KaMLuNg

iTrader: (5)

all u guys drive ACURAs and noone bought a navigation system??? is that the guy???

htown

I'm sorry man, I never was addicted to Acurazine until I started the meet, now I can't stop refreshing this page lol

I apologize

htown

LOL, I think none of us did have the navigation and I was supposed to go over the route the night before, but I believe it rained, we just missed one street though and got back on track

Chopsie

You still in the tire Biz ? or no ?

Chopsie

No, it was Waddy (another houston guy), that said that... he's the one that has the 3.5l Altima 6 speed.
I wonder how he's been anyway, haven't seen him around the forum.

Chopsie

*Puts on aviator sunglasses and soul train wig*

What chu talkin bout willis ?

Chopsie

Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 2 (2 members and 0 guests)
Chopper, trancemission

Ethan, I know your just sitting there letting the urine run down your leg as my welcome music has stunned the life out of you.

Get a floormat already

trancemission

*throws you a chew bone* that outta keep you busy......

Chopsie

<--- Stops breathing to laugh again






















































woof!

KaMLuNg

iTrader: (5)

damn it cooled down insanely after the rain... don't help that im sick tho... bleh...

shalinz

^^^ Yep, seems like everyone is getting sick. I have been sick since Monday evening and still I am not feeling that great.

G

You guys are great! Now I know why life is soo boring without y'all!! Anyways, been trying to catch up on work, but here is a rather long tid bit about the weekend. Well, about Friday, Saturday, and part of Sunday. I will fill in the good parts of Sunday and Monday later.

Disney’s International Olympic Distance Triathlon
Orlando, Florida
(also known as the most magical place on earth)
I am traveling to this triathlon with my Team in Training group which consisted of eight really cool athletes, one kick ass coach, one crazy Chinese girl, one demented Aussie, one horribly inappropriate longhorn, two awesome staff members, and we were soon to find out, one evil Houstonian. Our flight to Orlando left Friday morning at 10:57, and with all the Hurricane Rita craziness, not only were we happy to be getting out of town and all the traffic, we were also about two hours early for our flight thinking the airport might be more congested than usual. Not so, Bergstrom was as usual slow and sparsely populated, so we had plenty of time to get our coffee and Auntie Ann’s pretzel and have a nice talk about colon cleansing. This should have been an indicator of what was to come, however I paid the conversation no mind and hopped on the plan to Orlando. Thanks so much to Katie by the way for driving all five of us to the airport in her mother’s Buick! You’re the best!

Of course we have a connecting flight in Dallas since you can’t fly anywhere direct from Austin, so we arrive in Dallas and have to move to Concourse C to catch our next flight to Orlando. Since we are highly trained athletes, we’re all starving by the time we get to Dallas, and decide to grab some grub before we get on the plane to Orlando. Of course, none of us want the same thing, so we all spread out in different directions, get our food and arrive back at our gate just in time to catch the last boarding call. Perfect timing!

Our flight to Orlando can be summed up as such: Five year olds suck. Loud, crying, and antsy five year olds really suck. Especially when they’re sitting behind you and cant seem to keep their legs still. Especially when they’re with their grandparents who think they are perfect angels. Okay, enough. We get to Orlando in one piece, minus our sanity, and get off the plane as quickly as possible. We are greeted by happy, smiling airport volunteers with abnormally large, four fingered white Mickey hands. I love Disneyworld!! Already, I’m starting to get that magical feeling. We hop on the Magical Express to our hotel with a promise of a free breakfast with Chef Mickey lingering in our minds.

We get to the Contemporary Hotel (which may have been contemporary in 1985, but with the bright purple and turquoise leather seating, is definitely retro in 2005) check in and, of course, want to eat again. Did I mention we are highly tuned, ravaging athletes? We’ll eat anything you set in front of us. The eight of us head out to the Fort Wilderness restaurant while our staff and coaches attend a TNT meeting. To get to the Fort Wilderness you have to take the Magical boat ride (everything is Magical in Disney, so you better go ahead and just get used to it. The transportation is magical, the hotel is magical, your day is definitely wished magical, and I think even my sweaty socks were deemed magical). The bugs, however, were not magical. They were tiny, annoying, liked to fly directly in your face and multiplied by the thousands every second. The massive amount of bugs were explained to me as being a result of the hurricanes, although, I think they were just a result of Florida.

The Fort Wilderness was this great little log cabin looking restaurant that, I venture to say, had the best green beans and biscuits I’ve ever tasted. After toasting each other (did I mention we also drink as much as we eat?) we sit down and proceed to eat our $20 worth of chicken, ribs, mashed potatoes, pizza, salad, biscuits, cornbread and peach cobbler. Stuffed, but happy, we stumble back to the magical boat, through the magically annoying bugs and head back to the Contemporary. We are greeted by our staff member Amy (who hasn’t eaten yet) and told that our bikes have arrived and they have started assembling them. Did I mention how great our staff is? While we are out stuffing our faces, our hungry coach and staff members were assembling our bikes and stealing a couple of bites from McDonald’s chicken nuggets. We all head over to assemble our bikes, starting to feel that stuffed, sluggish, I’ve-just-eaten-my-weight-in-carbs feeling. Luckily, most of my bike had already been assembled, so I only had to put on my pedals and computer. Thank you Spencer!! I head back up to my room, unpack and go to bed early in preparation of tomorrow’s early morning training swim. I sleep a great, full belly, magical sleep and wake up Saturday morning feeling; oh….what’s the word….magical!!



Day -1



Saturday morning we were all woken up by an encouraging text message from our great friend and coach Tiffany (who, by the way, was confused and thought it was Sunday, race day). It was 5:00 in the morning our time, which meant it was 4:00 a.m. Texas time. We didn’t have to be at practice until 7:30. We all cursed Tiffany for waking us up, but love her for her energy and support all the same! Around 7:00 a.m. me and my roommate Christina decide we want to take advantage of the free breakfast with Chef Mickey. So we head down to the 4th floor to be told we needed reservations. Reservations for breakfast at 7:00 a.m.!! We are seated about five minutes later and proceed to take full advantage of the breakfast buffet. We even get the chance to meet Mickey and friends! Then the check comes and we realize, this is NOT the free breakfast buffet we had been promised! In fact, it was a $20 breakfast buffet! Ouch!! That hurt. So we hand over our money and make sure to give Mickey a bad look as we walk out. We have to take the magical boat again to practice, and after some encouraging words from our coach Spencer, I realize I have to find a bathroom…..now. It was a very long boat ride. We get out and I decide to get a good run in before our swim practice, so I sprint to the nearest bathroom. Now….I say that the toilet was broken before I even got to it, however, point is…..the toilet was broken and I had to tell a line of at least twenty girls that “I wouldn’t use that one if I were you.” Lovely way to start out the day. For the rest of the trip I am known as the “dunny crasher”, a nickname bestowed on me by our Aussie teammate. I can only assume a “dunny” is Australian for toilet. So we do a couple of laps in the water and head back to the Contemporary to test out our bikes. The rest of the day we spend shuttling to Transitions one and two dropping off our bikes and running shoes. By the time we get everything dropped off its time for pasta dinner!! Yeah!! One of my favorite parts of the trip!! We meet before we head to dinner and, of course, have another toast. Dinner is provided by TNT to all participants and we arrive to a mass of staff members greeting us by clapping, yelling and making lots of noise. We even have a Texas flag we run in with!! We quickly establish ourselves at dinner as the loudest and most obnoxious TNT group. We are all wearing our napkins in our shirts in honor of our teammate Annie, who doesn’t eat a meal without that napkin right under her chin. After an extremely emotional dinner and a speech given by Dave Scott, six time Ironman World Champion, we head to the hotel to decorate our race jerseys. This is also when we meet Clayton, the only member of the Gulf Coast team who ventured out of Houston during Hurricane Rita to do the race.

We decorate our jerseys with names of people we have either lost to cancer or who are battling it. My jersey reads “Faith, Hope Love. In memory of Mom, I loe you.” Others read: “Grandpop” or “Miss you Mom and Dad.” Some even have pictures safety-pinned to their jerseys. Nothing like a horrible disease to bring people together t accomplish great things! We are all feeling very nervous, but excited about tomorrow’s race. I head to bed around 11:00 after packing my bag and making sure everything I need for race morning is properly laid out and ready to go. They say you don’t sleep well the night before the race, but they are wrong! I slept so well and woke up feeling refreshed and ready to go, even though it was 5:15 in the morning.



Race Day



Oh my gosh, I have so much energy and I am so ready to go!!! We walk to the transition area to drop off our water bottles and helmets as we sing a few Disney favorites. Everyone loved the team from Texas!! I get my body marked and cringe as the lady writes “26” on my calf. Did I mention I just had my 26th birthday? I mean, I’m fine with being 26, but having this lady write it right there on my calf so everyone can see it….I mean, is this some type of punishment?? Now I’m checking out everyone else’s calves to see who is in my age group and secretly comparing myself to them. “She looks like she can kick my butt” or “She doesn’t look like she’s ever ran a mile in her life.” Really, this age on the body thing is a bad idea. We head to the swim start and chat nervously as we wait for the race to start. The first person in our group to start is Matt. The next people in our group to start are me, Annie and Misty. Oh my gosh, I am really starting to freak out now. I give a shout out to Austin, TX on the mike and do some club dancing in my swim cap and tri-outfit. I’m sure my Lady Wranglers would have been proud of me, if not proud of my lack of make up and not-so-flattering swim cap and goggles.

And……there goes the start gun!! We’re off!! Oh my gosh, oh my gosh!! We’re starting the race!! I hang out towards the back, because I know I’m not a strong swimmer. I’ve had to pee for about an hour but didn’t want to wait in the line for the portables so I take this time to relieve myself before I begin my swim. Sorry about that Misty. I hope you swam away from the warm water. The swim course was mapped out by six buoys. Buoy #1 was easy to get to and since I was hanging out in the back of the crowd, it really wasn’t too bad. Buoy #2 was worse. First of all, the sun was directly in my eyes and I couldn’t see for crap. Second of all, my goggles fogged up and I couldn’t get them to un-fog without stopping, treading water and running my fingers on the inside. I started following a group of girls I thought knew where they were going. Obviously not. About halfway to Buoy #5 I realize I am going directly across the middle of the swim course, not around it. I turn around and head back to Buoy #2 and this is when I start to get really nervous. I realize the next wave has started and there are swimmers actually swimming DIRECTLY TOWARDS ME!! They really don’t seem to be all too concerned that I’m in their way either. Oh my gosh, I am going to get trampled by these swimmers!! So this is where I start to kinda freak out a little bit. I try to head to the outside of the course, but in all honesty, I can barely see where I’m going, not to mention I have no bearings about me whatsoever. I somehow make it to Buoy #2 and then Buoy #3. I’m swimming slowly, and making a lot of stops to clear off my goggles, tread water and try to figure out where I’m going. I can’t find anyone to follow and there are stronger, better and meaner swimmers all around me just waiting to push me, pull me, and get me out of their way. I’m praying a lot and singing my favorite song over and over in my head trying to get my mind off the fact that I’m totally freaking out. I make it past #3, and at # 4 I decide to take a break and hang onto the buoy to catch my breath. This is when I start to really hate swimming. I mean, I hate it. I don’t know why I decided to do a triathlon, I’ve been scared of the water since I was eight and I failed my beginning swim lessons. I’ve never swam this long or with this many people before in my entire life. There is no bottom to this lake, there is no break after 100 meters, there is no coach there to give you encouraging words. Why, again, am I doing this? Now I just want to get out of the water and onto the bike and run where I’m more comfortable. I make it pretty well to Buoy # 5, but only after I make a stop at a kayak and ask the guy only half joking if he would bring me in. Luckily, he said no and I take off for Buoy #6. I’m almost done!! Oh my gosh, and then its over!! Praise the Lord, I am done with this swim!! I stagger out of the water and all I can think of now is “I have so much time to make up on the bike and run!!”.

Swim time: 52:56 (1500 meters) Rank: 72 (I suck)
T1 time: 2:28

Onto the bike!! I love life again! I am so happy!! The ride was great, a couple of good hills, but nothing that hurt too bad. I’m hammering it pretty hard trying to make up time and also trying to pass people in less than 15 seconds so I don’t get penalized. I could have done without the headwind the entire ride, but after that swim, I could have ridden in Hurricane Rita and been happy!!

Bike time: 1:29 (40K) Rank: 26 (I feel better now)
T2 time: 2:43 (someone had put their bike in my spot, damn them!!)

Yeah!!! The run!! This is by far my best sport, and the one I’ve been looking forward to the most. We run through Epcot and I am thrilled to see Mexico through Canada….twice!! The park wasn’t closed so we had a trail blocked off for us with cones. It was pretty funny seeing the looks on people’s faces as we ran right through the middle of Epcot as they ate funnel cakes and hot dogs on their family vacations. Except for the people who tried to cross the lane right as you were running through it, they never anticipate how fast you’re running and always end up just barely missing you. I almost take out a family with a stroller, but dodge them and keep going. I’m passing people left and right here and I feel great!! I’m yelling encouragement to all my TNT teammates and even some other random people. I just feel so good I want to shout!! I get close to the finish line and see my coach and staff members waiting to give me high-fives. I almost take their hands off and finish the run with a nice sprint to the finish.

Run time: 51:56 (10K)
Rank: 11 (way to coach Al!!)

Overall time: 3:19:20

Overall rank: 34

All in all, I a okay with this triathlon, even though I had wanted to finish closer to three hours. I cut myself some slack because it was my first one and I did completely freak out during the swim. However, I hate the fact that I did so badly on the swim and now I want to do more tri’s to improve my time, of course. I would not recommend this triathlon to anybody else because I heard they ran out of water on the run (and were telling people to use the water fountains) and a couple of people got lost on the bike due to poor (or lack of) markrs. The swim course was also pretty poorly marked and I wasn’t the only one who got turned around. The expo was the weakest I’ve ever seen, although the lines were short and well managed. It’s only the third year Disney has been doing this race (and they had to cancel the second year due to the hurricane’s) so perhaps this would be a good race if they improved the organization. It was a large race (1100 participants) so that was good, and Disney is fun, but definitely not worth traveling to unless you already had a vacation planned.

However, I had an absolute blast and completed something I’ve never done before!! I also raised over $4,400 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society while training for this race!! Thank you so much to everybody who donated and helped me out during my training. The coaches were truly amazing and I would recommend TNT to anybody looking to complete an endurance event, especially your first one. And to my awesome teammates, I can’t wait for the ride in Tahoe!! We’re going for the TNT trifecta!!

ATXTSX

DUDE G money you rock. I didnt know all your times. All i knew was that you did amazing. Way to go bro. I am very proud of you.

ATXTSX

Chopper question, are you always intoxicated when you post on az? Is that why i cant understand what you are trying to say sometimes?? But for some reason i still laugh.... .

shalinz

Good job G!

leolebo28

Kick ass G....but uh....can I get some cliff notes...hehe

htown

For sure Now I'm even closer if you need anything..

trancemission

Good Job G!! you da man...

G

Ha, a little clarification:

Those times are NOT my times!! This whole tid bit was an e-mail that a teammate sent out, so that is her times!

trancemission

I dont get it, why did you post her times?

htown

I think he meant to post only the beginning! Sup Grayson

htown

How far is ATX from Dallas? How long does it usually take to get from there?

htown

By the way, it feels good as hell outside.. where's a good place to grab lunch damnit!?

treyster

Man, that air filter still is not dry!! How long does it usually take? I'm dying to put the K & N on!!

KaMLuNg

iTrader: (5)

seems like a bug is goin around

KaMLuNg

iTrader: (5)

know where i can get 2 toyo proxies tpt??? 215/50/17??? i been looking around and its just rapage...

DeezNutz

I would think you could really shake the water out of it, and then just stick a little fan in front of it and be dry in a few hours.

KaMLuNg

iTrader: (5)

i don't know if u actually gonna feel any gain tho... its more mental that it is butt dyno effect..

leolebo28

Its like 200 plus change miles...About 3hours....depending on your driving habits..

KaMLuNg

iTrader: (5)

to G-$$$

leolebo28

Trey....bro...how the hell is it still not dry, what'd u do soak it for a day.....J/K....I left mine out in the sun and dried up in a couple hours........Definately shake it out as much as you can like Dan said and then you could try the fan thing.

trancemission

pussies.......

danny25

good, cause the word "magical" was used a little too liberally for a man.

treyster

I shook the crap out of it!! I'm still waiting for it to get a light green. The filter is still dark green, so I know it's not completely dry. I'll try the fan

KaMLuNg

iTrader: (5)

fawquer

KaMLuNg

iTrader: (5)

or a hair dryer

treyster

I don't think I ran too much h20 through it, maybe I did. Why doesn't it look like the red filter on the box? That one is red with a metal mesh around it. A lot better looking than the green paper filter with no mesh.....

trancemission

okay so far its me leo dan and drew. I think alex (mobilezen) is in as well. I PM'd Ron A (mod) on how to get the word out in the TL section. Hopefully we will have some good feedback on this. If we cant make this one work I will set one up farther in advance.

But either way..........Im going to bonedaddys with or without you guys Monday....LOL!!

KaMLuNg

iTrader: (5)

7PM it is!!!

leolebo28

Oh I'll be there....unless I have to go to services for Rosh Hashanah...but I think that starts on Tuesday....

And if anyone is wondering what the hell that is...its the Jewish new year...one of the biggest holidays in the Jewish calendar