P4 Mountain Bike

Finally decided this past weekend that I just can't ride the Zaaihoek loop with my bike anymore unless I want to end up in Hospital or dead very soon.

The Zaaihoek road is ideal for intervals as it's 10km out before it becomes a gravel road, making it an ideal 20km loop. There are also no major hills with just some rolling hills, making it perfect. The only problem is a coal mine opened some time ago on this road just before the tar section ends which made it a bit dangerous. But lately another two mines opened on this road and it is now just not safe anymore.

During Saturday's ride I almost got taken out twice by truck drivers. The second time was so close as one truck driver overtook the other one and luckily I looked back just in time to see what's heading my way and had to go off road losing all my water bottles, all gadgets on my bike and almost had a nasty fall. Going at full speed on the tar in the aero position and then suddenly going off road on a TT bike is not a pleasant experience.

The wind was also hectic and add to that a truck driver flying past you, it just spell disaster. The problem with this piece of road and frankly with most roads in and around Witbank is that there is no yellow line section.

Otherwise training is going really well and last week was not a big mileage week but shorter sessions with a lot of speed and power work.
The only issue I have is the swimming pool heater pump is broken again. Same as last year so I guess it is going to be wetsuit swimming until summer as I can't see them fixing the pump soon if I go by last year's experience. Last year it took them almost a month to fix it.

Picture at the top is the new book by Macca, everyone is talking about. So far it is not a bad read and I quite enjoy it.

Bombs Away

Did a 4 hour brick session earlier today, biking 3 hours and a 1 hour run afterwards. It was so cold and windy out there but I just couldn't imagine doing the bike session indoors on the trainer.

Doing too much indoor bike sessions during the week, so I decided to siu and go outside with 5 layers of cycling gear. The weatherman wasn't wrong when he said 1c and with the wind chill factor it will feel like -5c. Luckily it got better later on.

Just after my turnaround at the 90 minute mark I could feel that I must have or are busy getting a flat. I stopped and the front tire was almost flat. Instead of changing tyres I decided to use a "bomb" to inflate it. It was just to cold to change the tire.

I rode about 15km and had to stop again to use another bomb. Why I didn't just change the tyre, I don't know. Got to the house without changing the tyre but used all of the three bombs I had in my bag.

This was my first ride on my TT bike in I don't know how long. Lately I have only used the road bike and the Mountain bike. Need to use it more often before my race in August for the muscles to get use to the TT position.

Picture at the top is what saved my on my run the other day. I always carry three things with me when I bike or run. Obviously my house keys (with my Gym tag attached), some money and my small pepper spray canaster.

Runners will know the feeling but as I ran minding my own business I suddenly got this funny feeling and semi cramp and knew this is it. Time to pay a little visit to the toilet and this can't wait another hour, it is now or never. Lucky me, my gym tag is attached to my house keys and I was about 2km from the gym. What was an endurance run became a sprint session.

Got to the gym just in time, funny look from the receptionist but job done and I could carry on with my run at endurance pace.

Coach made me do a different kind of brick session on Tuesday and when I looked at it first I didn't know it will be that hard. Maybe something you can try. Was a 2h30 brick session with a 1h30 bike and a hour run. It was done as follows:

Bike: 30 minutes at endurance pace, 30 minutes Time Trail pace, 30 minutes endurance pace

Run: 15minutes at marathon pace, 30 minutes at 10km race pace, 15 minutes at marathon pace

Is much harder than what it looks like on paper

Finally here is a pic of me at DJ's Golf day where I played for the 1st time again in 20 years with the Clubs I bought at a Pawn shop twenty years ago. Who needs a bag full of Clubs when you can play with 5 Clubs.

10 to 5150

The first week of Ten to get ready for the 5150 race on the 13th of August went pretty well. It is the 1st race in South Africa under the 5150 series banner and although the entry fee was ridiculous(but what do you expect from WTC) I decided to do it.

Some triathletes can race week in and week out and others aim for one big race during the season and train for that. I am one of those that choose one race and really put everything into it. My "A" race is only beginning of December (IM70.3 Phuket) and I will go insane if I just train for the rest of the year without aiming for something before the year end. I prefer IM distance racing but missing IM this year and with no other one soon in SA, I am going to give an Olympic distance race a go as my "B" race.

Olympic distance is a bit too fast for me but I'll give it a go and I think 10 weeks will be enough time to get ready.

On the home front we had a terrible week with the passing away of Niel on Wednesday morning. We will really miss him so much. The Memorial service is next week Tuesday. The rest of the week was really emotional as it was Kim's late mother's birthday on Thursday and the 5th anniversary of my Fathers death on Friday. Now that's a different kind of Hat-trick, having three days like that in a row.

The photo above is of the rainbow I took on the morning of Niel's death on my way to work. I took the picture at about 7am and he past away at 6:45. Coincidence??

The picture below is one DJ created while fooling around on the Ipad, just the motivation I need!

Training wise my 1st week of 10 towards 5150 was good. Coach gave me an easy week and we are slowly getting back into it.

Week's Training:
Monday: 30min easy run, 5.3km

Tuesday: Bike: 10x1min all out at 110+ rpm on 1min recovery. Surprised to be able to maintain close to 400 watts per interval with the lack of bike work lately. Managed a couple at 400+ but last two intervals a struggle and only getting to 368w & 358w

Wednesday: Run, 5x2min fartleks on 3 min recovery- could manage 3:36, 3:30, 3:35, 3:40, 3:49min/km, dropping of quite a bit at the end

Thursday: Swim: 2500m

Friday:rest day

Maybe Next Year

Late Friday morning we got a call to say that Niel (Kim's brother) is not doing well and he's been admitted to Hospital again. He's been diagnosed with Kidney cancer and his condition suddenly deteriorated.

We were about to leave for the Kremetart bicycle challenge some 400km's north but instead all our plans changed and we headed 100km south.

Kim said I must go on my own to the bike race and she will go to the Hospital but that just wasn't on.

Seeing him in a lot of pain is not nice. Luckily this morning he looked much better, still in a lot of pain but better.

To come back to the race, this is the third year I've entered the race without getting to the start line. One year I couldn't do it due to work and the next because I was sick. This year it was Family, maybe next year will be the year when I race the Kremetart.

The picture at the top was taken at the VW annual awards some two weeks ago.

My next race will be the South Africa 5150 series on the 13th of August, the first in a series of 5150 events in SA. This will give me some ten weeks to prepare and hopefully I can get to the start line without any hassles and in better shape that I'm currently in. Something to look forward to.

As I did a quick one hour run this morning before we headed to the hospital I just realized again. Running is the best medicine ever for body and soul, period!

Run: 1h00, 12.3km

Unusual way to Celebrate

This past Saturday was our 17th wedding anniversary and we drove more than 500km to celebrate.

DJ had a dance competition and we drove to Bloemfontein for her to participate. Not your typical wedding anniversary celebration but hey, what you'll do for your child.

She did great and got a 1st place in Freestyle and a 6th in Slow dance. We finished later than expected on Saturday and instead of driving back to Witbank we changed our travel plans and stayed an extra night.

This gave us the opportunity to celebrate our anniversary and also DJ's dance results.

On the training front it is going better by the day and I am slowly getting back into things after my two week lay off due to flu.

This weekend is going to be a real challenge and one I probably regret come Monday.

I am doing a 175km road race on Saturday and a 40km Mountain bike race on Sunday.

The thing is I've entered this event some time ago and was doing OK training wise to do a reasonable time but getting flu didn't help at all. The race is in Kim's hometown and we decided to make it a weekend, when I entered some time ago.

Too late to change the family plans now, just need to SIU.

Another Curve Ball

We recently received some bad news about Kim's brother, Niel.

Niel has been diagnosed with Kidney Cancer and that at the age of 41!

We got the news before my sister's wedding but didn't want to upset and spoil the wedding, so we kept it to ourselves. He did undergo surgery to remove some of the cancer that has spread and they even had to break two ribs do get to the infected area and to remove it. He is now better after the surgery and has recovered in such a way that they could start with radiation to see if it will help.

If it doesn't help they are going to remove one of the kidney's. On the positive side the cancer has only affected the one kidney and the other one is still clean.

We are visiting him as often as we can as he now lives with his fiance and not with us anymore. They stay in Boksburg, about 100km's from us.

Get better soon Niel and we are praying for you.

I've been struggling with Flu the past couple of weeks but I said to Kim if you think about Niel and his set back you don't even wanna complain about having Flu. The only downside is I haven't been able to train for the past few days but hey it's Winter and maybe the downtime will do me good.

Picture is of Kim, her brother Niel and sister Marle at Marle's birthday on the 20th of February

Back to Normal, sort of

Last weekend was my sister's wedding and after months of planning the day was gone in a flash.

Luckily everything went well and we had a lot of fun. Apart from Heloise being late more than an hour but I must add that it wasn't her fault. Let's just say there was some miscommunication with the hairdressers and let's leave it there.

I knew that Gerhard had a lot of patience but waiting more than an hour just confirmed it. A very big thank you to my friend Warren who let the ceremony, it was great. Not that often that you get a lot of compliments for the ceremony and message from the Pastor. Thanks W!

It was a very emotional day for me as had to stand in for my Dad who passed away five years ago. Bringing Heloise into the Church and also saying something about the Bride's parents wasn't easy but it was a big honour and I know my Dad's would have approved.

We are still waiting for the official wedding photos while the two are on their honeymoon in Mauritius but Yolandi, a friend of Gerhard, Heloise and also the daughter of Debbie, who is Kim's friend took some lovely pictures. I've posted it on my Face book page

We had a great Mother's day breakfast the morning after the wedding and then it was back to normal getting all the things back to Witbank. Gerhard and my Mom surprised Heloise with an Ice cream wedding cake and it this big three layer cake. The guests could only finish one layer, so we are having ice cream for the next, I don't know how many months.

The company that made the cake supplied us with a freezer to transport the cake and when I picked it up Friday afternoon the owner asked me how far is the venue. I said between 1.5 and 2 hours. His words: Try making it in an hour.

Not that easy when you have to face Pretoria and Johannesburg traffic on a Friday afternoon. With DJ as my co-pilot we did the trip in 1h15. Coming back after the wedding with what was left of the cake was a breeze as it was Sunday morning and no pressure of a perfect cake.

Only problem was finding enough space to store that amount of ice cream. I had to use a saw to cut the cake in smaller pieces and Eddy had a blast and a sugar rush from all the ice cream that was waisted and also helping to clean the back of the truck after I finished.

The past weekend DJ had two dance competitions, both on the same day. We are still new to this dance thing but organizing two competition on the same day by the same governing body doesn't make sense to me, maybe someone at SADTA can explain this to me. At the one venue in Pretoria she did her Freestyle and Slow dance competition and then she had to do her small group competition in Centurion about a 30 minute drive.

Another hectic day as we had to wait for her to finish her couples section, then we jumped in the car rush to the other venue for the small group to dance. Then we had to rush back to Pretoria for her to dance again.

The program was so tight and as we arrived back at the venue they were at item #121 and DJ had to dance item #120. She was devastated as it was the slow dance section she missed and also her favourite dance routine.

To see my girl that way just broke my heart. I told her to make the best of the Freestyle item and make up for the section she missed and she did. She danced her heart out and made me so proud.

After all the drama she had a great day finishing 1st in the Couples and the Freestyle items. Well done DJ!

Training wise I had to put it on the back foot due to the wedding and just as I thought I'll get back into full training I'm down with Flu. Not good and so frustrated but what can I do, just need to rest and recover this week. Luckily we are now in the off season so no major races I am missing.