Category Archives: goals

August 22, 2011 · 1:23 pm

Captain Thurmond’s Challenge

Not your average Triathlon.

“The Captain Thurmond’s Challenge Triathalon consists of an 12 mile mountain bike leg, 8 miles of whitewater, and a grueling 8.5 mile run out of the New River Gorge.”

Many talented and athletic people (Tate!) compete in this event solo.  Lucky for me there’s also a relay category!

Meet my teammates.  Thanks Kelsey and Theron!

Go C’villians!!!

Tate competed last year and rocked it despite very little training so this year he was ready to go.

“On your mark!”

“GO!”

I didn’t see Kelsey but Tate pulled out strong from the start.

They hopped on their bikes and away they went!

Theron and I took off in the car to the first transition-bike to kayak.

Kelsey is relatively new to biking and she did awesome on the 12 mile mountain bike course!

Theron jumped into his kayak for 8 miles of class 4-5 whitewater and Kelsey and I drove to the next transition.

Here comes our man!

At this point it was 2:40pm and I’d been up since 6-I was SO ready to run!

And run I did!  The run starts with 1.2 miles of uphill then “levels out” (i.e gradual incline) for a few miles before hitting a long flight of stairs!   Yes, my eight and a half mile run included stairs.  Whew.  Most of the course is trail running and although it’s a challenging course, I felt strong and exhilarated.

I passed at least a dozen runners in the first few miles!  Granted, they were mostly solo competitors who’d already been going hard for almost three hours.   Most of the time I was alone, zipping through the woods, hopping over rocks and branches, and singing along to bad pop songs from my iPod.

Tate gave me a high-five and thumbs-up right before I crossed the finish!  Notice how he’s already changed his clothes?  He came across the finish nearly an hour before, more on that in a second. 🙂


I crossed the finish 73 minutes after leaving the river!  That’s good time for these legs and an elevation gain of 900 feet!  I am not built for speed but I am getting faster.

We came in THIRD in our division!!!!  We each got to pick a prize from a table, I got an awesome pair of Cannondale bike shorts!

And Tate?  Well, he came in THIRD OVERALL!!!!

I am SO impressed and proud!

We soaked up the glory…

And then all four of us crashed hard!

It was a great weekend; fun, challenging, active, exhilarating, sweaty, and spent with great people and beautiful surroundings.

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August 18, 2011 · 3:10 pm

Spread the Positive

Wow, my cup runneth over from all the wonderful comments, compliments, and suggestions in response to yesterday’s post!

Thank you! I really, really appreciate my regular commenters AND it’s really, really fun to hear from first timers, so thank you all.

I am looking forward to addressing each of your questions/suggestions for posts in the coming weeks!

A reoccurring comment I have received over the last year is that I seem to be a very positive and happy person.  While I love that this is how I come across it always takes me a bit by surprise.  I am not bubbly or universally optimistic.  I can be moody, especially when hungry or tired.  I am however, quite grounded and in general I am happy and positive.  Afterall, what’s the alternative? To be an Eeyore?

I have encountered many people in my life who I refer to (in private!) as Eeyore‘s.  You know that type, just like the Winnie-the-Pooh character they seem to walk through life in a storm cloud.  Something is always wrong and summer is too hot and winter is too cold.  While around an Eeyore I work to remain upbeat and positive and always leave the interaction reminded that there are many ways to look at a situation and many ways to put your own spin on it.

Here are some ways I spin things into the positive.

  • I keep my eyes on the big picture.  Sometimes the big picture is that I am healthy, in a wonderful relationship, and have a roof over my head.  Sometimes the big picture is that once I get through whatever situation is causing me stress I can move on; this stress is temporary. Sometimes the big picture is that things could be so much worse, which leads me to…
  • Gratitude. In some ways it’s the opposite of the big picture, instead of looking broader it’s looking closer and practicing gratitude for the daily things, food, relationships, a great run, a body that loves to run, the ability to grow a garden.  Gratitude makes me pause and recognize all the great things, big and small, that make up my daily life.
  • Life’s not fair.  When I was a kid I was known for pouting and saying “it’s not fair!” (except I had trouble with my R’s and it came out more like “fah” and I had a bad bowl cut and a big belly.  Yeah, years 8-10 were not my glory days.)  These days whenever I feel like “it’s not fair” I remind myself that while, yes, all things are not equal, I can choose to believe that the scale tips in my favor more often than not.
  • The power of choice.  A million choices that I made brought me to the life I lead today and I make a million choices all the time to move forward in a certain trajectory.  There are things that happen to us in life but the mostly we choose each and every second how to live out life.
  • Balance.  The quality of my life is increased dramatically when I find that perfect balance between work (I love feeling productive!), exercise, downtime (I really like T.V), social time, sleep, adventure, and creativity.   These are the elements that make my life satisfying and so I prioritize them on a daily basis.
  • Exercise and good nutrition.  Pure and simple.  I whole-heartily believe that regular exercise and high-quality, nutritious food lead me to be a happier, more positive person each and every day.
Negative and positive energy are infectious and I choose to spread the positive.
Have a beautiful day my friends, I’m off to interval train and hit the mat.

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