November 18, 2015November 18, 2015 Andrea

Occasional Adventures

Obviously, my post frequency has taken quite the hit with the onset of a 40+ hour work week. I’m getting settled in to a routine, though, and likewise, getting settled in to a rental house after being somewhat “nomadic” for a couple of months when I had to make the transition from living/working in the mountains to living/working in Denver, then dealing with moving and working a lot. It’s getting better, though.

First off, don’t forget- I’m selling a small Jet9 RDO. In order to be competitive with eBay pricing, I’m pricing it at $1900, shipped anywhere in the lower 48. It’s still in the box. I’ve only taken it out enough to snap a couple of pics of the color (slate/black/yellow).

As I alluded to in my last post, life now is days at Elevation Cycles in Highlands Ranch, riding when I can, and MMA classes a few days a week at the new (to me) gym. Weekend before last, the shop sponsored a work trip to Fruita. All three shops closed early on Saturday (and remained closed until Tuesday morning), and everyone rolled out to go west to the desert. Since I had Saturday off, I took full advantage and went to a jujitsu seminar with Andre Galvao.

It was a great day of learning. Also, I had the privilege of watching two people get black belt promotions (the two dudes on the outside of the pic below). It was emotional… in a room full of really tough athletes, there was hardly a dry eye.

Afterwards, I loaded up the Subaru and started my trip west (somewhere along the way, I rolled over 100k). The desert scenery and riding never disappoints. We rode the Lunch Loops and Ribbon trails on Sunday then Kokopelli on Monday. Dave- the service manager/mechanic in at the bench next to mine, who could be mistaken for my older brother based on riding style, proximity to gingerness, and general surliness, rode the drop in to Horsetheif.

I am the only woman between the three Elevation shops (other than the lady who does all the important stuff like paychecks and whatnot). I definitely put some pressure on myself to prove that I could keep up with the guys. I feel as though I was mostly successful in that.

Work itself has its expected high and low points. Example-

High point- geeking out over rehabbing a classic old Pinarello with Capagnolo Nuovo Record-

Low point- assembling a Speed Concept

It’s like trying to assemble Ikea furniture without an instruction manual.

Saturday, on my day off, I went up to 92Fifty to get the rest of my stuff out of the bike shop. I took the opportunity to go explore the nearby James Peak Wilderness area at the end of Rollins Pass road.

I’d passed the trailhead multiple times over the summer, and wanted to check out the snow and stuff. Hiking a trail in feet of packed-in snow was a lifetime first for me. I can’t wait to go back a little more prepared and hike up higher.

That’s about all of my adventures for now. I’m posting pretty regularly on Twitter and Instagram if you’re in to those things (links over on the right of this page). I mostly stay off of my personal facebook page. Facebook has become a shining example of how terrible, uncaring, and racist a lot of people are. I don’t want to waste my time confirming something I’ve suspected all along, so I quit really giving it much attention.

October 30, 2015October 30, 2015 Andrea

Work, MMA, and a Jet9 for Sale again!

Since my previous post, I’ve focused more on getting settled in to my new job and new house (signing a lease sometime next week to make it official. Woohoo!) With short days and cold nights, I haven’t been able to ride like I normally do. It’s going to take some re-adjusting to my new schedule in order to get back in to a routine where I’m able to keep some sort of fitness over the winter.

I did get out on Monday with Joe, the Rocky Mountain rep. He lives in the Ken Caryl area, which means he has access to the trails on the private Ken Caryl property.

Working at Elevation Cycles is good. Saying that my coworkers Dave and Brian are really good wrenches is somewhat of an understatement. I’d let them overhaul my bike before a race and not even check it over before I started. Also, the shop dog Ella is in love with Indy. She tries her best to get him to play, but since he’s 99% deaf and 85% blind, he just stares at her and shakes when she starts hopping around him and yipping. When he sleeps (most of the time), she comes back in to the work area to check in on him hourly.

The shop is closing early on Saturday the 7th and will be closed on the 8th & 9th for a trip to Moab. It’s pretty rad to be at a place where we get a most-expenses paid trip to go ride someplace rad. Since I’m off on Saturdays, I’m gonna leave early in the morning and get an extra ride between here and there.

Outside of work and riding, my winter “stay active while working a bunch” plan is to get back in to the gym for some MMA training. I’ve never been as fit and felt as good as when I trained MMA, and it’s something I can do after work on most days of the week. Tonight, I’ve got a first lesson/evaluation at this place: http://www.thetrainingcamp.net/

I’m funding my winter of MMA with one of these:

Yeah… so, when I was taking photos of scratches on my Jet for a potential eBay buyer, I found some small cracks in the seat tube. They’re sending out a warranty frame in the colorway pictured above. If you’re interested in a small slate and yellow frame new and in the box, I’ll sell you this one for $2,000, shipped to your door (they’re on Jenson USA right now for $2,300). I’m going to also put it on various online swap meets through facebook, but if it sits for a while, I’d consider other reasonable offers before I put it on eBay. Email me andrea at brickhouseracing.com if you’re interested.

March 3, 2015March 3, 2015 Andrea

Indoor Training

First off, I’m trying out a new WordPress theme. Comment here, on twitter, or on the Facebook page and let me know what you think.

Now, back to the weekend’s shenanigans.

Continuing my quest to maintain a healthy level of physical activity in the ongoing crap weather, I filled my weekend with various sorts of indoor activities. Riding was, again, an hour trainer ride with some intervals. That strategy seems to be doing a good job of maintaining my lactate threshold-related fitness level, and keeping to short and focused sessions makes them mentally bearable. Saturday afternoon, I went to an afternoon inversion workshop at Pike Yoga

Though I haven’t practiced inversions in at least a year, the core strength I’ve gained from MMA/Jiu Jitsu made it much easier to balance upside down compared to the last time I was practicing inversions regularly.

Afterwards, I went home and made some dinner and watched the UFC 184 PPV- Rousey vs. Zingano. If you haven’t read about/heard/watched, I’d suggest a quick google search… The fight was 14 seconds long. I have to admit, in my bike racing “career” of going-on 9 years, on more than one occasion, I’ve felt the same way as Cat Zingano at the end of her fight… there’s a big difference between doing your best but still getting beaten and outright losing via your own mistake(s). That’s when experience is more of a motherf$#!^r than a teacher.

P.S. If you’re a fight fan, I’d suggest finding a replay of Friday night’s Invicta FC11 Strawweight bout between Alexa Grasso (6-0) vs. Mizuki Inoue (8-3). It’s one of my favorite fights I’ve watched since the upset/title fight between Dillashaw & Barao.

Sunday morning, I woke up early and carpooled over to LDMA in Sherwood, Arkansas for an awesome Jiu Jitsu training day. It was a ton of fun to train with some other women who were similar in size and ability to myself. Highlight of the day… being told by a guy that my guard was “ridiculous.” (in an “I can’t get out of this” sort of way)

Quick lesson- if you have no idea what I’m talking about, look at these pictures. If you’re holding someone “in your guard,” you’re the person on your back, and the person between your legs is trying to get out, or “pass” your guard.

Between the yoga and the Jiu Jitsu, I felt wonderfully sore all over Monday morning. It’s been a long time since I felt that way, and I’ve missed the hell out of it. Today, I get to continue the cross-training with John and Matt. It’s been winter monsooning here, and the first local race of the season is scheduled for March 28th, so we’re going to go to the trail with shovels and drain any standing water so that it’s got a fighting chance of being dry enough for racing.

Up next? We’re under a winter storm warning tomorrow. Again.

February 17, 2015February 17, 2015 Andrea

Adventuring in the Covington Pike Bottoms

The weather in Memphis has been totally normal this week… that is to say, we rode in short sleeves on Saturday, and on Monday, we awoke to piles of sleet on the ground.

Sticking with our theme of being bored with the same trails (and knowing that since the weather was great on Saturday that those same trails would be packed), Matt and I struck out to explore what local cyclists call the “Epic” trails. More often, they’re referred to as the Covington Pike Bottoms, and they’re equally as popular for ATV pilots as our usual Shelby Farms trails are for runners, hikers, and cyclists. It’s basically a bunch of tracks through the woods along the south side of the Wolf River (and, as you venture westward, crossing to the north and continuing on towards the Mississippi). They stay incredibly muddy year round because of the ATV traffic, though when it hasn’t rained for a couple of weeks, you can pick your way around the bogs and have a pretty nice adventure.

As of Saturday, it was very slow going- the ratio of good riding to “picking around wheel-deep mudholes” was about equal. A summer drought is normally your best chance for a higher ratio of riding-to-bogging. We still had a good out and back adventure, though… occasionally stopping to watch ATV drivers and whatnot.

On the way back, we were stopped at a neighborhood trail entrance by the Memphis Police. More accurately, two cops were arresting ATV drivers as they emerged from the woods and into a neighborhood where the residents were fed up with loud, somewhat drunken jackasses going 50mph up the street and slinging mud all over the place. One cop told us to get on someplace else because they were going to go in and get more people out. We found a suitable detour, though, and stopped to make friends with people we met along the trail back to where we’d started.

As is customary for all weekend blog posts, we met with friends to watch the UFC Fight Night at El Toro Loco. Matt made a matching shirt buddy while Torian and I made fun of individuals who exemplified our respective racial stereotypes.

Sunday the weather transitioned from nice to arctic-ish. People battened down the hatches in preparation for a winter storm that would eventually dump several inches of sleet across Tennessee. We took an evening adventure to WalMart and speculated a purchase of a fatbike, but decided against it. It was an entertaining trip, nonetheless.

Screw the milk, bread, and batteries…

The storm system didn’t disappoint, if it was buckets of sleet you were dreaming about.

I was happy to have a chance to test out my all wheel drive vehicle

High quality entertainment right there.

I was tempted a couple of times to go ride, but ended up deciding against it because A) in order to not get hit by a stupid driver, you’d need to drive to a trail to ride, and B) it’s solid ice… not snow. It’d be like riding on a rutted hockey rink. I’ll stick to trainer rides and donut-ing my car in parking lots.

February 3, 2015February 3, 2015 Andrea

More Bikes and MMA!

Hey, another weekend of riding bikes and doing MMA stuff! I’m OK with this trend…

Matt and I struck out on a “typical” Wolf River Trail ride from the house on Saturday. The only modification we were going to make was a stop off at the U-Haul just off the north end of the trail in order to pick up the coffee mug I’d accidentally left in there earlier that week while they were installing the hitch receiver on the Impreza. After the pickup, we were going to head back south and follow the usual trails back home.

However, once said mug was tucked into Matt’s Osprey pack and we were re-entering the trail, we discovered a 4-wheeler trail continuing north. Sense of adventure kicked in, and we began following it into the unknown. I don’t think that anyone in the general public knows who owns the woods immediately adjacent to the Wolf River, but given the lack of policing of ATV traffic in the area, I don’t think anyone cares. It’s one of those good/bad things about this city- we get the opportunity to go on these sorts of adventures, which is good and exciting. However, the opportunity exists because no one “cares” about that part of town, and the police in the area are far too busy taking care of the (frequent) “real” crimes in the area to worry about trespassers in the woods.

It’s definitely not a place you’d go alone.

We ventured out as far as we could, given our time constraint. We needed to be back at the house in time to finish prepping for some friends to come over and watch the UFC 183 Pay Per View at the house. We’d talked earlier in the week about meeting at a sports bar, but I’d then decided to say “eff it” and buy the event to avoid the crowds and crappy service. It turned out to be an excellent choice.

Because, at Buffalo Wild Wings, there’s not enough room to imitate Nick Diaz during round one:

You also don’t have couches, blankets, and a chair that’s usable as workout equipment:

Sunday morning, I awoke to rain. Steady buckets of rain. For reasons only known within the depths of my brain, I felt like suffering. So, I went out on my cyclocross bike and did a 20 minute power test in the rain.

The power test was alright. I needed the baseline if I am to start adding in some structure to my workouts. It wasn’t my best by far, but also not my worst February 1st numbers, either. The suffering part? Well, it ended up being too warm to suffer. Other than feeling a bit muggy in my jacket while I was going full-gas, I was pretty comfortable.

Suffering, denied.

Later in the afternoon, Matt and I went to watch Torian (from the previous night’s antics) test for his jiujitsu rank. I’d never watched such a thing, so it was interesting to get a feel for how it works (though, according to John, everyone who is capable of ranking/promoting students is different).

That night, we hung with much of the same crew for a Superbowl party. Also, I rallied the Impreza through some wet gravel in John’s neighborhood, which, though the game and company were good, may have been slightly more exciting. I can’t decide if I should wash the mud off or not. It kinda looks more natural with the dirt splatters all over the front end/windshield.

January 28, 2015January 28, 2015 Andrea

A Week of Random Things

First things first… remember back in November when tendinitis put a halt to my winter running aspirations? Well, the patellofemoral pain never fully went away. Luckily, it didn’t really hurt when I rode, so I just kept waiting for it to go all the way away so that I could get back to my usual crosstraining with some weights, plyometrics, and kickboxing. When it wouldn’t leave, I finally went to Campbell Clinic and was put under the care of of PT who found a whole heard of trigger points in my left quadriceps. So, between using an anti-inflammatory cream, a knee brace, some manual therapy (basically the PT uses her thumbs to break the knots apart), dry needling, taping, and the foam roller at home, the trigger points and the pain have subsided drastically. I’ve been instructed to test it out this week with something that’d normally hurt, so I’m going to a kickboxing class this afternoon (includes a little running and some other ballistic-type movement that was keeping me from kickboxing before). Fingers crossed.

Along the lines of training, nothing of much interest is happening on the bike. It rained some, so I have stayed off the trails, which means I’ve been isolated to short “linking together little bits of gravel” rides or the trainer. If you haven’t followed along on Twitter and Instagram, Roommate/JRA Co-host Matt determined that when you ride the trainer and don’t post a picture on social media that God makes another armadillo. So, if you ride indoors, be sure to post a pic/video with the hashtag #onelessarmadillo.

In random “around my house” news, I installed two new valves and a new faucet in my kitchen last week. The old hot water valve was broken and a little leaky, and I decided I’d go ahead and replace the cold water valve while I was down there with the water turned off.

I find plumbing to be very much like working on a bike with Campy. No one ever taught me specifically how to do it, but as long as you understand the basic mechanics and you have some decent instructions, it’s easy to figure out. My biggest issue was other residents of the house coming by and futzing with the new faucet parts while I was waist deep under the counter… No, I don’t know where that hose is going to go because A)I’m under the counter and can’t even see what hose you’re talking about, and B) STOP F*&#KING WITH IT.

They got the point pretty quickly, and the new stuff is pretty pimp.

Saturday, at the gym, Eric (Ingram’s Martial Arts) had invited a school from Arkansas to come and train with us. It was tons of fun, and I was thoroughly exhausted when we were finished.

Bonus pics of Eric’s puppy Rory:

Saturday night, I helped Matt build a ramp and did my best to relax and recover from the day’s activities:

Then there was the random impulse buy at Target the other day…

He’s actually pretty OK with it. I can’t really lead him anywhere, but he seems to cautiously enjoy wandering around the back porch and using the house as a spot to scratch his face.

If I get out and ride some this afternoon, I might post again later this week about these:

I actually rode them once on the trail last week before the rain came in, but I want to get a little more time on them before I’m like, “OMG THESE ARE THE BEST WHEELS EVER”

December 23, 2014 Andrea

Cresting the Hump

Sorry for the lack of posts lately, but I’m trying to maintain a balance of “awesome stuff” and “everyday life is a struggle.” It’s been a quiet handful of days since my last Arkansas adventure. Mostly because the weather has been cloudy and a consistent 40 something and either drizzling or 70-80% humidity. Also, the level of crazy expressed by drivers with the advent of the holiday season has reached a fever pitch. I can’t fully comprehend why people do this in the name of what’s supposed to be a religious holiday. Seriously… all the obligations, putting themselves in debt, under stress, and into fits of shopping and road rage, and seemingly losing sight of what it is they’re supposed to be celebrating in the first place. It’s nuttier than the amazing fruitcakes I baked last week.

Stevil Kinevil says it best in his recent post on All Hail the Black Market

Now that the “struggle” part is out of the way, on to the good stuff- I found some sanity in a new yoga studio that opened back just before Thanksgiving. Pike Yoga is just about perfect- a 10 minute drive from my house, and classes that work well with both my daily schedule and my training schedule (not everything is “level 8 kick-your-butt-vinyasa”). I’ve been going to yoga on most weekdays since they opened, and it’s definitely made a difference in both my physical and mental health.

I’ve also been having a great time learning the gi in jiu jitsu class. I’ve had a bunch of people ask if I want to fight again, and the answer is a definite yes. The biggest setback I’ve had in getting back to training is the nagging patellar tendinitis in my left knee brought on by my failed attempt at off-season running. It keeps rearing its ugly head every time I jump or bounce on my left leg… a movement that’s very necessary for right-leg kicking and any sort of plyometric conditioning.

The combination of yoga, jiujitsu, and getting in rides when I can is keeping me sane until I can get over the December 25th mountain and make it to the cabin, where I plan on cocooning myself in miles of rocks and woods and emerging a badass, fitter, tougher, and more skilled butterfly on the other side. I’ll probably go for a road ride with The Matts (McCulley and Robbins) tomorrow. It’ll be my 3rd one since having repeated scary driver run-ins just after my trip to Colorado in the summer (those basically brought back the post car-hit panic attacks that had become very few and far between). It makes a huge difference that I’ve got some good friends and a bike that I can’t help but fall in love with a little more every time I ride it.

Time to stand and hammer up the crux.

December 8, 2014December 8, 2014 Andrea

Easy Days in the Woods

Late last week, I opened up a “make new blog post” window and then didn’t have anything to say. About the only fun thing and interesting that went on last week was that I started learning the gi in Jiu Jitsu. Prior to that, everything I’d learned was based on Jiu Jitsu that’s useful in MMA, when you’re not wearing a robe that serves as a million different handles for you or your opponent to grab onto, and when it’s generally acceptable to hammerfist your opponent in the face from mount. The new instructor, Eric Ingram, is excellent, and his wife, Anna, is also a somewhat experienced white belt, so of course, she and I got pretty buck on Thursday night…

I borrowed a gi for the two classes last week, then ordered one of my own. It’s got phoenixes on it, and they’re purple, so I basically had to get it… Tatami Phoenix Gi

Friday, it rained nearly all day. I decided to warm myself up with a kickboxing class in the afternoon. I’ve been laying off of any sort of ballistic training (running, jumping, etc) since the onset of both patellar and posterior tibal tendinitis a few weeks ago during my last training run. It doesn’t really hurt as long as I’m not bouncing around on it. Kickboxing is a good test for knee and ankle pain because, while bouncing on my left leg is a necessity for throwing a rear leg round kick, there are a lot of other things I can do that don’t involve rear leg roundkicks. So, it’s great indoor exercise on days like Friday. I just want everything on my left side to hurry and get healed up so I can get back into some more strenuous work.

Saturday and Sunday were reserved for exploring the woods on cyclocross bikes. The trails were way wet, so Matt and I drove out to Shelby Forest on Saturday and the Collierville Wolf River Greenway on Sunday to get in some low-intensity saddle time and enjoy the scenery.

Shelby Forest paved-ish bike path:

Wolf River Greenway:

Afterward, we checked out a new “fancy Asian fusion” buffet near the house. I give it a solid “meh” review. It’s not much different than other buffets in that its full of nearly stale food and everything tastes like it’s fried in yesterday’s oil. The sushi is a little dried out, too. The place is huge, and I totally missed that it had a Mongolian BBQ section until after I’d already eaten a plate full of regular buffet food. I’d like to go back sometime in the future and try the fresh-cooked option.

Later, a friend from the gym came over to pick his new (to him) bike up from the house. Matt and I sold him a few parts and put it together for him as the rest of the pieces filtered in from the internet and surrounding bike shops.

Back to my original thought… this week may actually be a two (or more!) post week since, on Saturday, I also purchased a pair of Shimano M200 shoes. They’re billed as “enduro” shoes, which I don’t really care about one way or the other. I do, however, like the idea of something that’s stiff enough for hammer time, yet also more comfortable than a traditional XC-oriented shoe for getting off the bike and walking on rocks and on other steep isht. I rode in them yesterday, and I plan on talking about them a bit on Just Riding Along tonight as well as posting a few pictures and initial thoughts on here once I’ve ridden them a little more.

December 2, 2014December 2, 2014 Andrea

The Long Weekend

Since my family acquired a cabin near the Syllamo Trails, I’ve been going over there for Thanksgiving. The past two years, it’s been a family event, with one or more relatives coming to visit. I decided to take Turbo this year since she’s been fighting off pneumonia for the past two months and the extra exercise of being able to trot around and pretend to chase deer (there’s not much real “chase” when you’re a large 13-year-old dog) is good to help clear her lungs. On Wednesday, I took her to a small local bakery/grooming shop called Woof Gang Bakery where they offer self-service baths/blowdry. She loves the attention…

Speaking of dogs… look how cute these two are:

Also on Wednesday, I made the best green bean casserole, ever. I love it when I find a recipe like this one that’s been bastardized by pre-made/canned food and take it back to the basics to remind everyone that even a casserole can taste like actual food and not just salty mush.

Thursday morning, Ryan and I left early so we’d make it to the cabin for lunch festivities. Everything was pretty delicious, though I refrained from gorging too much because we planned on squeezing in a post-lunch ride that afternoon. Not long ago, a professional work crew cleared the entire 13-ish mile Red Trail, and, even though it’s not my favorite one in the system, I hadn’t ridden it in more than a couple of years because it’s continually been in bad condition. Other than a couple of branches and lots of leaves, it’s now super open and nice. We also checked out the Yellow trail on the non-trailhead side of Green Mountain Rd. between the Red trail Trailhead and the Yellow/Blue Trailhead. Half of it was clear and open like the Red Trail, and the other half is thorny with several trees down.

Thursday night brought about my newest Thanksgiving tradition- an obnoxiously large and difficult puzzle. This one was particularly terrible because the photo used for the puzzle is mostly out of focus.

Spoiler alert- we never finished it.

Friday, I wanted to ride a potential Enduro course. Details are mostly a secret, though I will say the transition climbing is going to kill the shuttle-runners off with a quickness. It’s very scenic, though.

Sunday, we attempted to ride the “hard” part of the Yellow Trail from the middle Green Mountain Trailhead going clockwise (reverse race direction). It still has some overgrown spots- especially in the logged-off areas (of course) and a pretty steady amount of downed trees. However, the rock gardens are in prime condition. Ryan wasn’t enjoying the looseness of the leaves and marble-y gravel beneath them, so we ended up bailing off at a logging road just after the Overlook.

We extended our ride on the nearby gravel roads and checked out the scenery at the bottom of Sandy Flat before heading back to the cabin to eat and pack up for home. Conclusion? The trails are about 85% awesome right now. The more traffic they get, the more the leaves will be unfluffed, and the better they’ll ride. If you’re on the fence about going to Syllamo because of past conditions, I’d say it’s worth the trip.

Sunday, I wanted to get in another good ride back in Memphis. The weather was super nice, with highs somewhere up in the 60’s for much of the day. Since it hadn’t rained in a while, Matt and I decided to try checking out the “Epic” trails- a sort-of system of 4×4 trails that winds through the narrow strip of woods between the Wolf River and Interstate 40 across most of the length of Memphis. Because of the neighborhoods it crosses, it’s not a place to go alone, and there are mudholes there that could swallow a jeep, however, when it’s in good shape, it’s a lot of fun to explore as long as you know what you’re getting in to.

Along the way-

We found out very quickly that it was way too muddy. We probably should have taken a hint from this guy, who we found stuck in a hole near the beginning of the trail-

My tires clogged with muck within a mile, and both wheels couldn’t turn. Our adventure thwarted, we turned around and hiked out. Lots of other people were out enjoying the mud and nice weather, so we had some entertainment along the way back.

I recorded a little video:

http://youtu.be/mkMdeDbWneM

Our bikes were pretty trashed in a short period of time, so we rode back home and, following a little errand-running, drank just enough alcohol that playing “you be jab, I’ll be cross” with my boxing gloves and later “trade leg kicks” sounded like a good idea. Ryan didn’t participate, and, lo & behold, he was the only person in the house not walking with a slight limp on Monday morning.

Now, it’s back to the grind for the time being… mostly. There’s currently another Syllamo trip in the planning stages. I’m also about to have a bit of a change in my MMA training. Since my fight back in July, John and I have been training a little on Tuesday and Thursday mornings. However, since the building that Ingram’s Martial Arts was in is being taken over by another lessee, they’re moving their classes to UFK, and I’ll be starting in with them tonight. It’s slightly uncomfortable to be the “new kid,” but I’m pretty sure it’ll turn out just fine.

November 18, 2014 Andrea

Change of Plans

Well, when I started my marathon training last month, I said that my main goal would be to increase my volume at just the right rate to both be prepared and uninjured. Saturday, I went out to the Wolf River trails (pretty flat, pretty smooth) to do my weekly “long run” of 13.5 miles. When I started warming up, my left ankle and knee were kinda achy, but it mostly went away after a mile or two. I finished my run, cooled down, and drove home, only to find that after sitting in the car for 5-10 minutes, the same slight pains I’d felt warming up were now nearly crippling.

I took a couple of days off, and now I can walk and go up stairs with no pain. However, running and going down stairs are left-side torture. At first, I was thinking it’d be a job for ibuprofen, ice, and KT Tape. However, once I started looking in to KT taping for medial ankle pain, I found out that the pain- likely caused by tibialis posterior tendinitis, wasn’t something I should be training through for something as un-serious as an offseason marathon.

Of course, I immediately took to becoming an internet expert on it.

The odd thing seems to be that, though one of my feet is slightly flatter than the other, the injury is not on the flat side (it’s usually associated with lots of overpronation & fallen arches). The good news is, mine is relatively minor at this point. I can still stand on my toes and balance on that foot. However, if I want it to go away, I need to not piss it off any more and do some rehab exercises… all of which I’m still too sore to do at this point, according to the instructions.

So, my marathon status is very unsure at this point. I’m basically going to be forced back on to the bike for any endurance exercise. That won’t be unbearable, except for the fact that it’s really freaking cold outside. Also, I’ve developed a nearly crippling fear of drivers. I have this terrible mental picture of how much people want to kill me when they see me riding a bike on the road. It’s terrifying. Cars are huge and terrifying, and the people who control them are totally tuned out and self absorbed. I don’t know how I’m going to deal with it. For now, I’ll likely be taking the unfinished greenline to the nearby trail system in order to avoid nearly all roads.

In the meantime, I’m definitely getting the fight bug again. I ended up not going to the proposed grappling tournament over the weekend because of schedule conflicts with training buddies John and Aaron. Oh yeah, and it’s probably worth noting that a couple of weeks ago, the nice girl who gave me free rhinoplasy back in July won against her next opponent via first round TKO. She no longer has the losing record as she did when we’d first picked her as a potential opponent. I have to say… good work on her part. If you read the comments section on most of her old fight videos, there are some really mean people saying mean things about how she should just give it up. Ryan was at his Marx-Bensdorf team party Saturday and was asked by a couple of his teammates as to whether or not I’d fight again. Of course I will… why not?

In other non-cycling, non-MMA news, I’m super excited that a yoga studio (Pike Yoga) opened not too far from me- less than a 15 minute drive. Their schedule is nice, and includes plenty of classes that are somewhat “easy,” which is nice when all of your other physical activity is “hard.” They’re offering free yoga until Thanksgiving, too, so, for now, I’m going to take full advantage of it. I need both the physical benefits and the inner peace at this point.