Happy New Year!

From a snowy Rochester New York, I wish all of you the most wonderful New Year’s Celebration tonight, and the happiest new year ever!

It’s my tradition to work New Year’s Eve…. I get Thanksgiving and Christmas off, so I make that trade. I have done it for so long that it is something I look forward to. As a pediatric emergency nurse I get to see a lot of ….. interesting…. things. Today I shall work 2pm to midnight and will have the opportunity to spend the ringing in of 2008 drinking Sparkling Grape Juice with my Peds Ed family and the families and children that are with us. It’s a strangely special event.

Once the clock strikes 12 we begin the countdown. When will the trauma bells ring and who will be the first to shoot his neighbor of the new year? New Year’s Eve is a big “shoot your neighbor” night.

To all of my fellow blogging buddies, to all of my wonderful athletes, to all of my wonderful friends, to the world for crying out loud…. from my family to yours, have a HAPPY HAPPY NEW YEAR!

🙂 Mary Eggers

Pausing

Its been over a week, the workouts have been light, the coughing has subsided and this morning I feel like 100% again. So I took a day off.

WHAT?

Yes, a day off. I spent the early morning sitting by the window sipping coffee, making myself a great farm fresh egg breakfast. Curt was already out training and Luc was still asleep. And I just needed to take a moment.

Its as if I am on a roller coaster that is pausing at the top of the hill, waiting to take the big plunge. I know these next 6 months and going to fly by. A lot of work in all fronts, and lot of focus in all fronts is what is coming. I have spent the past 8 weeks recovering and planning the delicate balance that I am prepared to hold from now until the end if July.

Oops… that’s 7 months.

Athletically I have set my goals, studied, broken them down. Determined what I need to do to hit those goals. With Coach T as the guide I have no worries that I will come up short.

Academically I begin Grad School in January 2009, and I have another degree to complete in the meantime. This means I have to adjust to sitting in class for 4 hours Monday evenings. If I could only bring my trainer…..

And there’s more but I will spare you the details. Bottom line is I have prioritized, balanced, organized, and I have prepared for a smooth flow.

I have gotten a lot of rest and now I feel 100% recovered from the year of Iron. I am ready to begin the real work in preparation for our Carolina Training Camp in just 9 weeks. I am so glad we are doing this because it gives me a big mid winter focus. The thought of riding through mountains with some sunshine and good company is enough to almost take me out of a day off.

It will be good times for sure.

So on this Saturday morning when the Christmas snow has melted but new snow is on the way. I took a few moments to reflect, to refocus, and to sip my Jittery Joe’s coffee. I took the time to sit back and watch the sunrise and wait for the little feet to come down the stairs.

Pausing, looking around, taking it all in before the roller coaster lurches forward and begins its descent…. has been the very best medicine of all.

Avoiding Illness

It was a beautiful Christmas here in Western New York. The entire family was together, we did a lot of sledding…. and guess what? The greatest sled on earth happens to be a an air mattress. Trust me on that one. I will be posting some pictures tomorrow.

One thing to remember is that we all get sick. Training happens or it doesn’t when we are sick. My old rule was if the illness was above the chest… go easy. Below the chest…. rest. I was almost able to stick to that rule, when I was diagnosed with pneumonia last week. After having it for over a week and forcing through easy workouts… I finally surrendered and had a chest x-ray.

The next day my 30 minute run lasted 4 minutes and 54 seconds before I spent the next 6 hours, and the entire next day in bed.

That happens when you are stupid.

This week has been focused on light workouts and getting better. My runs are feeling good, my bikes are fine, swimming is fine. All are slow, but this time of year they should be.

You can’t fight illness. And you can’t always prevent it. I know many who double dose on vitamins to attempt to prevent illness, or to try to get past it quicker. Here are my illness tips:

• Your body can only absorb so much of any given nutrient. Mega dosing is useless because the body will simply excrete what it does not absorb.
• Illness, colds, etc ….. the very best prevention is hand washing. Those antibacterial soaps are wonderful but remember it is actually the friction of rubbing your hands together that eliminates the germs better than the alcohol. Have nothing but water available? Then rub your wet hands together for 2 round of “Happy Birthday” and you will be set.
• Avoid antibiotics as much as possible. Colds caused by a virus will not be at all affected by an antibiotic. Many pediatricians prescribe them (not mine) to appease parents. You build up a resistance to antibiotics every time you take them. Have bacterial pneumonia? Yes, take them. Have a viral cold? You might as well drink water. You just have to ride a virus out.
• Do what you can, do it lightly, and rest. The lungs were designed to breathe in cold air. They are lined with tiny hairs that warm the air up upon entry to the lungs. Now, with a chest cold breathing in ultra cold air can cause bronchospasam and make you cough, so playing it safe and wearing something over your mouth is never a bad idea.

In summary…. you just have to accept being sick. There is not a whole lot you can do to prevent it aside form washing your hands and wearing a mask around town. Take care of your body, eat the best food you can, and give your body the chance it needs to heal.

Merry Christmas To All!

Merry Christmas everyone! Don’t forget to track Santa starting at 4am EST at www.noradsanta.org! From my Family to yours….. peace love and a very Merry Christmas!

Santa Tracker

I can’t think of anything I want for Christmas. I honestly have everything I could ever need. What I do know however is that my little boy Luc has instilled that feeling within me. Perhaps it’s his amazing sunshine personality. Perhaps it’s his absolute love for Christmas…. perhaps it is because he is the bravest little boy I have ever known in my life.

Have I ever told you that I named him after Luc Van Lierde? Have I ever told you that in the NBC video of the 1999 Hawaii Ironman, I am in the finish scene with LVL? (In the crowd). And in Triathlete and Inside Tri…. I just happen to be in the background there?????

Make your own conclusion……

He’s just 7 years old and truthfully he’s been through his fair share of stuff. Whatever he faces however he comes out the other side with a great big smile.

The day after his very first triathlon this summer, Luc broke his leg. He spent eight weeks in that cast, and you know what? It was just a broken leg. Bones heal. How did he handle it? He just did. He learned how to scoot on his butt, he learned how to use a wheelchair and he learned how to use a walker. When kids would stare and people would look at him with wonder, he would simply tell them “I broke my leg.”. I might have snarled and said “What are you looking at????”

On October 11, 2004 Luc had open heart surgery to repair an atrial septal defect, a hole between the two top chambers of his heart. We had known about it since shortly after he was born. On the spectrum of heart defects this was the best one to have. It was almost considered a sew and go. Except that they cracked his chest open and his heart was stopped while he was on bypass for 30 minutes.

During that 30 minutes my heart was stopped too.

When he arrived to the PICU later that day he was still intubated (had a breathing tube). He didn’t look scared. When they asked him to look at his toes, testing to see if he had regained control of his neck yet…. instead of looking at his toes he pulled up his feet.

When they extubated him he sat upright. With a fresh incision on his chest. I was told that in 10 years of PICU nursing, my friend Bill had never seen a kid do that.

I marvel at Luc’s attitude, his brightness, his lack of fear about anything. He is a kid who speaks his mind and if he has a question, he will ask you it.

I don’t know how this little guy became so amazing but I am learning so much from him.

This year for Christmas he wants nothing more than a Polar Express Train. Nothing else. Just a small train please. He’s been wearing a Santa hat for the better part of a month now. They even allow him to wear it all day at school.

This morning he woke me up…..

“Mommy!” He whispered….. “Look out the window!” I came to the window wondering what he had seen. “Look” He pointed to the sky. “Very small Mom.” I squinted. “If you look very closely Mom, you can see his sleigh.” He touched my shoulder. “But only if you believe.”

I believe little buddy, I smiled and hugged him. I want that magic forever.

Do you believe? Well just click right here to track Santa for yourself on Christmas Eve. Call the phone number and speak to one of the Santa Trackers and I promise, you will believe too!

Thanks for stopping by.

🙂 mary

In the News

I am very proud to be coaching Amy Moritz, one of the sports reporters from the Buffalo News. She’s new to triathlon, and cycled through Europe this summer. Problem is, she didn’t know how to swim. As she’s been taking swimming lessons she has made great progress.

One of the reasons I became very excited to work with Amy…. she didn’t sign up for the Ironman as her first race.

Amy is chronicling her journey to become a triathlete both in print and online. She’ll have a monthly article about how things are going in the Buffalo News, and she is keeping an online blog.

Click here for the first article in the series, and click here for her blog.

Amy was contacted by a man named Paul who used to live in the area, but now lives in Georgia. He has a really nice site called A Ticket to Kona. Take a look at this guy’s results section by clicking here. Notice his progress. Notice how consistent training has significantly improved his Ironman times. Notice he moves past the bad days and embraces the good ones.

And notice this….. his 5K time has not improved significantly in comparison to his Ironman time. I just had an applicant for my Ironman team who believed he was going to qualify for Kona in 5 years. He almost didn’t make the 17 hour cut off this year. He refused to swim more than once a week because the water was too cold, and in December he was doing 400 repeats on the track to get his 5K time down, as he believed it would help his Ironman.

You make the conclusion.

Specificity. Goals. Dedication and commitment.

Goaltending Part II

Thanks for the amazing comments, support and friendship. I can’t believe how lucky we all are to have this community out here. This Christmas I am feeling more grateful than ever to have such great friends, however, whenever and wherever we have met.

I did forget my number one goal…. survive training camp in February. Gulp!

Goaltending

The season is being planned and my goals have been set. Through the past 2-3 seasons things have not gone exactly as planned, but I attribute that to a lack of dedicating myself 200% to my goals. Yes there were injuries and nutrition issues, but in reality those were within my control. Blaming other things besides me, didn’t get me very far.

2007 was a great year for me. My 70.3 performances, lackluster as they had become, catapulted me into a renewed focus.

Ironman Lake Placid was the day things turned, the day I laid the demons to rest. I was flirting with 11 hours and found myself walking in a hyponatremic state. I remember making the decision, I could walk 13 miles or I could put this all to bed. I literally drank almost an entire can of table salt, but more importantly I made the decision to end the disappointments now. I was only 20 minutes off my previous best Ironman Lake Placid time after that.

As we headed into Ironman Florida Coach T gave me the kick I needed. The data proved that I could. The question was if I would. I raced Ironman Florida in completely in control of the world, knowing I could give more, go faster, but stayed within my box and myself and proved to myself that I could.

I just needed to believe it.

And so I sit here on the eve of the 2008 racing season. I want this to be my fifth and final Ironman for a little while. I love to walk away from and come back to it. So I want this fifth Iornman to be everything I can make it be. (And I can return my focus to 70.3 for a while!)

And the 2 1/2 Ironmans along the way I am bringing Mary back. The only reason I have not gone under 5 hours since my 4:48….. is because of the space between my ears.

So I am laying it down now. Here are my goals……

1. Sub 4:50 at Gulf Coast

2. Sub 4:50 at Mooseman

3. Ironman Lake Placid….. sub eleven.

My smaller goals that will help me achieve the big 3

1. Optimize my nutrition. Eat Clean.

2. Focus on the plan that Coach T creates with me

3. Run…. run…… run

I am dedicating myself 200% to this plan, to this agenda, to these goals. On July 20th I want to know I did everything I could do to get to where I want to go. I might fail, but I might not. In fact I will not.

Because as my friend E.L.F. has taught me, the race is won in my head, and as my friend Jen has taught me, I need to believe, and as my amazing coach has taught me…. I need to HTFU.

So E paced runs and sweet spot rides…. here I come. So mountains of North… or South… or whatever Carolina I am going to… here I come. So 100’s on intervals that I will not allow Grimm to lap me on…. here I come.

Because if I want something I have never had, then I’ve got to do something I have never done. And believe me, I am ready.

🙂 Mary

Running Again

I had to warn every single person I knew in Rochester. Look out… I warned…. we are going to be in for something new, something terrible and I promise they said that the sky is going to fall. Literally.

Sit down, I said. Take a breath. It’s going…. it’s going….. TO SNOW!!!!!

I know, I hear you gasp. I know how strange it is to live in Western New York and hear this very strange word call snow. I know the weather forecasters are trying to frighten you; we might get 6 inches… a foot… maybe even 2! Stock up on your emergency kits and hunker down people!!!! The sky is falling.

But let’s not let the weather channel in on our little secret. We’d steal their fun. Listen close everyone….. we are not new to snow! Holy Cow you cry! I know, I know. We don’t want them to know because what would they have to say to us?

Truth of the matter is, we don’t get frightened until power lines hit our houses. We don’t blink an eye until the feet total over 5. This is snow for heaven’s sake and we’ve been dealing with it all our lives. In fact… we even like it.

See, this is the United States of America and being that it is the good old USA, we can live wherever we want to! So those who live here, choose to live here. Those who don’t …. take a breath…. DON’T!

Case in point, my brother. He moved to Georgia years ago. Funny thing is though, he is immersed in air conditioning. Doesn’t go outside much.

My sister…. moved to Paris 8 years ago. I don’t know if it was the snow or the bad croissants that drove her away. Doesn’t matter she’s a full fledged Frenchie now.

So when Sunday morning arrived and there was a mere foot of snow on the ground I didn’t think much of it. Except that it was ass cold out. Ever been in ass cold? It’s just like it sounds. Ass cold.

But we HTFU ’round here.

And I was ever so grateful for my recent treadmill purchase. Because today was my first land run in 3 weeks and I was not about to go ice skating. But wait…. our mill of dread is not in the comfort of the house. Our home gym is in the garage. We bike, vasa train, and now run in there. And yes, today it was ass cold in the garage.

It helps us HTFU to train in there.
So I followed instructions and I ran slower than E pace and I focused on cadence as I ran a gingerly 30 minutes. It felt incredible, I felt like I had been given new legs. Could this rehab plan have actually worked?

So far so good. Pain? What pain? None, nada. Zip, silch. I smiled form ear to ear, hell my smile might have even been wrapped around the back of my head I was so delighted. Amazing this thing called rest and rehab. Amazing what happens when you listen to your body and to your coach. Amazing when you know when it is not the time to HTFU because to do that through a niggle only ends in disaster.

Happily running I will be, on the treadmill until the streets are ice free and don’t present a danger of re injuring a tendon. I feel great, hopeful, and ready. As we are slowly beginning to ramp up training I am holding a nice and steady low 10 hours a week right now.

Did I mention that I did 2 Ironmans in 3.5 months? My husband told me that I reminded him… enough. When I reminded him that an Iron Girl needs to take the time to heal… he reminded me of one thing….

I need to HTFU and shut the hell up!

When I am ninety and crocheting transition bags in the nursing home with my titanium walker, sitting next to the senile and over caffeinated Jen Harrison…..

“Jen in 2007 I did 2 Ironmans….” I will tell her, she will have Alzheimer’s by then and won’t mind the story telling….

“Really?” she will say as she sips an empty coffee mug. “That’s nice. Did they put soy milk in my coffee? I really need soy in here….”

“Yes,” I will tell her, “And you did Hawaii a few times.”

“Who’s Hawaii?” She will ask… “Was he cute?”

HTFU

While training for Ironman Florida my coach told me I needed to HTFU. To learn what that means and how you can too…. I suggest clicking here.

🙂 Mary