2008.02.22

On Friday night, at Wright State University, in the midst of the Adventure Summit, Mini-Omega and I participated in an indoor triathlon. The event ran pretty smoothly. The people (especially Susie) at Up an Running did a fantastic job. Now, I will begin my whine...

We started with the swim. We only had to swim 250 yards. To give you an idea of how far 250 yards is; in most pools, the lanes are 25 yards. So, we did ten laps or five trips down and back. Are you confused? Well, math in public schools is pretty crappy. Don't blame me. Blame your teachers.

Anyway, our goal was to finish the swim in under 10-minutes. I finished the swim in 6-minutes and some change. MO finished the swim in under 8-minutes. At this point, we were stoked. We were excited to have met our first goal.

I need to stop for a moment. Most of my life I have had really oily skin. Sorry to gross you out. In the past year or so, my skin has dried out. For the first time in my life I actually need chapstick. I actually need to use lotion.

Last week, I was tying my 2-year-old daughters shoe and the tip of my index finger split open. Simply sliding my finger on shoelaces was enough to cause a blood rush.

Swimming in the chlorinated pool water was a bit rough. It felt like there were a million pigmies with straws trying to suck fluid from my skin. After we got out of the pool, it felt like my body was wrapped in cellophane (the plastic wrap on DVDs and other commercial goods). Bizarre.

Next up was the run. I figured MO would beat me on the run. MO (9-years-old) always puts in enough energy to beat me in distance races. His goal for the 2-mile run was to beat 18-minutes. My goal was to beat 20-minutes. After the pool sucked all of the moisture out of my body and then coated/sealed my skin "breaking" a sweat took on new meaning. It felt like sweat was trying to escape my body, but it could not find a path out. Finally, about halfway through the run, the floodgates open and sweat poured from body. MO did a great job, he finished in 18:17. He didn't quite reach his goal, but he did well. I finished in about 19-minutes.

We finished on a stationary bike. During good weather, I like to ride my bike. Several times last year, I rode my bike from home to football practice. From my house to the field is roughly 8-miles each way. For the triathlon, we were to ride 6-miles. No problem.

There was a problem. We all had to ride at the same resistance. The resistance level was incredibly low. I mean really low. It was so low that, 9-year-old, MO wanted to increase the resistance. He weighs 90 pounds and it was too easy for him. I weigh 220 pounds.

We had hoped to finish the 6-mile bike in under 18-minutes. That goal quickly went out the window. We had to generate a lot of RPMs to travel any distance what so ever. I tried to keep my RPMs in the 120s to 130s. To accomplish that; I was bouncing all over the place.

For the uninitiated, bike seats aren't what they used to be. Bike seats tend to be rough. I hurt so badly after the ride, it feels my butt used a steel fence post as a pogo stick.

I finished the 6-miles in around 21-minutes. MO finished in around 28-minutes. The bike was a time assassin. The bike was Lee Harvey Oswald to my JFK. (What? Too soon?)

Sitting down is not a pleasurable experience. I am in pain, a lot of pain.

On the plus side, we are doing another indoor triathlon this coming weekend.