mountains. My initial impression, shaped by the perfectly-coiffed New Jersey suburbanite stepping out of her Land Rover in front of reception, was that this would be more of a yoga-light, spa experience than a hard-core hippie retreat. While there were some yuppie elements, I was pleasantly pleased to find out that my initial impression was incomplete and that guests could tailor their experience in whatever fashion they wanted.

Personally, I wanted my experience to be an active, energizing one. That entailed 3 yoga sessions a day, multiple lectures, hikes and runs and meditation; all achieved on a caffeine-free, macrobiotic diet (No coffee= big deal for SG). I very possibly overextended myself. By the end of my stay, I felt sore in different places, but relaxed and really happy. After being put through the meat grinder a few times this season, I needed a clean start and Kripalu was exactly the place to seek it. I’m ready to move onto the 2011 season, armed with a few more tools to keep me healthy, grounded and feelin’ the prana, baby. That being said, delicious, wonderful coffee will definitely be reintegrated into my life at some point.

Deep-fried Dallas

For a couple of months, I have been eagerly anticipating my last race of the year, the U.S. Open Triathlon in Dallas, for one reason: the Texas State Fair. I have a borderline unhealthy obsession with the State Fair and its crazy assortment of fried foods (plus the added bonus of livestock!). For the most part, I view the fried food fiesta as entertainment (Who the heck would fry flavored butter? And, more puzzling, who would eat it?!). This year, however, I was looking forward to actually trying this year’s winner, fried beer. How can fried beer NOT be good? Unfortunately, fried beer, an insipid ravioli like pocket filled with lukewarm, beer-flavored liquid, is pretty awful. So awful, in fact, that the fried beer ended up in the garbage. Considering I was with my brother (in photo), who happened to be in town for business, and my Dallas-buddy, my dad, this is saying something; Groffs will pretty much eat anything.

So what does fried beer have to do with triathlon? I guess that I see the whole fried-beer experience as a reflection of my season this year. I went into the season with high hopes and expectations, hoping to find a new level of awesomeness. I took a calculated risk and while I was immersed in the right environment and surrounded by great people, things didn’t turn out as I had hoped. For the most part, my results, while not inedible, certainly weren’t the nuggets of deliciousness for which I had hoped. I’ve grown through the experience, however, and I’m now armed with knowledge and experience that I didn’t have in the past.

After the disappointment of the deep-fried beer, Adam and I waited in a 30-minute line in order to try the “Elvis”, a deep-fried peanut butter, jelly and banana sandwich. It required patience, but I was pleasantly surprised by the final outcome. In the past, I would have passed by the line and merely been entertained by the idea of this calorie-bomb treat. After trying and failing with the beer, however, I was more willing to take a risk and invest the time into a potentially positive outcome. The long wait and the nastiness of the fried beer only made the “Elvis” taste even better. At some point, I will be have the breakthrough that I desire as a triathlete and it will be even more rewarding after the frustrations of seasons like this past one.

[This was intended as a race report and ended up being something else entirely. As for the race itself, I ended up 5th- a good result that isn’t reflective of how mentally and physically difficult it was for me. It has been a long, draining season that has taken its toll on me and that was glaringly obvious on Sunday. Phew. Thank goodness the 2010 season is over!]