Thank you all for the generous support that was shown when I raised money for Team Riley while I trained for the Mini Marathon! If you donated, you should have received a thank you note and a Riley Hospital for Children bracelet. If yours did not arrive, please let me know and I will send you another one! Team Riley raised over $9700 for Riley Hospital for Children! Mini Marathon day (May 2) was great. It was a beautiful day for a run. I was pleased with how I did, especially with my lack of training due to my thumb injury and surgery. I was even interviewed on TV and got to talk about my involvement with Team Riley and I Run 4. I was happy to be able to talk about my little buddy Anthony. I will post the video if I can figure out how to upload it to Youtube from my phone!
My favorite photo from the Mini
My thumb is feeling much better now. I have been back on my normal night shift schedule since May 18 and last week I was discharged from my doctor's care with no restrictions. My range of motion keeps improving every day and pain is minimal!
The scar from this pin actually doesn't look too bad!Matt and I celebrated our fifth anniversary on June 12. Thank you for all the nice cards and messages that we received! On June 11, we went to see "Jurassic World" in IMAX 3D and had a great time. On the 12th, we celebrated our anniversary by going out to dinner at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, and Matt got me a beautiful anniversary ring! We purchased it at Jared before dinner and the sales staff are good friends with the management at the restaurant, so they called over and had them give us a free appetizer in honor of our anniversary. The restaurant also gave us a free dessert! We had a wonderful meal and a fun night.
Today, my dad and I went on a new adventure. We have both talked about completing a triathlon for a while, and today we finally did one! With only 4 weeks worth of training, we finished the Tri-Insanity Super Sprint Triathlon in Danville, IN, about 15 miles west of my house in Avon. The triathlon was composed of a 250 meter swim (10 lengths in an Olympic-sized pool), 10-mile bike, and 2 mile run. Here are my thoughts regarding my first triathlon experience:
-I am so glad that we selected such a small race for our first triathlon. There were just over 100 competitors total, with only 40 in the "super sprint" division. The swim portion was just a mass of flailing arms and legs and it was very hard to actually swim properly, especially for a middle-of-the-pack racer like me. I got kicked in the face, my arms hit other people's legs as I was trying to do my freestyle stroke, and I know I accidentally kicked other people as well. I ended up using breaststroke/doggy paddle most of the time due to lack of space.
-I was very pleased with how quickly I was able to transition between the different portions of the race. Between the swim and bike and between the bike and run, you have to stop into the transition area and change out your gear for the upcoming event. It took me less than 2 minutes each time to switch shoes, take out or put away my bike, etc. and to transition between events.
-I need some serious bike practice. Any advantage that I gained during my decent swim and fast transitions quickly dissipated due to my slow biking. I love my new bike ("Juliette") that I purchased on Craigslist a couple of weeks ago, but it need to put in some more riding time. I also need to learn how to properly use different gears to my advantage.
-I felt very strong during my run. When I am just out for a run, I usually run 11-12 minute miles. My two miles were under 11 minutes today!
In the end, it was a good day and a fun experience. It was fun to race with my dad and to try something new. I think I will participate in triathlons in the future, and I am looking at doing an all-women's event (the "Go Girl Triathlon") at the end of August.
Thanks for reading! I can't promise that I will continue to blog on a regular basis, but this is better than nothing, right? :-)
Love.
Stacey (and Matt and Thor)
No comments:
Post a Comment