I Am the Luckiest

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I pray that wherever you are that you are able to spend some quality time with friends or family. This year, I have a lot to be thankful for (too much to tell you in this blog). A few things I am thankful for include:

-Supportive family and friends- Both in Colorado and on the other side of the country... you guys mean the world to me!

-Being injury free (besides a few minor incidents) this past year.

-2000 Olympics- The first year that triathlon was contested as an Olympic sport. Yea!

-Ben and Jerry’s Half Baked Ice Cream- For helping me graduate college this past Spring!

And most importantly, you, the readers of my blog! Best wishes to you and yours this holiday season!

Gobble gobble,

Amanda

San Francisco ITU Race

The race this past weekend signaled the end of the season for most and the last time I will race for almost half a year. It's hard for me to explain to you how weird it will be for me to spend that much time away from racing after constantly switching from cross country to track and back again for the past 4 years. It’s only been 3 days since the race in California and I am already getting antsy to compete again!

The race did not go as planned and definitely was not the way I wanted to end my season. In a year where I’ve seen so much progression in my training, I was never able to put all 3 disciplines together to have an amazing race. I guess Rome wasn’t built in a day…

I pretty much dug my own grave in this race early on after a disastrous 1^st transition. As I approached my bike and proceeded to rip my wetsuit off my body (the water was 56 degrees), the suit got caught on my timing chip and I struggled to get it off. When I eventually did, I had lost almost a minute to my competitors who had since exited transition with their bikes and were nowhere to be seen. I ended up riding the bike portion of the race by myself and came onto the run with quite a sizeable gap to make up. I was able to make up a couple minutes on some competitors, but at that point, the gap was so wide it didn’t matter. I ended up in 13th place.

This is a disappointing end to a season in which I only raced 4 pro races, but I know that it will only add fuel to the fire for next year. Now, it’s time for a much needed break. I haven’t had more than one day completely off in over a year because of indoor/outdoor track and triathlon season so I am ready for some serious rest and relaxation. Once again, thanks to all my supporters! I wouldn’t be where I am today without you all! I sincerely hope that you all will join me next year when I “put it on the line in 2009.”

Thanks for reading!
~AHahn

Chain-ges

Seminole XC ladies, back to back ACC Champs! Go Noles!

I can’t believe that this is the penultimate week of my triathlon season! Where does the time go?! After next Saturday’s race at Treasure Island (San Francisco), triathlon season 2008 will be completely finished.

Last year, the race was turned into a duathlon after an oil ship had trouble navigating in the fog and crashed into the San Francisco Bay Bridge, pouring over 50,000 gallons of oil into the same water the triathletes were supposed to swim in the following day. However, I did not participate in this race last year as I was still back at college running cross country…

Since this is the end of the year, I have been concentrating on getting the little things right for my last race and the races to come next year. A big part of triathlon is technique, especially in the swimming and running portions of the race. Quite honestly, technique is something that I’ve always struggled with…but this year I want to make the effort get it right. I’ve spent the past couple of weeks working with running coach Bobby McGee on my form. The guy is pretty much a walking book of knowledge and has taught me so many helpful new drills (surprising that I didn’t know these being a college runner) to correct my running form. Thank you Bobby! Also, I have been running around town inside a tire (trust me, although I look like a nerd, there is a reason for this!) As for swimming, I’ve spent the past couple of weeks getting some yardage in with a snorkel. This helps because I am able to concentrate on my arm position in the water without worrying about the breathing aspect of the stroke.

In addition to the technical aspects of the sport, I decided that it was time to take my bike in for a tune up. I regularly clean my bike so I don’t feel the need to take it into the shop that often. But, the other day when I noticed the chain clicking and screeching in almost every gear in the big ring and realized you could probably hear me coming from a mile away, I decided it was due time to take it into the bike shop. And it was a good thing I did. Although my frame was nice and clean, the mechanic said that I’d stretched out my chain so much that it was certain to snap sometime in the near future. Scary! So, 80 bucks and a new chain later, I am ready to go for the race next weekend.

On a side note, I’d like to congratulate the Seminole ladies on their 2008 ACC Championship!! This is the 2^nd year in a row the Seminoles have won and I am one proud cross country alum! At Florida State, it is a tradition that the flame on the Unconquered Statue on campus is lit for an entire night (sunset to sunrise) to commemorate any kind of championship (conference, regional, national). So, if you are in the Tallahassee area sometime next week, look for the flame!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone!
Q: What do birds give out on Halloween night?
A: Tweets!
Hope everyone has a spook-tacular day! :)

Training Adventures

As far back as I can remember, it's been ingrained in my head that if I am driving and I see deer, DO NOT swerve...always hit the deer. So, when I was biking down a hill the other day at around 40mph and saw a handful of deer in my way once I rounded the corner, my first instinct was to hit the deer. Luckily, at the last split second I was able to override my logic and somehow swerve in between about 4 deer to safety...talk about some serious bike handling skills practice! This actually might come in handy as my last race of the season will be very technical on the bike.

This has not been my only encounter with the wildlife of Boulder. Last Sunday, on the eve of Colorado's first snowfall of the season, the temperature was hovering around 35 degrees and was accompanied by a light drizzle. Because it had rained the day before, everyone (for the most part) was indoors. But not me. I am ok with biking inside on a trainer but treadmills are a different story. I cannot stand them and avoid them at any cost. Even on days when school was canceled because a hurricane was coming, you would most likely still find me on outside in the rain sloshing around before you would find me at the gym on a treadmill. So, I headed out on my 1.5 hour run from my house and ran to the dirt loop that is just across the street. It didn't take long to figure out that I was the only one out there. I didn't hear dogs barking, footsteps, anything. After I'd already done the 6 mile loop once and was on lap #2, something moving caught my attention in the distance, about 200 meters away. A deer perhaps? Nope. A mountain lion. I freaked out and I sprinted as fast as I could the other direction until I came out to the sidewalk near my house. I checked behind me and luckily it was nowhere to be seen. After telling my story to a bunch of my friends and family, I'm told that running away is the worst thing you can possibly do when in the presence of a mountain lion because the lion may mistake you for a deer. I guess I'm lucky this one was smart enough to know that deer aren't pink. :)

The other big news is that in addition to training, I am working 3 part-time jobs right now...but I'll save details on that for another post. Until then, train hard and stay warm!
~AHahn

Fotografias for Fall

I went on an "easy" hike up through the town of Jamestown with my roommate and her dog, Leon

It was also a good excuse to break in my Mizuno running kicks

A bubbling brook we spotted along the way!

Homeless No More!

Ok, so maybe I am exaggerating a little but yeah, as the title says, I finally have a place of my own. The best part is that I will be helping the worldwide effort to go green! How so you may ask? Well, there are running trails, the NCAR hill(to bike up), a gym and a grocery store all within walking distance which means I will be able to save on gas and walk instead. It's so pretty here right now, the leaves are already starting to change colors! I guess you could say that fall has fallen :)
P.S. Since this is my blog and I can plug whomever I please... if you're looking to read some interesting articles on the college cross country scene, copy and paste this address: http://www.trackshark.com/features/angelina/archive/
That's all for now!
~AHahn

Nationals Recap

I contemplated not writing this post at all. But then I decided that you can't make something go away by pretending it never happened. Further, I've always believed that any athlete who has a blog should not just skip over their failures and only write about their successes. So here goes probably the shortest race recap I will ever write...

This past weekend, the elite and age group nationals took place in Portland, Oregon with the age groupers taking the morning shift and the elite women and men starting in the afternoon. With a noon start time, I was able to sleep in until 8 (which as I've mentioned before is really sleeping in in the triathlon world) and take my time before rolling out of my hotel at 9:30.

The women's race had a noon start time, and since this was an ITU race, we were able to pick our spots to start on the pontoon. Since I haven't competed in an ITU race in over a year (Kelowna 07 was my last one), I had one of the higher numbers and was one of the last to pick my spot. I ended up choosing the slot between Julie Ertel(2008 Olympian) and Sarah Groff. I knew I'd have to get off to a quick/clean start in order to not get beat up and was pleasantly surprised when I was able to jump on Julie Ertel's feet after the start and hang on them for a couple hundred meters before she kicked it into another gear. For the rest of the swim, I really had no idea where I was in the pack of 15 girls. So, I hammered the rest of the swim, fearing that I might be at the back of the pack. When I exited the water, I glanced back for a quick second and was super excited to see about half of the pack still coming around the last buoy.

So, I sprinted into transition and had a good T1 before I headed out on the bike, knowing that I would most likely have a pack to work with after a lap or so on the bike. And that is exactly what happened. After about a lap, a group of six girls caught me on the technical part of the loop heading down into transition. The bike consisted of 8 loops of 5k each, and each time we had to pass through transition and over timing mats. As the group passed me, I looked for a place to settle in and eventually had to take the last wheel as there were no gaps in the group. As I latched onto the last girl's wheel she started to overturn the corner and had to end up braking to make the turn. This lost us the pack. We both sprinted out of the saddle for about 15 seconds trying to catch up. She was able to catch them after about 10 seconds. As hard as I tried, I didn't have enough power to catch them. So, for about half a lap I rode with the pack about 5 seconds ahead of me. No matter how many surges I threw in, I wasn't able to catch them. Over the next couple of laps, the pack was gaining about 20 seconds per lap on me. Then, after 4 laps, I realized the lead pack of girls were gaining quickly on me. I held them off for six laps, until they lapped me. It is a rule in ITU competitions that if you get lapped, you're out. So, my day was done. I was very disappointed as this is only the 2nd race I've ever DNF'ed (besides a race my junior year of high school where I crashed my bike and injured my arm and carbon frame), so I'm not used to the feeling of just quitting. I know I am in better shape than I was last year at this time, but that breakthrough race can't come soon enough. One more race to go for the year so stay tuned..
~AHahn

Countdown to Nationals!

4 days and counting until Pro Nationals! This is like the US Open in golf, the Kentucky Derby in horse racing, the Daytona 500 in NASCAR ( you get the picture). This is probably my biggest race of the year since I'm not partaking in any WC (World Cup) events this year and also my first draft legal race of the year.

I leave on Thursday for Portland so that I have enough time to scope out the course and swim/bike/run on it a couple of times before race day rolls around. Friday is the pro pre-race meeting where I will be able to see just how many women will be in the field. From the website, it looks to be a pretty sizable field but you never know until the day before who will actually show up since some register for races months in advance. For this race, I am competing in the under 23 age group which starts at the same time as the rest of the pro women.

This week has been a rest week in which I've significantly dropped my volume. So, for example, I usually bike 2 hours on a Tuesday but on a recovery week Tuesday I bike for only an hour and fifteen minutes. Hopefully it will provide me with that extra spark I need come Saturday at noon. Check back for a race update early next week.

~AHahn

Realizations

During the short time I've been in Colorado, I've come to a couple of realizations.

A) My car will never be clean. No matter how many times I wash it, the dust and rocks will always find their way to my car, giving it that rugged outdoorsy look.
B) On my easy spin days on my bike, I may get passed by mountain bikers. Enough said.
C)There are people 2-3 times my age (males and females) in Boulder who are just as fit/fast as me. See description for B.
D) High school football games are played on Saturday mornings. I found this one out the hard way last Saturday when I was searching for a high school track to do my track workout on. This was a shock to me because in Florida (where football is so huge), high school games are played Friday night so that the HS players can attend the college games on Saturdays.
E)Do NOT trust weather.com. The weather can change at the drop of a hat. A nice sunny with a high of 75 day can quickly turn into a 45 degree windstorm so I must always be prepared.
And last but certainly not least...
F) The "Cheese" Effect. You know how someone says "cheese" right before they take a picture and the parties being photographed have that goofy smile? That's the kind of smile I've unconsciously had on my face many days while training here. I just can't help it! :)

There's not too much else to write about for now. Right now I'm starting to wind down towards my taper week next week for nationals.
~AHahn

Busy, Busy, Busy...

Fat tire division for me? Maybe someday....

If you look really close, you can see the elk

After running the gorgeous trail in Nederland

As I mentioned in the previous post, my amazing parents drove my car all the way across the country for me. After they finished the journey, they stayed with me in Colorado for a couple of days before they flew back to Florida. So, while they were here, I had to get all of my training in and entertain them at the same time. It worked out perfectly because they wanted to see the mountains and I needed mountains to bike/run up. On Thursday, in between house and job hunting, I took them up to a trail called Caribou Ranch in the town of Nederland (not too far from Boulder). I've only been to this trail twice but it is already becoming one of my favorites because of the changes in scenery (from forest to wide open space with flowers) along the way.

On Friday, I had a little bit of a lighter day training-wise and we were able to go to Estes Park, about an hour drive from where I'm staying right now. Estes Park is the name of the town and within it is the Rocky Mountain National Park. If you are at all interested in nature/wildlife I highly recommend going (2 thumbs up). Because the park is a vast expanse, there are maps and signs within the park to guide you where to stop and take pictures or where to look for certain animals. My favorite spot was one where you had to look straight up a cliff to see elk blending themselves into the pine trees. :) After a great dinner at Grub Steak in downtown Estes Park and some homemade ice cream (there was 7 shops within a block so clearly it was a sign to stop), we called it a night. That's basically all the excitement from last week. Since then, I've been...you guessed it...training! Nationals is approaching fast, but more on that later!

~AHahn