From XL to XTERRA

The holidays are over, and luckily John and I survived without any substantial weight gain. Actually, John continued his trek down Weight Loss Mountain by dropping another six pounds last month, while I have trimmed another handful off of my frame to make for an overall loss of 14 “ell-bees.”

After swimming the tanks in the lagoon on Monday, it was pretty cool to hear from a friend that I was looking to be in great shape—and that I no longer had love handles. Yep, things are going pretty well on the road to XTERRA, but as my friend Ken McKinney passed on from a little band called the Grateful Dead, “When life looks like easy street there’s danger at your door.”

Well, danger is right around the corner, as the third event of the Northern Marianas Islands Triathlon Federation Enticer Series is about to unload 1,200-meter swim, 30-kilometer bike, and 8km run upon me tomorrow.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: This will be the longest distance race in which I will be competing, and I’m a little nervous about the event. So far, I haven’t trained with any of the energy packets along the way, and I have been fine, but this will be twice the distance of last month’s race. I have been juicing up with quality fluids that were provided by our friends at PowerAde, but as of yet, there are no Goo packets hanging from my handlebars, or stuck in my pockets.

This is where the whole experience thing kicks in, and since this is all about training for the big race—and not the big race itself—I will just take my time and go without pressure. Afterwards I will gradually work the added fuel into my training regimen.

At least I won’t have the added weight of a pack of cigarettes this time out of the gate.

I will be a full five days into my new smoke-free lifestyle. It hasn’t been easy—let me tell you. I thought about having a cancer stick –count ‘em—17 times on Sunday! It’s a good thing that I have told everyone that I’m not smoking because I cannot back out now. Well, that’s good, but my “inner smoker” secretly hates it, and I have no chance at getting Phillip Morris as my sponsor.

While I have spent the past few days fending off the fumes and training solo, John has been reacclimatizing to Saipan following his recent vacation to Bali with his girlfriend Jennifer. After fearing the worst, the big guy is raring to go once again:

“After recovering from a brief bout with “Bali belly” while on vacation, I was running everywhere (like Forrest Gump) on my vacation. Jennifer and I walked on average 5-6 hours a day through the forests, cities, and jungles of Bali. We were also able to participate in two runs of the Bali Hash House Harriers, which lead you on a long and harrowing trail through different parts of the island. The two trails we ran were amazingly challenging, pitting us against huge mountain climbs, narrow rice paddies, and thick jungle.

“While I didn’t get a chance to do my regular active morning and evening exercise training, I was able to stay active, and eat healthy. I do feel like I need to really push myself to get back on track with my weight loss and exercise routine. Vacation tends to make you soft on waking up at 4am and running for miles.

I’m also excited because I was able to keep up my weight loss in the second month of training. While I came nowhere near my initial success of about 20 lbs. the first month, a six-pound loss in the second month makes me happy. I still have plenty of old doughnuts and beer to work off before I am anywhere near XTERRA. But with three months to go, I feel 100 percent on target to complete that monster of a triathlon.”

While we are creeping closer to the date of the big show, little things that we didn’t anticipate—like bike repair—are making their way into our focus. With a race tomorrow, my finely tuned mountain bike from Romey at Saipan Bike Pro is riding like a dream, but John is still experiencing difficulties with his two-wheeled machine. We’ll probably have it ready in time for the race, but if not, the big guy is prepared to get the training value from the run and the swim anyway.

That’s the kind of spirit that can’t help but grow on you, and make a guy want to do better at this stuff. That’s the kind of thing that we have been experiencing since we embarked upon our mission. Tomorrow’s three-sport race of a three-part Enticer series starts at 3pm—wish us luck, luck, luck.