On East 11th St, as you drive past the throngs of semi-crazy meat fanatics waiting for (in my and countless others’ opinions) the best barbecue money can buy, you’ll come across a lonely trailer set up in an empty grass lot. Artistically painted on the trailer you’ll find a curious word name: Micklethwait.
And Week 6 is a wrap! One activity — The Boston Marathon. The remainder of the week was rest and recovery, or at least try to rest while we traveled back to Austin. Time to get back into it!
Six weeks down, thirty to go!
In light of everything that happened at the Boston Marathon this year, I couldn’t decide how to write this post, or to even write one at all. Despite the personal accomplishment and significance of the race itself, the cloud hanging over the event for so many others in Boston, the running community as a whole, and around the world can not and should not be forgotten. With that in mind, I want to recap the everything from my perspective, chronologically, to capture the emotional highs and lows of the weekend.
::TRUMPET FANFARE::
The. Boston. Marathon. This is it. The big one. Honestly, it’s probably the apex of my running career. But that’s ok. It was a tough, occasionally hidden, road to get here. Now that it’s here, it’s pretty surreal. But before we fall into any sappy, nostalgic mumbojumbo, I’ll give you a quick preview of what’s about to happen this weekend. 
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This Ironman training thing is tiring! Put another week in the books. It was another long-ish week, coming out to nearly 10 hours, and finishing up with a hard run. Not exactly ideal for what should be tapering for THE BOSTON MARATHON, but it felt good. Even as a long week, it was still pretty run-of-the-mill. That is, except for Sunday.
To close out the week I ran the Statesman Cap 10k. It’s the biggest 10k in Texas and 5th biggest in the US. I won’t get into the details now (because you can read all about them here!), but it turned out to be a harder effort than I probably should have run. So now it’s just a matter of taking it easy from now until next Monday. Boston here I come!
Four weeks down, thirty-two to go!
Another Cap10K is in the books! Over 15,000 people took to the streets to take on a pretty tough 6.2 mile course through downtown Austin. For me it was my 3rd go at it. Last year I ran for my company’s corporate team en route to a PR. This year, with Boston NEXT WEEK, I chose to take it a little easier. But things don’t always go the way you choose.
Week 3 is a wrap! It was pretty uneventful, other than those pesky 9 workouts. Most notable was getting my new bike all tuned up! I swung by Bicycle Sport Shop just before Trailer Food Tuesdays to pick up my ride. When I dropped it off on Saturday, I had gone in with the intent of only getting the crank arm fixed so I could screw the pedal back in. To fix that? Only $30 and two days. But I also needed (according to the mechanics) a new chain, a new cassette, both wheels trued, new pedals, and a deluxe tune-up.
Needless to say, a little more than just $30. But whatever, I was getting a great bike back up to nearly new condition… almost. I took the bike home assuming all was well and good. You know what they say about assuming, right? It means you’re an idiot. It meant I needed to take the bike back Wednesday evening to address quite a few issues, namely the wheels weren’t trued, I needed new brake pads (which should have been discovered in the deluxe tune-up), and the shifters wouldn’t, well, shift into the big gears (another item that should have been caught in the tune-up). Needless to say, not pleased with the level of service thus far.
Semi-redeeming, the service I received Wednesday night made everything better. It may have taken an hour and a half, but they fixed up all of the things left undone from the tune-up. So now I’m all set with a new, awesome bike that’s going to make me go really fast and tackle the 112 mile portion of the Ironman.
Here’s a preview of what the new bike looks like. Full post coming in due time!
Three weeks down, thirty-three to go!
It’s 2013. Spring is here. Summer is basically here. And that means Trailer Food Tuesdays is back! Taking up the amazing back patio of the Long Center, eleven food trucks looked out over the Austin skyline to serve great food to hungry Austinites. New for this year Trailer Food Tuesdays invites one truck from out of Austin to show off what other cities are made of. For this event Dallas’ Easy Slider drove into town to join ten of Austin’s favorite trucks (listed at the bottom of the post for posterity).
Well I’m not dead yet! Actually, that may be how I start a lot of these posts. The week started out pretty tame swimming, a few two-a-days in a row, and a solid 10 mile run on Friday. That 10 miler was in place of an optional swim day. I am still training for a marathon, so I thought running might be a good idea.
The big news (which will get its own blog post soon) is that I got a new bike Thursday night! It’s red and fast and awesome. Anyway, with that new bike and 3 of my neighbors, we set off to tackle a charity ride that supports a school near our houses. It was a cold, windy morning when we put our wheels down for the 42 mile route. We planned to regroup at each rest stop and I took off to see what the new bike could do. I was flying! Well, at least when I wasn’t going uphill into a headwind, which is what the first 11 miles felt like.
Unfortunately, as a result of my own poor mechanic work, around mile 28.5 the left pedal loosened itself out of the crank arm, stripped the hell out of the crank arm, and then detached from the bike while still connected to my shoe. I went another 1/2 mile on one leg and decided riding the last 13 miles on one leg wouldn’t be smart. I hitched a ride with the SAG truck to the finish line and waited for my friends. Not awesome, but the bike is great and I can’t wait to get it back from the shop!
On Sunday, with tired legs and a bad taste in my mouth from Saturday’s ride, I amped things up. Hazel and I set off for a quick 5 miles (7:35 min/mi for the little one! She’s fast.). I then dropped her off and knocked out 13 more for a really solid 18 miler. With no time goal for Boston, I was ecstatic with how things went!
To refuel, Ev, some friends, and I went up to Pflugerville for food trucks. What did we sample? Well among other things… deep fried beef ribs! So. So. Good. So good. They were a combined effort from Hall of Flame BBQ and a new trailer that specializes in hushpuppies! Overall a really good week of training.
Two weeks down, thirty-four to go!
Hey look! Did you see that? Hmm, maybe it was just a shadow, or my imagination… or maybe it was… nah, couldn’t be. Yes! It’s the Yeti! Well, not the Yeti (or Bigfoot or Sasquatch), but it is Yeti Frozen Custard!
