You Can Be an Active Ambassador TOO!!!!

Here's your chance to get a shot at being an Active Ambassador.

I recommend to ALL my triathlon, running and cycling friends - FILL OUT THE APPLICATION!!!!!!
 

Between NOW and September 20, you can go to Active Ambassadors and fill out a profile...create a profile on Active Ambassadors - Your profile must be 100% complete to be considered for an ambassadorship.

What can you get?????
Well, you can get picked up to be an ambassador for several teams.
(Marathon, GSeries, Polar, Sony, NB, Aquaphor, Gillete, Eating Right, Michelob Ultra, etc.)

Last year I was an Odwalla Ambassador.
I got a triathlon kit, a run kit, a jacket, visor and LOTS AND LOTS of Odwalla bars and coupons for drinks.



The best part of this sponsorship was I talked Odwalla into donating a great Native California Tree for the local elementary school. Plus my friends, training partners and my boys LOVED the bars...oh, and the clothes were pretty cute.


But Odwalla did NOT have a team for 2012 and I was sad.

The AWESOME part came when I was notified that I was picked up to be an AQUAPHOR Ambassador.

It has been wonderful.

Not only is the product fantastic.

The athletes are PHENOMENAL!!!

I mean, WOW!!!

 

Look, we all know my motto is "Slow, but GO!!!"

But my fellow Aquaphor friends are SUPER DUPER FAST and GO!!!! I am amazed by them. And even though I am old(er) and slow(er), they are all so supportive and nice.

 

Then things got even better when one of the Aquaphor Athletes shared a tidbit about the Timex Factory Team, and the next think you know, I am on that, too!!! Woot-Woot!!!

 

Okay, the main point of this is that all this goodness can be YOURS too!!!!
Again, go to the Active Ambassador site and fill out the profile 100 Percent.

http://www.activeambassadors.com/

When it the profile question asks "HOW DID YOU HEAR ABOUT ACTIVE AMBASSADORS?" type in my name:

Kandi DeCarlo

Come on friends, Active Ambassadors is LOOKING for new athletes to put on some new teams and they want people who are cyclists, runners and triathletes.......and they are looking for friends of people who are ALREADY Ambassadors!!!

Go online now and do it......
NOW!!!!



A Year Can Make a BIG Difference

One year ago today, Jeanne weighed 154 pounds, and that's after training with me for a month and dropping 6 pounds.

One year ago today, Jeanne had her ass off the couch and had trained enough to run/walk the Kevin Cook Spirit Run. It was her first event.

But not her last.

The Kevin Cook Spirit Run 2011 was to be Jeanne's pre-race for the Mission Inn Run 2011. That run was going to be Jeanne's BIG event in 2011.

Jeanne ran the Mission Inn Run 5k without stopping.Here we are with some of our fabulous fitness friends!!!

Turns out the Mission Inn Run was just a pre- for her REAL race......the race for health and fitness.

Jeanne decided she wanted to try a tri. But she didn't have a bike. So she went through all her old jewelry and gathered up an assortment of bracelets and rings and took it to the gold buyers.

Then we went shopping.

She had enough $$ to buy the smallest Giant.

Jeanne's first ride on the Santa Ana River Trail to the Beach..38 miles.

Jeanne was on the swim team in high school (okay, we won't talk about how many years ago that was).......so she is a great swimmer. She stopped swimming years ago, though, when she got married and had two girls and became a mom. Like a lot of women (me included for a while), she neglected herself for her family.

Her girls are in college now and she FINALLY she is taking care of herself.....and having fun!

Jeanne's first sprint triathlon was Tinsel Tri!

My friend Tanya, me and Jeanne. It was cold So Cal in December!

Training for triathlon was a lot of fun for Jeanne, until it was painful because of her hip issues. Doc gave her some injections and told her to rest.

She did spin classes, lifted weights and continued to swim. But for several weeks - NO RUNNING (dang, I can relate).

But she was could still ride a bike, so one morning Jeanne and I and a couple of other people rode our bikes to the Redlands Classic (road bike races in Redlands, CA).

Right before we left my house, Jeanne fell over in the street. You know we all do that once in a while. It was just a little topple over.

She got up and shook it off and said she was okay.

We rode the 18 miles there...up some hills and down some hills. We looked at the expo and ate a great pancake breakfast. Then we watched some fast racing.

Actual shot of great racing in Redlands.

On the way home, Jeanne says to me, "If I am going slow up this hill, I'm sorry. I think I broke my rib."

WHAT?????

Sure enough, X-rays showed she broke a rib when she fell over that morning....BEFORE the 36 mile bike ride.

The break was bad, but recovery was torturous.

She couldn't bike. She couldn't swim. She couldn't run. She couldn't hardly breath. She couldn't sit up. She couldn't lie down. She just COULDN'T!

She missed out on her first open water swim triathlon because she was injured.

But as soon as she was "sort-of, kind-of" healed up, she was ready for her first open water swim in a lake.

Don't tell the doc she was out swimming, biking and running a couple of weeks before she was suppose to.

Me, our friend Barb and Orietta and Jeanne at June Tri Series Triathlon. Jeanne was down to 126 pounds. Woot-Woot!!!! It was Barb's first open water swim also. She did it without a wetsuit. Neither Barb nor Jeanne had any open water swim practice before the race. Uhm, but Barb was on the USA National Synchronized Swimming Team for many years and she is a swim WHIZ!!! Orietta didn't wear a wetsuit either, but she grew up swimming in the Pacific Ocean in Ensenada. Orietta is FASSSSST and likes cold water. Of everyone in this picture I am the newbie swimmer...and I am 11 years younger than it says on my arm, and I learned how to REALLY swim in the past year....so do the math!!!!

BACK TO TODAY!!!!!

Jeanne has lost a total of 36 pounds and she is an ATHLETE!

She has changed her eating habits and she does some form of exercise - run, bike, swim (yeah, I have to hit her over the head to get her to lift weights), hike, walk the dog...almost everyday!

This year I did not pace Jeanne on the Kevin Cook Spirit Run. She ran the entire 5k on her own.



She ran the race AFTER she tried out the bike rack.

Jeanne coming into the finish line today at the Kevin Cook Spirit Run.

She finished 30 pounds lighter than last year.

Congratulations Jeanne!



What-nots and Tidbits

What-not:

Well, I didn't do anything planned for 7 days because I was on VACATION!........

but I did manage to do a lot....

I rode my bike up and down the trail from our campsite to Newport and back several times (round-trip 18 miles) ....

That is not me...but I think my dog pooped somewhere along there and I had to pick it up.

I walked the dog to dog beach and then ran (well, I tentatively jogged in the sand) for several hundred feet with the dog....

That's the dog...not me!!!!

I did jump in the water and use my porpoise kick to get in the waves and then I had to use my body strength to get out of the undertow that was trying to pull me out to the some island.

Beautiful, but dangerous.

We used all the toys we brought on our vacation -

even the one I didn't know we had until the third night when everyone was tired and bored of campfires and s'mores.

It seems my guys bought an antennae for the RV while I wasn't looking so they could watch TV. They tried to pass it off as a good thing for ME, so I could watch the Tour or the Olympics while we camp.

Uhm, guess what we watched this year?

AMERICA HAS (no) TALENT

I watched a guy play air guitar...Sorry, but holy shit, I could do that and I wouldn't look like I was trying to get myself off....

Ah-uh, you know what I mean.

And FYI note to myself for next year - NO SHARK WEEK SHOWS WHILE VACATIONING AT THE BEACH.

TIDBITS!!!

When I can home I had my first TIMEX FACTORY TEAM surprise:

Yeah!!! My Timex watch! This was one of the perks of being on the Timex Factory Team!

I really needed that new watch.

Dang, I am going to stop using micro on my camera...it makes me have TOO many wrinkles on my arms. But I did just go to the dermatologist, so that mole you see is okay. No worries.

My old TIMEX watch is at the top...it is BIG and it is worn out....I love that the new one is smaller, but still has all the great features.

My new TIMEX watch is on the top...It is a lot smaller than my old watch.

  Also notice that my old watch was so worn out that I had to keep the band down with a hair band.

Now I need to find a place to carry my extra hairband in case of a hair emergency....Oh, and I have had those.

Thank you TIMEX FACTORY TEAM!

I can't wait to pair my watch up with my AQUAPHOR team clothes and actually enjoy an event......

Cripes, that will be this Saturday, when I am suppose to run a 5k...though I have not actually run since my laundry injury.

(see past blogs if you don't know what I am whining about)

I have been train(ing)-n-tri(ing)....just not running.

Saturday's Kevin Cook Run will be my tri-it back into running.

I am going to be happy even if I have to walk!!!



National Bike Challenge

 

I did it!!!!

Back in May I joined the National Bike Challenge and set my goal to ride 850 miles between May 1 and August 31.

This is my May 10 blog about National Bike Month and the National Bike Challenge:
http://train-n-tri.blogspot.com/2012/05/national-bike-month.html

It sounded like a lot of mileage when I set the goal. I looked at my mileage for 2011 and from the beginning of May to the end of August last year I rode my bike 825.8 miles. I was sure I could tack on another 25 miles for 850 miles.

850???

I set my goal TOO low!

Since the beginning of May, I have ridden my bike(s) 1006.86 miles and I still have 4 weeks left in the challenge.

So far I've ridden 905.22 miles on my road bike and 101.64 miles on my mountain bike.

Whoop-Whoop!!!!!!

Thanks to the National Bike Challenge and the Tour de France Challenge, I was motivated to clip in and ride my bikes way more.

I love riding with a group.

Riverside Bicycle Club's Smog to Surf ride.....We've got some awesome ladies!!

And I love riding by myself.


Well, actually, I was NOT by myself in this pic. I was riding with my fabulous training friends from Triathlon Connection. Luckily, some people in my tri club can ride their bike REALLY fast and then stop and take pictures of the rest of us!

I especially like riding bikes with my guy.


Robert and me at Wildflower.

And now my son has caught the cycling bug.

Dion used his own $$$$ and bought himself a road bike. I hate to tell you, but his kit is something I picked up at a garage sale when he was in the 8th grade and he was cycling with friends. He even did the cycling portion of a triathlon with 2 of his friends back then and they came in 2nd. Seven years later and the kit still fits him.....but I think it is time he upgraded.
Uhm, think I can get him to compete in a triathlon? He is an awesome swimmer after swimming and playing water polo in high school. And he can outrun me. Maybe I should buy him some tri-shorts instead of bike shorts.


Now I have 2 DeCarlo men to cycle with.

My goal for next year's National Bike Challenge?
I think I'll just double this year's goal.





Jumpers Knee

Jumpers Knee?

I got a third opinion this week and the verdict is in.

Jumpers Knee.
And I didn't even jump, I fell. So maybe it should be called Clumsy Jumpers Knee.

But the Doc said....it is all going to be okay.

As long as I keep stretching my quads and don't overdo my knee it will get better......

I got another opinion because the first doc said 4 to 6 weeks and it has been 7 weeks.

My right knee feels better than when I first hurt it by running into the fireplace bricks and falling onto my knees, but it doesn't feel well enough to run on.

This was my knee after I fell over the fireplace bricks. The first doctor told me I did patella tendon damage and no running or jumping so I wouldn't get Runner's Knee. Three weeks later, the second doctor said she agreed with the first doctor. Arggh.

No Running.

No Jumping.

I have followed doctors' orders.

I HAVE ridden my bike with a high cadence. I have swum numerous miles. I have spent too much time on the elliptical (BORING!!!!!!)

But I was missing the get-out-there and run feeling.

So a couple of weeks ago, Robert and I planned a hike up to Cucamonga Peak. There would be no running or jumping involved. Just walking 4,800 feet up to the peak and then 4,800 down to the parking lot for a total of 14.5 miles.

The hike up was gorgeous.

The hike down was great....until the last 2 miles.

My knee said, "NNNOOOOOOO!!!!!"

Luckily, my guy is handy with duck tape.

This got me off the mountain. Robert was glad he didn't have to carry me.

 

The day after this hike, my knee felt fine. Well, as fine as it has been feeling.

 

I was a little worried about the Bridge to Nowhere hike this past weekend. But I taped it up with KT tape, instead of duck tape. There was some up and down, but no huge elevation changes.

 

Bridge to Nowhere 12 mile hike. Taped my knee BEFORE the hike.

My knee was stiff, but it didn't hurt.

I thought it was time for another check to make sure it was healing okay.

Third opinion - it wasn't my knee hitting the bricks that caused the problem, it was me FALLING on my knee AFTER I ran into the bricks.

Result? My kneecap jammed into the underlying cartilage and caused Jumpers Knee.

Whatever the docs call it, the outcome is basically the same.

NO RUNNING. NO JUMPING.

Good news.....I am getting really good at taping my knee.

My son thought I needed another fashionable color besides black.

More good news!

While I can't run (insert frowny face) and I can't jump (insert a who cares face).....I logged more miles in July than any other month so far this year.

When I add up my swimming and biking miles for July, I traveled 603.575 miles....

I looked on the map and that's how far my house in Riverside, CA is from Redding, CA.



Thinking about things like this make me feel less bad about not being able to run.

Until I CAN run, I will just continue to Train (swim and bike)-n-Tri!