Life is Good...Pics from Age Group Nationals

Life is Good...Mrs. G's Office

Life is Good..94 miles

It all started early this morning. I pulled out of the Brownell Travel parking lot alone this morning on my bike at 4:55 am. Its peaceful to ride so early. All the late night owls have gone to sleep but the early risers have not risen. In almost an hour of riding I saw only 3 cars. At 6 am I was back at Brownell to meet a group of about 40 riders. The 70 mile route started out at a slow pace, catching up with friends and how they spent, or survived, their weeks. The pace picked up as we meandered along, through Mountain Brook, Irondale, Leeds, Camp Winnataska, Moody, Cook Springs, Brompton, Vandiver, over Double Oak Mountain on HWY 25, Dunnavant, and back into Leeds. Through the country we saw aggressive dogs, passive dogs, cows, goats, horses, and too many churches to count. The group had narrowed to five as we came back through Leeds and up Cemetery Hill on HWY 78, back towards Irondale. At 10:30, 87 miles later, I racked the bike and 3 of us headed out for a 7 mile run. It was hot. It was painful. It was lovely. The workout ended shorty before noon. Not quite 140.6, but closer than I've ever been.

A few hours and a few beers later we're taking it easy. Mrs. G. is grading papers. Teaching continues to be a challenge. They are lucky she's not getting paid by the hour.

A 15 mile run is posted on the schedule for tomorrow. The legs will be heavy, but I'll make it.

JG

Life is Good...Age Group Nationals

Earlier this year I qualified to participate in the Olympic Distance Triathlon Age Group National Championships. Under normal circumstances I probably would not have done the race, but this year it happened to be in Tuscaloosa. Last year it was in Oregon. We went up with a few friends last Friday to get checked in. The competitors all had 0% body fat and shaved legs.

I new I was in trouble when we ran into 2008 U.S. triathlon Olympian Matty Reid at dinner.

The swim was in the Black Warrior River. Because of large amounts of rain last week the damn was open. Two thirds of the almost 1 mile swim was upstream against strong current. It took me about 14 minutes longer than planned.

The bike course was comical. I've never been passed by so many people. Men, women, old, young, big, small. They were all fast.

For the 10k run, which was hilly I average a 7:07 per mile pace and came in just over 44 minutes. I raced way above my expectations but only finished 63 out 86 people in the 25-29 year old age group. I didn't qualify for the World Championships, which are somewhere in Europe. Its probably a good thing because my dumb ass would have probably gone.

All in all a good, but humbling experience.

JG

Life is Good.....Tired

Its 7:56 and we are going to bed. The workouts have been pretty intense this week. I wake up at 4:10 and run every morning before work. In the evening I usually do some combination of swimming, biking, or running. I bailed on the p.m. Thursday tri workout this afternoon. Just couldn't do it. I was getting gas after work and forgot what I was doing and started to drive off while the gas was still pumping. Some nice man starting screaming at me. At this point I decided I was too tired for 2.5 hours of strenuous physical activity and came straight home and passed out in my chair.

Ironman Florida is 10 weeks away.

Life is Good...Have You Seen This Person?

Who is this person pictured above? Its Mrs. G. of course.

Katie is completing her third week as a 9th & 10th grade English teacher. You may not have seen or heard much from her lately. I can report that it appears she's doing a great job. Its hard to believe how much work it takes to be a good teacher. I have never seen someone work so hard or so much at anything. Her new career makes training for an Ironman look like a leisurely stroll through the park. Up at 4 a.m. At work by 6:00. Leave work 12 hours later at 6:00. Eat dinner. Work 'til bedtime.

They say it gets easier after the first year. I managed to sneak her out for a four mile run this evening, which was lovely.

Keep up the hard work babe. Remember that these folks will be running the country when we are old folks.

JG

Coffee's Ready

I had a great weekend and want to do a more detailed post later . . . although I'm not sure that will come to fruition. We had a great time @ the Mtn. Lakes Tri this weekend. My relay team placed 1st--PowerSpouses + 1 and our other team member J.E. who went this one alone conquered the course and landed on the podium! Saturday night we celebrated the "end" of tri season (although J. and I have one more--Augusta). Big shout-out to Bob who completed this as his second tri ever!



M. and I had a fantastic 10-miler to kick off the Memphis training. I'm glad I've got her here this time around. As busy as I am right now I need that accountability.

I'm another 12-hour day in and not through. I just brewed a pot of coffee and have my "office" set up in the living room. I anticipate I'll spend the next 4-5 hours tonight working away. At the end of the day I learned that I had a homebound student and a handful of students who are going to start the year off in alternative school (seriously???!!). Catch is that I have to have all of their materials pulled together (all neat and finalized) so that I can get it to them by 1 p.m. tomorrow. So tonight I have to do a solid three weeks of planning.

On the upside, we learned that the high school grad exam is going to be dropped . . . something we were going to have to spend almost an hour each week of instructional time studying. Students will now, instead, take the ACT. Fewer standardized tests means more class time and less redundancy. YEAH!!!

So . . . I'm off to planning short stories, lessons about capitalization and punctuation, narrative writing, and parts of speech. Who said teachers have great hours????

And here are some pics of the classroom I share:





Coffee's ready.

Happy Anniversary--Six Years

This time last year (click here),we were just getting into all of this fun stuff. Life has changed a good bit since that post as well but we're just enjoying life even more. Who knows what this next year together will bring!


Love you babe!

KG

Fake it Till You Make It

Just a quick blog to update you before I run out the door to get to work on time--no more sleeping in for this late-riser.

Parents night went GREAT!! I was fearless--and actually had a really good time. Although I hated having to move from room to room and shuffle my things around with only 3 minutes in between class changes. There will be 8 minutes between blocks so I'm hoping moving from room to room when the kids are there will be a little better.

After two 12-hour days I'm headed back for another. I sense a trend. And I think for the first time I'm actually going to have to establish some really clear home/work boundaries because I seriously could work continuously on this stuff.

My desk is all set up (in my corner of a room) and I love it. I'll post some pics this weekend. The teacher I share a room with is GREAT--and it's her first year too. There are four girls on our end of the hall who go to UAB. It's a good environment with friendly people. And of the kids and parents that I have met, I can honestly say that I'm really looking forward to working with them. The freshmen that were there last night looked like deer in headlights. I had forgotten how scary that transition is from middle to high school.

On other fronts--Mtn. Lakes is this weekend!! I haven't swum/swam since Chattanooga--but it's only 600 yards. I just can't drown since the relayers are counting on me. We're racing with B-Rad's daughter this time around and we're stoked to have her on our team (PowerSpouses + 1). Our runner relayer from the original PowerSpouses team is heading off on her own to conquer the WHOLE course. Good luck J. E.!!

It's gonna be a fun weekend--hopefully relaxing. AND of course . . . marathon training kick off!!! T - 17 weeks to Memphis (give or take a bit). Are you ready Meg??

TGIF! Hope everyone has a safe and enjoyable weekend--the last weekend before school starts (yikes!).

KG

Life is Good...as the training continues

We've passed the mid-point of triathlon season and the 36 week Ironman Florida training program. At this point it seems that the schedule calls for a morning and afternoon workout everyday. The once rare 4:10 am alarm buzzer is now a daily event. Although it continues to get more demanding, I continue to enjoy it more and more. I've got great people to train with. Very few of my workouts are done alone. It seems like the number of people showing up for the Thursday and weekend workouts grows every week. None of us would have ever imagined that the group would multiply so fast, but we all love seeing new faces.

On Saturday we'll all be participating in the Mountain Lakes Triathlon in Guntersville. We've got 5 first timers and one first time leg shaver (not me of course). B-rad got a bunch of shirts printed for everyone. They're grey and say "MAS" on the front. It should be a great event. I'm hoping the Power Spouses +1 reach the podium again so I can steal some of Katie's prizes.

After Mountain Lakes we've got one weekend off before Age Group Nationals, which are being held on the 2008 Olympic Trials course in Tuscaloosa. This should be a humbling experience with pretty stiff competition.

In late September we'll be traveling to Augusta, GA for the Augusta Half Ironman 70.3. This will be Katie's first half Ironman. She's been making great progress on the bike, which has been her least favorite of the three disciplines until recently. She even had fun on our last ride, which was a pretty tough 40 miler. I think she'll do great.

13.5 weeks until the Ironman!!

JG

Weekend Wrap-Up

Had a great 40-mile ride, my syallabus is ready, all my materials are pulled together, and the weekend was, in general, a lot of fun--full of work, play, and friends! Now I'm off to new teacher orientation . . . to learn about discipline plans, curriculum changes, testing procedures, and more.

Tonight I hope to get in my long run that I missed yesterday (just 8 miles--so I guess it's a shortish long run). Because I'll have to be at work by 6:30 (and I have a 30-minute commute to school) I do not think I'll be able to be a morning workout person. I'll just plan on taking my work-out bag with me to work so I can hit the J. or run after school. Works hours from 6:30-3:30 aren't too bad . . . will have most of the afternoon to get in a workout.

Hope you all have a Happy Monday! (And a special shout-out to M. today--her first day on the job as an official TBICU nurse :o)