weirdest injury ever

I have been trying to be good and get back into a routine of stretching. I know that it's good for me, and I used to stretch faithfully everyday. But somehow over the past 5 years I stopped. And a bunch of repetitive use injuries popped up. So I've really really been trying to get back into a routine of stretching.

Sunday I went for a long workout, came home, pulled out my yoga mat and started stretching. At one point I pushed back into downward dog (pretty standard yoga move) and as I did so my elbow popped. I didn't think anything of it, until the next morning when I discovered a big lump on my forearm and was having trouble using my hand. Turns out I pulled a small extensor muscle that runs from my thumb up onto my forearm. Doing anything with my right wrist and hand is incredibly hard (yep, right handed!).

Here we go again....ice, advil, and an ace bandage are my new best friends

Does anyone actually read this thing?

It's been a busy fall between work, ski training, and french classes. Yep thats right, I'm ski training again. Vince and I are signed up for the Marcialonga, which is a 70km ski race in the Val di Femme region of northern Italy on January 30, 2011. 70km!!! I'm a little afraid! I'm far from the skiing shape I used to be in 10 years ago and it's safe to say that my main goal is going to be to just finish the race. And not get run over by 2000 Norwegian masterblasters.

Our other big trip in the next few months is home to Anchorage for Christmas. I'm very excited to show Vince where I grew up, and we are both looking forward to lots of skiing while we are there. Sean is coming as well, and it will be the first family Christmas we've had in Anchorage in at least 5 years. Lets hope it's less cold and more snowy than the last time I was in Anchorage for Christmas!

(skiing up at Glen Alps in 2007, there was no snow for skiing in town and it was -5F the whole time I was home!)

Thinking of warm places...

Its starting to feel like fall again in Calgary. Almost a year since I last posted on here (oops!). As much as I love winter I'm hanging onto these thoughts of warmth (from Greece) for at least another few weeks!

Tri Diva Tri

I meant to post this a very long time ago, but apparently never got around to adding the picture, and therefore posting....

My big athletic goal this summer is to do the Wasa olympic distance triathlon (1500m open water swim, 40km road bike, and 10km run) on June 12. I've been training with a great group of girls since January at the local triathlon shop. Most of the girls have been training for a triathlon that is in Las Vegas this weekend, but with my upcoming trip to Greece I decided to save my money and vacation time and just do local races this summer. Since I'm not going to the Vegas race, and I haven't done a triathlon in 5 years, I was poking around to see if there was something I could do close by as a warm up race in May. I ended up signing up to do the Tri Diva Tri on May 2, a women's only super sprint (250m swim, 9km bike, 2.5km run) in Airdrie.

We've had a pretty crappy spring in Calgary so the weather on race day wasn't that great. It was cloudy, windy and cold and I was worried about getting cold in my spiffy new triathlon outfit. Luckily I have a pretty good coach who can advise me about these things and the weather ended up not being an issue. In terms of the actual race...My swim is the event that I struggle with the most, and I just tried to go fast and relax at the same time. Even though it only took 6 minutes it felt really long! The ride went really well, it's usually my best event. I was passing people like crazy and felt really good pushing it on the bike. I tried to settle into the run but find the transition from running to biking hard. I still need to work on that for Wasa! I ended up finishing 17th in the swim, 4th in the bike, and 9th in the run which combined for the overall win!!! There were a lot of women racing who had never done a triathlon before, but I definitely wasn't expecting that result! In a regular local triathlon with all the hardcore triathletes competing I think the result would be a little different....

My parents were in town for the weekend and came out to watch the race with Vince. It was great to have a little fan club =) Since the race was more about getting people out to participate and not as much about the competition they didn't give out any prizes. Vince and my dad decided that I needed a trophy and stopped on their way home to pick up this little guy for me. He'll be a great addition to my garden this summer!

Update: I not only survived the Wasa triathlon, but managed to make my goal of finishing in under 3 hours, with a time of 2:48:24. Good enough for 93rd out of 238 women. I left for Greece 5 days later and had the best vacation ever!