tri virgin in MD

Hello everyone -

Wanted to take a moment and introduce myself. If you don't want the whole life story, skip to the bold text.

As you may have guessed, I'm Josh (27y/o M). Since high school, I've been a runner. Cross Country and Track and Field, back in the days where I was 160# and trying to gain weight and couldn't (those were the days). After college, I became a high school English teacher but also coached cross country and track and field (middle distance and jumping). I've sinced moved on to government work for $$ and time (stress) reasons, and am pretty happy.

Run history: In the past few years, I've run 2 marathons - one a college graduation present to myself for which I was woefully undertrained (student teaching), and one a few years later that I actually trained for, though not as consistently as I would have liked. PR was 3:47, which is not bad for my weight (225). As you can see, the hyperactive metabolism failed to graduate high school with me, and I've been a pretty big guy since the end of college (6'2", 210-230 lbs).

Swim history: Went to a running clinic last year that offered instruction on swimming (cross training for them), which I turned down since I never considered it exercise (as opposed to fun). I had swum quite competitively as a small boy, but one terrible swim-teacher when I was about 10 ended that career (she was mean, often a no-show, didn't really teach us technique, and failed to show for our "graduation" test to move to the next class). Dad went to Purdue on a swimming scholarship, so I still have a good coach available...

Bike history: I have a trek 1000 which was awarded to me after a nasty bike accident when I was struck by a pickup (her at fault) while riding some old schwinn garage sale salvage in college. Insurance company thinks they made out great getting me a new entry level road bike, but I think several stitches, a slight bonk of the old cranium (yes, wearing helmet), and some pretty significant road rash was well worth it - wife not happy when I said of the accident, "I'd do it again in a second." This past week I went and got shoes and clipless pedals, and am loving them so far. I've never been in a bike race, though I have supplemented some runs while marathon training in the past with long bike rides, including two centuries (my shins and knees can't take the abuse that marathon training dishes out at my weight).

Bottom line, a friend (Jesse) and I recently decided to do a first tri. We're doing Diamond In The Rough in Perryville, MD, on July 7. 1 mi swim, 27 mi bike, 5 mi run. I did a bit of running and stationary bike work to build up a base, and since then I'm 17 for 17 (havn't missed a workout yet) on the 16 week 2x week bike focused (3x bike) olympic plan from this site. I've lost 9 pounds since March 6, which is when I started seriously keeping my log again. I FEEL great (energized, bounce in my step, etc).

Ran 11 miles last night on one of those perfect evening runs (light breeze, no humidity, high 50's or maybe low 60's). It might as well have been a 5k. My legs complained the last mile or two, but not so much I couldn't tell them to shut up. It was a pure JOY - best run I can remember in a long time.

Also wanted to say thank you for this site. I can't say how much I have learned reading the forums, race reports, articles, logs, etc in the past few weeks (I've read back more than a year in most). Thank you for maintaining such a valuable resource, for keeping such an encouraging and positive climate, and for (from what I've seen) always being willing to offer [well reasoned, experience supported, emotionally sensitive, science backed] advice to anyone.

Looking forward to keeping you updated, asking advice, sharing my experiences (I do know a bit about running at least), and enjoying your comraderie as I strive along-side of you all towards whatever goal you are chasing. Hopefully, I'll even be standing next to a few of you in the water at DITR wondering how badly I'm going to get mauled on my first tri start. Not sure what color cap I'll be wearing (clydesdale or I might just sneak under 200).

Apologies for the long first post, and thanks if you've made it this far!
Josh



Edited by JoshKaptur 2007-04-04 8:47 AM