BigScreen BashRing

I hate my phone. Camera so dark.

It feels like a month since my last post, so that's probably a good indication of how my weekend went. :)

Friday evening was full of excitement as we made a final decision and picked up a new TV. I've been holding out for 60" plasma but after seeing the quality of the picture we figured it was best to go with a slightly smaller screen but at the highest end model and picture you can get. Even at 54" it looks kind of small in our room but I don't think the 60" would have fixed that either. I won't go projector, it wouldn't look right with the lighting. So needless to say, it was a late night enjoying the new toy. I don't remember the last time I stayed up that late watching movies.

I got SUPER excited when I found that you can to You-Tube directly from the television. I got to watch all the Ironman Triathlon Motivation videos in bigscreen. A few searches later I somehow wound up at watching Prank Wars videos and LOLCats. You-Tube has that side-tracking power doesn't it? lol. Oh and incase that's not geek enough, you can do Twitter right from the TV too. As well as pull weather info on demand without having to use computer or weather channel. To finish the Nerdiness I made sure my freshly built Media Center PC got hooked to it too. Everything works like a charm!

Saturday morning was a slow go. You can't just get a new TV by itself you know, you have to have a new stand too. So we spent the entire day looking for a stand. Entire day. The whole thing. It was dark by the time we found one. At least we found one, and it is perfect. Mostly. I think. Nevermind, I'm not looking any further so it's perfect as far as I am concerned! :)

Yes, I missed my long run on Saturday. My intention was to make up for it on Sunday!


Finally installed.



I've been looking forward to this Sunday ride for ages. I was meeting up with some MTB groups to hit some technical trail together at Hilton. It started off cold in the parking lot but we warmed up quickly. The one group showed up with typical cross-country riding gear. Nothing out of the norm. The ride leaders, from the other group, showed up with full face helmets, shin pads, knee pads, elbow pads - full body armor. This does not look good for the casual weekend warriors. There were some nervous looking riders in the group lol. I know these trails and they have every right to be nervous, and then some. Heck, I FINALLY installed my rock-ring specifically for this ride. I expected to bash a few rocks as this was going to be a hardcore ride. :)

To my surprise, this combination of riding groups moved at a decent pace. It was not without it's regular bottlenecks but considering there was almost 20+ people it went swell. I stuck around for 3 hours, just a little longer than half of them. I wanted to complete the last hour but I blew my rear suspension. That, or it deflated. I haven't looked yet, I'm afraid too. This could be an extremely expensive repair. Borderline new bike/frame given the complexity of the shock. Either way,  admittedly I wasn't sad to go. I was spent. Physically I was getting sloppy, I needed to eat lunch and was making dumb mistakes. I'm surprised nobody got injured. Overall , a great fall ride!

Given that the ride was much longer than expected,  and much tougher, I decided to not run. I was so tired that I sat in front of the TV for the rest of the day and didn't move. While I got the workout of a standard bike + run combined, I still missed out on the important run-specific muscle/joint training. I know that no amount of mountain biking can replace the specific training required for running, I learned that last year, so I am feeling guilty.
I'll make up for my run wussy-ness this week though. This 'off-season' is supposed to be more run than bike. I suck at running and need to toughen up!

Edit: oops I forgot to add the weekly totals

WEEK 5 TOTALS (Set 2, Wk 1 - Maintenance Mode)

Swim:  2hrs
Bike:   3hrs
Run:    1.25hrs
Strength: nil
Total:     6.5hrs