After Sears I knew I needed a break. I kept seeing the ICC looming on my calendar but decided that a break was more necessary than trying to sharpen up for this race. I gained some weight and only did zone 2 workouts and I simply hoped that it wouldn't really work against me come 7 December. I left San Francisco Thursday night, slept for awhile, and woke up Saturday morning…
The first time I climbed the Sears tower, I wound up not coming home for six months. I hated my job more each day and found it increasingly difficult to get out of bed. I lacked the motivation to pull myself out of this slump, not quite realizing that I didn’t have to do this for the rest of my life. One of my best friends was living in Hong Kong,…
What's Been Going on Since Aon LA? After Aon LA I decided to go kind of nuts on the bike. I put in some crazy high mileage weeks (for me), intentionally rode dirt for the first time, and always took the high road to take advantage of those stair climbing muscles. I kept saying that I wanted to lose some weight but I know I have trouble dropping weight while primarily riding,…
Presidential Towers (9 March 2014) Coming back from Vegas, I was pretty run down. Various viruses had been floating around my office, I was particularly susceptible after that race, so I opted to take it pretty easy all week. I did some easy rides to keep my legs loose (and my brain sane), spent a lot of time in the steam room trying to make peace with my lungs, and slept…
For the past few weeks I kept thinking about my Aon climb back in January. I had spent the previous few weeks regenerating all the muscle that I lost while running, moving, and traveling and had felt dead legged for weeks. I didn't feel great going to the start line that day, and five floors in my legs confirmed it as they turned to lead; at floor ten it felt like…
After racing at Sears/Willis last year I decided that I'd focus it as my goal race in 2013, working to break 20'. However, a few days later I decided to sign up for a marathon just three weeks before Sears/Willis. Bad idea, lesson learned; I'm not doing any serious distance run training until I've kicked the stair climbing bug from my system. I think I peaked about a week too early…