"It is not the critic who counts..."

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat."

-Theordore Roosevelt

The quote above is one of my top 3 quotes ever.  I first discovered it about 20 years ago when I was having a particularly difficult time in my life.  I often refer to it and lately, with all that has happened in my life over the last 18 months, the quote has been on my mind a lot.

You see, I've always feared failure. I've tasted success in my life, so I know what's that's like.  But I've also failed miserably.  For every goal I've accomplished there's an equal or greater amount that were never realized.  I can honestly say though that I have never given up.  Sure, some plans changed and some goals I've had have fallen off the wayside simply because they weren't important to me.  I truly believe when we focus on meaningful endeavors, whatever they may be, the un-important stuff will simply fall by the wayside.

In order to deal with some of my recent failures, I've had to regroup, re-focus and simplify my life greatly.  That's extended into my training as well.  While I've been more focused I've also been a bit more relaxed in what I'm doing.  I'm not weighing myself every morning like I used to.  Yet lately I've had many people comment that I'm looking slimmer.  

I've cut simple things out of my life like my addiction to energy drinks.  I was drinking 2 sometimes 3 cans of Rockstar or Monster every day.  In the past few weeks I weened myself to just one a day and for the last week or so, I've had maybe 2 total.  

My diet has become simpler.  Making meals more meaningful, whether by who I eat those meals with or where I eat those meals. keeping in mind that every calorie counts.  Its not an obsessive but a thoughtful thing.  I still eat bacon.  I still drink milk (In fact I'm drinking whole milk!).  And I still enjoy a burrito.  But I'm staying away from fast food, preparing more of my meals at home and I still have my Mavrick addiction, but I opt for salads and fruit instead of Bahama Mamas and Tornados.  Who knew you could eat healthy at the gas station?

But all of it has greatly benefited my physical and emotional health.  I'm forming new relationships and re-connecting with old ones.  I sleep better.  I wake up refreshed for the most part and I'm extremely motivated to keep going.

In a few weeks, I will race my first real triathlon.  I've actually wanted to be a triathlete for most of my life, but I really hate running.  My body just isn't built for it.  But I'm overcoming it.  With the help of special friends who care about me and my well being I'm able to accomplish more and more each day.  Sunsets are prettier.  Runs, rides and swims are easier to get up early for.  Even my commute to work has become therapeutic.

So what am I doing to train currently?  I had my first brick workout yesterday.  While it was eye opening how difficult it is to go from a fast bike rider to a fast run, it was just more motivation for what's to come.

I've dropped the spin classes and the gym work.  Its all riding, running and swimming now.  

Tue, Wed, Thurs and Fridays are my most structured days with ride/run/swim/run workouts.  Fri, Sat and Sunday are unstructured but I'm getting in at least one ride in and trying to make time for more.

But this more relaxed but deliberate angle to training has done wonders.  

I still feel battered and bruised sometimes.  Its still tough to take some of the real failures that I've experienced.  But none of it has knocked me out.  I may have been knocked down but life ain't over.  If I don't get at it, life will keep moving on.  I prefer to have life keep moving on with me an active part in it.

Emotional Eating

I like to eat.  Its one of the reasons I have trouble attaining and keeping my racing weight.  For a cyclist, where power-to-ratios are super important, overeating can make or break your diet goals without much effort at all.  I enjoy flavorful foods, which can come in healthy meals, but the fatty, chemical filled treats (like the ones you'd find on the gas station roller) are a real weakness.  While I've managed to control this unhealthy taste in cuisine I falter most often when I'm tired, bored or stressed.  I'm an emotional eater.

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I take comfort in food, especially the unhealthy kind.  But life will always be filled with trials, sadness, stress and fatigue.  What's a person to do to kick the bad habits of turning to unhealthy calories when faced with stress?

I found this little article from the Mayo Clinic to that's helped me get pointed in the right direction.

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/weight-loss/MH00025

However, its my dietitian, Breanne Nalder, who has really got me on the food straight and narrow.  Send me a message and I'll hook you up with her contact info.

Emotional eating for me has been a lifelong struggle but with simple stress and food management techniques, the habbits can be kicked for good!

Happy New Year!

Wow!  What a year 2012 was!  I'm always amazed how fast time flies and here we are again, with 2013 already to go.

I like New Years.  It gives us a chance to renew, recommit and reconnect.  Its a great time to set goals, analyze the past and set a course for new and better things to come.  Before we look forward, lets look back a bit.

While 2012 headlines were filled with  too many tragedies, storms and the downfall of a sports icon, we also saw great triumphs of the human spirit and things that left an inspiring mark on the year.  One of my favorite moments was watching Felix Baumgartner make his record breaking freefall.  The fact that we got to see it live and hear his words as he stepped into the atmosphere, just made it all the more dramatic.  Red Bull can sponsor some wacky stuff but this feat to me was on par with many of the great adventures of our time including Steve Fossett's records and roving Mars.

I hope in the New Year we can remember those we lost but look forward to making our world better.  Hopefully we continue to find the things that will inspire each of us to do good, reach our goals and treat people better.

With a new year comes new goals.  I'm willing to bet that most of us have some sort of weight related aspiration to attain in 2013.  I started my weight loss plan about a month ago.  While the past 2 weeks have been difficult with so many parties and family dinners, I'm happy to report that last week I managed to maintain my weight from the week before.  Counting calories really makes all the difference and the numbers don't lie.  I've mentioned MyFitnessPal before and I'll mention it again, because it truly is the tool that has helped me reach my goals.  Its great to have all the nutritional info available right there on the site and planning your food and exercise for the day becomes second nature.  It takes less time than checking your email and your results are front and center for you to analyze.

With counting calories, food quality becomes so important.  You start to realize that in order to make it through the day on the calories you're limited to, you can't waste 50 of those calories on a mini Twix bar or a heavy lunch with no nutrients.  Feel free to "friend" me on the site if you'd like.  My username is "sailtowery". Then we can track each others progress and reach our goals together.  Having a partner in any quest is helpful!

Many years ago, a reporter in a Porsche press conference asked Dr. Ferry Porsche what his favorite Porsche car was.  One of his executives, Peter Shutz, sensing some discomfort is Dr. Porsche simply said "we haven't built it yet".  (Excellence Magazine #200) What that says to me is that no matter how great we may have been in the past, its nothing to what we may yet become.  May 2013 be your best year yet!

Mega Monday

Ok, maybe not so mega, but its still Monday.

With pro cycling in winter training camp mode, most of the news from my favorite pro sports is on the snow sliding type.  Ted Ligety continued his giant slalom dominance while one of my all time favorite athletes, Lindsey Vonn, opened up about her battle with depression.  This revelation was important on many fronts.  A prominent and respected athlete coming out with this kind of struggle can help many others, including athletes who quite often don't like to admit when something is ever wrong, it sheds light on a even greater misunderstanding of mental health.  With the horrific events in Connecticut on Friday, I believe more focus needs to be given to mental health and how it affects society.  All the talk lately is how Americans' physical health (and the care thereof) affects our economy, our morale and our lifestyles but omits the major mental portion of our well being.  With more dialogue about the mental health issues facing our nation, maybe, just maybe, we can avoid more tragedies like we saw this weekend.

I actually like Mondays.  I see them being like the New Year.  It gives us an opportunity to try again, make things better and work towards another great weekend.

This past weekend saw some much needed snow fall here in Utah and in my home state of New Mexico.  I didn't get out to try my new AT set-up however as I couldn't find a partner.  Most were waiting for the conditions to improve.  With avy danger considerable today, we should see some nice and more stable conditions by the weekend.  Anyone up for earning some turns?

Since I didn't ski and the roads were too wet and snowy for our normal winter training rides, I spent some QT with my indoor trainer and Coach Troy for some basement riding.  I spent 80 minutes with the Spinervals 16.0 Aero Base Builder workout burning 712 calories making sticking to my 1782 net cals for the day quite a bit easier.

Staying indoors was actually a tough decision.  I was trying to debate how slick the roads really were.  There was something challenging about going out on the road bike with some snow coming down, but in the interest of safety over manlyness, I chose the basement.  Training indoors can be quite boring, but at the same time, I believe the dedication builds mental toughness and the quality of the time spent can be greater than that of riding around town.  Riding outside is filled with stoplights, traffic, coasting and interrupted intervals.  I've heard you can count on a good indoor trainer session being worth about 1.5 times what you would do outside.  Sounds good to me!

On tap for tomorrow is an in depth look at my current training plan and my great desire to crosstrain.  Have a happy Monday!

I'm back!

Its been a while since I've actively posted anything here on the blog.  And to be honest, I've missed it.  I enjoy writing about cycling, training and sharing tidbits on my other interests as well.  Hopefully some of you have also enjoyed my musings.

As I continue, we'll try to keep things consistent with Mega Mondays, a review of the happenings of the weekend...races, training, fun events; Training Tuesdays, something about my own or other's training for cycling and other pursuits; we'll call Wednesdays either Wide Open Wednesday or Wet Wednesday.  I still keep tabs on yacht racing and motorsports, so Wednesdays will have something along those lines.  Thursdays we'll leave open for product reviews, ski reports, cycling news and other relevant topics and of course Fridays will highlight a fun video I've found.  Maybe keeping to a schedule like this will keep me going and motivated.  The blogging sure does help my own training and focus.

So, to get back into it, lets kick off a Training Tuesday!

Now that we're officially in the off season, its a great time to discuss diet, especially as the holidays set in.  Normally I put on a good ten pounds in the winter but being that I had such a difficult season of racing in 2012, I never really dropped what I usually do in season.  I never got below 180 lbs whereas the past few seasons I've ended the year at 172-175.  I also had to deal with a bout of overtraining and some difficult personal struggles so after Harvest Moon Criterium, I took some time off the bike.  Needless to say, I started my winter training last week at 190 lbs.

With the extra weight, I've renewed my focus on getting down to race weight.  My biggest help so far has been my wife.  She also has some weight loss and training goals.  It helps immensely to have a partner in any kind of goal, especially with health related endeavors.  The second help has been Brianne Nalder, a sports nutritionist in Salt Lake City.  She's opened my eyes to issues such as bone density, nutrient timing and cooking for weight loss.  She also provided me with my Resting Metabolic Rate, which told me exactly how many calories I should use as my baseline.  With this data I've been able to utilize an amazingly simple but effective online tool:  www.myfitnesspal.com.  This website keeps your food diary all in one place with more than 2 million foods already in its database.

Whats been most eye opening has been how much good food you can actually eat, as long as you keep track.  What has also been interesting is to see how much I was over eating.  It doesn't take much.  500 extra calories a day can be consumed without really thinking about it, which equates to about 1 lb a week in weight gain.

With watching calories, every calorie counts.  If you splurge on lunch, dinner becomes more difficult and that snack you need before bed is impossible.  So each food item becomes important.  It has to be satisfying, nutritious and filling.

My resting metabolic rate has me at 2232 calories per day.  That's basically what my body needs just to function during the day.  So to lose a pound a week, I need to be at 1732 net calories.  I'm working out 6 days a week, so keeping to that number has been relatively easy, but on Sundays, that is a very hard number to keep.  Its amazing to see how much physical activity affects your calories for the day.

So with that, lets keep this going.  Please leave feedback or drop me line.  Peace!

Fatty McGee

I recently volunteered to be a part of a masters thesis project comparing bone density in athletes to sedentary people.  As part of the study I get my body composition, diet and bone density analyzed and hopefully find out some helpful things about my body along the way.  After the first testing session, I got some interesting news.  After the body composition test, I found out I'm really, really fat.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm healthy.  I'm 5' 9" and weigh 180 lbs.  Not obese by any means, but for a Cat 3 cyclist, it doesn't look so good.  Here's why:  19.7.  Average speed for a workout?  Mileage for my short loop around town?  Nope.  That's my body fat percentage number.  I was told with the machine we used, which measures body fat with electrical currant through the feet and hands, I could lob 3 points off that, but still, 16.7%??  I asked if I was the fattest cyclist in the test group.  The answer?  Yes.  No wonder I can't climb for jack!

I've been told I don't look 180 lbs, so I wear my weight well.  But I do have, and have always had, a spare tire.  Not the kind in my saddle bag, but around my waist.  I've tried so hard to get rid of it.  But the body fat number worries me because I may be fat on the inside!  If I wear my weight well, that fat must be living somewhere. 

So here's the plan.  I won't be going on any crash diets.  I'm well aware of the nutritional needs of training.  But its time to re-evaluate my diet again.  I've already made changes.  Its wraps and fruit from now on at Chick-fil-a and I'm watching my sugar intake much more carefully.  The sweets are gone from the house and I'll be watching what snacks go into my body.  I made some bug changes to my diet 2 years ago, but evidently some of my old habits have crept back in.  So the new goal is body composition changes.

In celebration of being the fattest athlete in the test group, here's some classic Adam Sandler:

Fuel

Fuel. Not only is it my #2 favorite Metallica tune (Master of Puppets in #1), fuel has been on my mind since my Boulder ride on Saturday. See, what I didn't mention last post is that I barely made it the 4 hours I needed to complete. About 3 hours into it, I started to feel the inevitable energy drain that comes from not taking in enough fuel.

Fuel, or food, is of utmost importance for an athlete. Even more so as I get older. In my swimming days way back when, I remember beginning race day at Dunkin' Donuts. As a 16 year old without much direction, I really didn't know better. I had carbo loaded the night before with my team and figured as a sprinter, that's all I really needed to do. Fast forward 20 years and I now know how misguided I was. I wish I knew then what I know now about sports nutrition.

This past Saturday, I failed the nutrition part of my weekend for sure. I was staying at a friend's house so I didn't have the normal staples I keep at home; oatmeal, bananas, yogurt, etc. Nor did I eat very well on Friday. Friday night's steak dinner with heavy appetizers probably didn't do much for me.

I began Saturday's ride with a trip to Einstein's Bagel. OJ and a whole bagel with egg is all I ate. Out on the road, I managed to get 2 Gu's in and some water. That isn't much for a 4 hour ride with intervals and fast groups. Once I made it back to town, I quickly downed a Rockstar and some peanut M & M's which got me home. I finally decimated an all meat pizza while watching KU take on Texas. Not exactly a model for proper fueling techniques.

Here's what I would normally have eaten on a long Saturday ride:

Friday dinner: pasta, diced tomatoes, broccoli and tall glass of milk

Saturday breakfast: bowl of oatmeal, greek yogurt, banana, GNC Mega Man supplement, can of FRS.

During ride: 4 Gu's, 1 bottle water, 1 bottle sports drink (I drink G2, Cytomax or EFS)

Post ride: smoothie made with berries, milk and protein mix followed by a decent sandwich and lots of water.

That's what an athlete's plate should look like! Not my hodgepodge thrown together bits. And the proof is in the proverbial pudding. I limped home. Granted after a 4 hour ride I should be tired, but not almost bonking.

Check you diet with a food diary and I'll bet you'll be surprised by what you actually consume in a day. I've been tweeking things for the last 2 years and its really paid off. I also recommend Racing Weight by Matt Fitzgerald. It really has been my bible over these years.