And now it's truly been a while

Here we are! Mostly on the other side of a pandemic (waiting on my daughter's vaccination for it to be truly over for us). Last year was a complete wash race was. BUT in a stunning turn of events, I learned how to "gravel bike"!

I bought a used cyclocross bike and decided I would become a triathlon person by summer and a cyclocross person by fall/winter! What is cyclocross? I have no idea! But over the course of the pandemic I have been buying equipment and preparing for this fall! It's a way to compete and it involves effort. I'm sure I'll like it. 

But even if I don't, I have discovered a true love of riding. I ride at Umstead Park in Raleigh and it is magnificent. I have had to diversify away from running due to my knee (which sucks). But I can still compete in sprint tri's and my mostly biking I can get a great workout. In fact, the workout I do is the same calories as my old 8 mile run. Has this hurt my running?

No! In some strange twist of events, my running (5k length) is as good as ever. How? I don't really know. But bottom line, I can pull out a sub 7 pace 5k without issue AND I am getting good at something I have been kind of just ok at... biking! Swimming is also going well.

I competed in 1 triathlon so far and it went pretty good. Would have been great (top 10, 1st AG) IF I just didn't trip and fall on my face at the finish line at the Carolina Double. Still got top 10 but 2nd AG). Oh well, i have several more tri's lined up for this (another fairly lost year) prior to trying my luck at cyclocross (cx). 

What does this mean for marathons?! I'm not sure. I may still be able to do one very slow to check the box. I think if I had a lot of time (2 year and potty training so forget that) I could slowly jog distance. Just not interested in that. Tri's and maybe CX will be how I compete. Maybe I can check the marathon box (about 8 left in my quest) at some point. I've decided that if I can't do them anymore, hell I'll just do a bike century. Calorie wise, a bike 100 miler is WAY more work than a marathon. I calculate a marathon is equivalent to about 75 miles (doing Umstead hills). I was worried I would hate biking (I kind of did) and it wouldn't be able replicate the feeling of really doing something. I'm happy to report that I am actually pretty happy with it. Would love to check the running marathon box but we'll wait to see what is possible. 

Whearas marathons/half marathons were my way to "destroy" previously, I get that from tri's (and maybe cx?) For now I'm excited to finish up this weird tri season and then kick off a new adventure with cx.