Training Partners

Everyone knows that a good training partner is priceless. I have been blessed with some great ones. In Macon I had a few amazing triathletes who had more years of experience with this sport than years I have been alive. They were kind enough to mentor me and share lots of great advice. I also have Jose, who is always ready to push me to the limits and give me a good butt kicking. The H2A team has been kind enough to let me join them and get my butt kicked in the pool by a bunch of 10 year olds(more on that another day). Recently HHI has had a growth spurt in young new triathletes with some great natural talent, who have also kept me company on many long ride. My list goes on and on, but there has been one training partner for the last three years that just really stands out. Poor guy can just not figure out how to ride a bike so he as been bugging me to do a relay with him. Which I must say I have thought really hard about as he is a good runner and with my current run fitness I could use a good runner. I told him I just didn't think he was quite ready yet. So he shows up at my door looking like this.



I explained to him that although he has a great nose to show him the way, the course routes can be difficult and he may get lost. He has been training hard lately and really wants to race so the next day he shows up at my door dressed like this



He then tells me that he would swim for me. I still just don't think he is ready to race. I feel really bad for him, so I told him I would let him enter the costume contest for this weekend's Halloween race in Savannah. I am trying to help him think of a good costume. Any suggestions?

Commiting

Life is all about committing. Since I am a poor communicator and often leave those around me in the dark about what is going on in my life I am committing to keeping a blog to keep everyone up to date. I have some high expectations for the next couple years in my life, from sport, to family, and career, and I look forward to sharing my adventures to all those interested. I will post about some of those expectations another day.

Sometimes in life you need you need a little extra help to follow through with your commitments, as my friend Josh knows. Friday night I got an email from Josh saying he was looking for some people to ride 100 with him on Saturday. I am never one to turn down a long ride with good friends so I ditched my standard Saturday Run, Swim, Bike routine and showed up. The ride started out a mess, two flats, several drops, a killer headwind, among other challenges. At mile 70 we took our second store stop, where it started to rain. UGGG! Josh however had made the commitment to finish this loop strong, but he knew he need a little pick up. Man goes into the store and walks out with a paper brown bag, inside a SPARKS!

For those of you that didn't part enough in college, Sparks, is a malt liquor energy drink. Craziest thing I have ever seen, Josh downs about 2/3 of is drink and mans up to finish that century strong! Two more flats later, more rain, enough wind to annoy me, and some really crappy roads due to a short cut to avoid more rain, we made it home!
I hope that over the next year I am able to find the drive to follow through with my commitments sans to many sparks..... we'll see.