13 days to go and I have collected $5112!

"If God invented marathons to keep people from doing anything more stupid, triathlon must have taken Him completely by surprise."
P. Z. Pearce

Today, while packing my bike to be shipped to California, I actually heard about a, possibly, crazier event. It is 3 days of triathlons. The first day is a sprint distance triathlon. The second day is two Olympic distance triathlons (32 miles each). One in the morning and one in the afternoon. The third day is a half-ironman triathlon (70 miles). The guy I talked to was planning to race all four. Crazy? You tell me!

Wildflower is just around the corner and, man, has this been an eventful week! It all started friday a week ago when I received a summons in the mail to appear for jury duty this tuesday, 4/22. This is not something you can just ignore. I immediately saw my plans for Wildflower going straight down the drain. I started thinking about a plan "B". I promised to complete a half-ironman for all my wonderful donors and, by golly, I am going to complete a half-ironman - even if it ends up being the Cleveland triathlon in August instead of Wildflower in May. Well, I may still sign up for the Cleveland triathlon but I WILL be going to Wildflower afterall, thanks to an understanding judge.

Early tuesday, while I was waiting for word from the judge about my jury summons, I went for my third 13 mile run while in south Florida. The run went well and I felt like I was recovering nicely so I ran 3 miles the next morning and 5 miles the morning after that, Thursday. Well, the 5 mile run was a little more than my legs were ready for. And my left quad let me know it in no uncertain terms. Seems like bicycling, not running, is the best way for me to recover from a long run. Anyway, the best I could handle on friday was a 3 mile walk.

In the mean time I got word on Wednesday that my oldest daughter had gone into labor with my third grandchild, a boy, Evan Louis. Mother, father, and new son are all doing just fine. She left work at 3PM and Evan was born at 7PM, just 4 hours later!

Yesterday, back home in Mentor, I got together very early in the morning with some of my half-ironman wildflower teammates for a 56 mile bike ride. We were riding in the Cuyahoga valley on a beautiful, warm spring day. The ride included a number of sizeable hills which were good training for the Wildflower course. My left quad, still a little injured from the long run early in the week did not give my much trouble at all but I had to beg off on the run (after the ride) because I was afraid of doing more damage. That's now looking like a very good decision because an easy 12 mile bike this morning has me almost fully recovered from yesterday's long ride and my left quad is feeling pretty good. Although, I do think I detect a touch of tendonitis in the back of my left knee. Better get the ice pack!

As I said, it has been a VERY eventful week.