Superbowl Pool

Still have some Football Squares up for grabs! If you are interested just scroll down a few blog entries and you will find all the details listed. Or you may just contact me directly at 301-643-2568

A NOTE FROM COACH DAVE *MENTAL FORTITUDE*

Greetings Ironteam,

This is the first in a series of email messages you will receive on the mental aspects of racing Ironman distance triathlon.
Often we hear that triathlon is three disciplines (1) Swim, (2) Bike & (3) Run. Then we begin to peel the onion another layer and discover the fourth discipline (4) Nutrition. Rarely do we peel the onion any further because that will make us cry. What is crying anyway? It is an emotion. Under the right circumstances and in a controlled situation, crying comes in handy. Have you ever cried your way out of a jam with your parents when you were young? Did you ever cry your way out of a ticket when you got caught speeding? Over the next several weeks we will peel that onion and discover our powers of control and learn techniques to balance our emotional response mechanism in our favor, not only for race day, but for everyday life too. Welcome to the fifth discipline, (5) Mental Fortitude.
From the American Heritage Dictionary - for·ti·tude (fôr'tĭ-tōōd', -tyōōd') n. - Strength of mind that allows one to endure pain or adversity with courage.
Yes, Pain and adversity. Before you know it, these two will be your swim buddies, your cycling companions and running partners for 140.6 miles. Wouldn’t you rather run with friends than adversaries? So would I.
Congratulations on your accomplishments over the past few months. Your coaches, captains and mentors as so very proud of you and your progress. Can you believe we have been at this for eleven weeks now! Come Ironman day, the cold water of Lake Del Valle and Treasure Island, the long workouts you have under your belt already and those to come will be but a memory, stored in your subconscious for recall when the going gets tough. If you have not already, you will soon have a moment of clarity, much like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, that you simply “aren’t in Kansas anymore” and things are a bit fuzzy. Welcome to Ironman, please take your seat, fasten your seatbelt and prepare for the ride of your life!
We have all heard the cliché phrases of our time like “When the going gets tough, the tough get going” or “If it doesn’t kill you, it makes you stronger” but those simply don’t cover the incredible array of emotions an endurance athlete feels in a given week, let alone an entire season. And, yes, each of you is an endurance athlete! Say it with us; I AM AN ENDURANCE ATHLETE. Pretty cool huh?
The first step of just about every time-tested progressive improvement plan is to come clean and admit that everything is not a bed of roses. And in our case, we need to start with the acknowledgement that the task ahead is hard and the journey will be difficult. In my tenure with Ironteam I have often repeated to athletes that we are training for Ironman, not Plasticman, and I mean that in a very literal way. Strike a match under a plastic spoon. Watch it curl up and see the plume of acrid black smoke that rises into a toxic cloud above you. Strike a match under an steel fork, forged from Iron, and you see it will begin to glow are vibrant orange yet keep it’s shape. In fact Iron is hardened by flame.
So here’s the “meat” of today’s message. I want each of you to spend the remainder of the week thinking hard during your workouts. I want you to focus all your mental energy for at least an hour this week on one thing. What is that one thing? Well, it’s your “One thing”, not mine so I can’t tell you. It’s your personal mantra that takes you to your “happy place”, reducing your stress and re-engaging you in the mind-body ballet called Ironman training.

Olympic Distance Tri-Louie Tri

Well I did it... I sure didnt feel like a "stud" or even look like one. That's what my teammate Amy calls us for braving the cold Bay waters. The mantra "I'm a stud, I'm a stud" never came to me.. i was too cold and all thought processes went out the window. I had to force my face to stay in the water submerged so that eventually it would get numb.. and eventually it did. At first my face hurt and just on my forehead it felt like a brain freeze... ouch!
We were supposed to do 3 laps around the bouys in the water. I managed to only make it 2x around.. not that i didnt want to try. They kept asking me if I wanted to stop and even thought it was best. I was basically holding the kayakers up.. and the coaches wanted me to finish with the swim aspect and start the bike and run. Besides being so slow.. I was also dealing with being sea sick. The Bay water was generally calm at the start of the swim but the winds picked up and then things started getting rocky. Besides the fact that I hate being cold.. the next most hated thing is feeling nauseated. I absolutely hate it.. and i get car sick easily too... blayaak! I actually was hoping and trying to make myself vomit but its difficult to do while floating in the water.
The next phase was bike...I was all ready to just hop on the bike but I was shivering so badly from being so cold that i looked like i was having seizures. The coaches wouldnt let me get on the bike at first.. I was grouped hugged (not complaining there), then wrapped in blankets and forced into a heated car.. oh and also given chicken broth that just wanted to make me hurl. Just plain hot water would of been fine. Eventually i was aloud back on the bike and to start the course. It seemed like eternity.. i think it was about 15-20 min or so... All i kept thinking was that i needed to stop shivering so i could get started. I didnt want to be the absolute last one out there.. no matter what... yes im a little competitive.. but more so with myself. I always try to push myself to do more than I think I can.. which can be a bad thing or a good thing.
I guess I made up time on the bike and run.. I caught a few people and managed to finish strong. People said they were happy to see me on the run because i was smiling the entire time.... the reason for that was that I was so DAMN HAPPY to be on land and not in the water.
Overall it was a good day.. we had great weather.. everyone was so supportive of each other, relentless and strong.. I admired everyone and how they pushed through.. I just wished i could of or was allowed to push through the swim... but im not upset about it. I realize its a process and eventually i will get there... WE ALL WILL GET THERE... because WE ARE IRON. Wish you could of shared the experience of the day. I was very fortunate to have 8 of my closest friends and proud to say my "chosen family" come out to cheer me on. Today.. I felt blessed for so many things.. my health, my determination, my Iron Family and my dear friends. What else could I ever need?
Please remember Im doing this for all of those who can't... for all of those who are sick and need help. Please donate today. Just click on either the Ironman logo or the ALC logo and follow the link. Thank you everyone near and far for all of your support! Now time to start training for the Half Ironman distance!

Donate now and for every $20 you could win back $150-$300!!

Superbowl Pool Fundraiser!!!!!!

Hi Everyone,

Are you a football fan? Maybe just an occasional watcher or fan only during Bowl Season... or you just want a chance to win money while contributing to a good cause? Here’s your opportunity! I have a pool for this years Superbowl being held Sunday, February 1st 2009 (in case you didn’t know ). First, Second and Third quarter winners will receive $150 and the Fourth quarter winner will receive $300. The remaining funds will be donated to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and or the AIDS/LIFECYCLE (good tax write-off and warm fuzzy feeling). That’s a 4 in 100 chance of winning $150 to $300! If you don’t already know, check out
Please pass this along to your friends and family that would be interested…

Details:
· $20/square (100 squares)

· Names will be randomly placed in squares or personally placed by
you on a blank grid.

. After the grid is filled, I will then place numbers 0-9 in the
appropriate boxes (they will be drawn from an envelope)

· Email will be sent out early morning Sunday Feb 1st. with the
grid completed with all the donor names and grid numbers.

· On Game day a winner will be determined every quarter according
to the score.

I need from you:

· How Many Squares you want (more squares increases your odds)

· -Money mailed (5530 College Ave Apt. 16 Oakland, Ca 94618) Belinda
Agamaite
-You may give funds to me personally
or
-You may just go to one of the links at the
bottom of the page to go directly to the donation page. I will be alerted of the donation as long as you do not
mark yourself as anonymous **THIS IS THE MOST EASIEST**

. Winners if not local will be mailed their winnings. So be sure I
have your contact info!


I know this is short notice. Please feel free to forward this email to any of your friends or family. I have 71 more squares to sell. You may also contact me personally at my email blahagg@yahoo.com


Thank you in advance for your contribution! With love, Belinda


I'm training for an Ironman event and trying to raise funds for Blood Cancer Research:
http://pages.teamintraining.org/sf/VineFIrn09/bagamaite

I am also training for the AIDS LIFECYCLE Ride in 09:
http://www.tofighthiv.org/goto/Bagamaite.com

Clif Bar Triathlon Start Commercial

What do you think? A great fundraiser!

I would be willing to do this! It's all for a great Cause.

A Note From Coach Dave

Build Phase II - Happy New Year - Congratulations!


Greetings Ironteam,

Happy New Year and thank you for your awesome commitment to the cause and to your health. It always amazes us as coaches when we get to see each of you grow as an athlete and a person throughout the season!

Attached you will find the next phase of the training schedule. Here are a few notes to go along with it:

Ø Brick Workouts – We will begin to start doing OYO and some mentor/captain led brick workouts from time to time. You will always see the work “brick” after the date if that workout is intended to be done as a brick. What’s a brick? Glad you asked. A brick is a workout where more than one sport is involved and the transition between each activity is rather fast. No long shower, big meal or baseball game on the boob tube between sports. In a Bike/Run brick you will get off the bike, slip out of your bike shoes and into your running shoes, grab a little run hydration and hit the road.

Ø Two-a-day Workouts – Often you will see two workouts on the same day. If it does not say “brick” then it is intended that you rest and recover for at least 40 minutes between activities. The best way to split these days up is pick one for the evening and one for the morning. There is no set rule that says you have to do the one listed first in that order, just try to get both in during the day sometime.

Ø Color coded calendar. Some people are visual people and like pretty colors. If you are one of those people, you are in luck. Bike workouts are Purple. Run workouts are Red, Swim workouts are Green and strength/core workouts are Blue. With one glance you can see what your week looks like in Technicolor.

Ø Periodization Hours – Another visual guide is now provided on the far left side of every week. In the colored box you will see totals for each sports and a weekly tally of total training hours. These are estimates, not set in stone. They are a way to show you the progression you will be having in your training as we go through the process of three week builds with one week rest in between. Sometimes the hours will look a little funky because the calendar is running Sunday to Saturday and we have long workouts on the weekends. If there is a race included in that week there are very generic estimates for time in each sport. These are not benchmarks you must hit, simply estimates to help understand how we coaches designed your training loads that week. Keep in mind that our totals include the time you are doing strength and core work so you really are not swim/bike/run-ing for all of those total hours at the end of the week. If this representation of the training load works for you, great. If not, you can ignore it and still train just as well.

Ø The schedule is now represented as one month per page, not a mixture of months on the same page.

Ø The schedule document will have other useful tabs on it too like marker set route sheets, run workout reminders and other handy notes to help answer questions about the schedule.

Ø There is a tab on the schedule document that has some important dates you will want to mark on your calendar. As the season progresses, there may be a change or two to those dates but for now they are accurate. Half-way to Iron weekend works best if you take a vacation day on Friday so you might need to get that on your employers radar now. (Friday 3/20).

If you have further questions about the training schedule please check with your mentor first, then contact Dave if you need further clarification.

Once again, thanks for your re-commitment. Ironman here we come!

Your Coaches, Wayne, Dave, Nancy & Alex.

First Open Water Swim

Well I did it! I actually suited up in a wet suit and dragged my body into the freezing temps of Lake Del Valle (outside temp @ 31 degrees). My biggest fear was that I was going to drown. My second biggest fear was that I wasn't going to be able to breathe while in the wet suit. Well much to my surprise.. the wet suit worked to my advantage. It actually helped me float along the water.. so drowning was no longer a fear. The wet suit was a bit tight though and very much a challenge to put on. I found that breathing was also somewhat difficult at times.. but I learned quickly that if I just slowed my pace and controlled my breathing I could get into a rhythm. The team was split into two groups. Those that have had experience in open water and wearing a wet suit versus those that have not. Because I have not had any experience with either.. I was with the group that wasn't required to swim out as far as the others. Between each swim drill.. we were all required to come back to land to crunch out some core.. ie. planks, sit ups, squats etc. Unfortunately we weren't in the water long enough to really get acclimated.. only long enough to have a taste of what it would feel like. There are no other Open Water Swims scheduled between now and our 1st Olympic distance Triathlon.. which is January 25th. I will have to swim .9 miles. I have never swam that far without any breaks.. I guess I will see what all this training has done for me.. hmmm

Another highlight of the day was the Spirit Cape. A Spirit Cape is awarded to a person that represents the overall Ironman "spirit". Every 2 weeks its awarded to a different participant. I was surprised to be bestowed the cape this time around. It was an honor to be recognized but feel that there are so many others who give so much more than I do.. who really do deserve it more than I. All I could say was.."Thank you"... and keep hope that I can continue to carry that "Spirit".

As each week passes and the months go by.. I am slowly bonding with the team. I have started learning names.. hearing stories.. sharing moments with these teammates of mine. They are all AMAZING individuals. As much as I try to relate everything that I or we go through during training via Blog.. I can never convey all that is required in becoming an "IRONMAN". The commitment these individuals have to their personal goals, to the Cause, to their family and friends... It's a full plate but we do it.. whatever it takes.. We as a team will get there! Please don't forget why we are all here. Please make a donation today. Just click on either Cause on the right and follow the link. With much love, Belinda

Second Month of Training Pics