“At some point you just have to let go of what you thought should happen and live in what is happening.” – Heather Hepler
This year has had its up and downs, good and bad but you have to roll with the lemons you’ve been given and do your best to make lemonade. Between 3 weeks of a nasty sinus infection (May/June), a wonderful trip to Europe (June/July), my first bike crash (July) and some minor injuries that prevented a lot of running – the plan this year was tossed out the window and I’ve pulled the plug on IM Chattanooga for 2018.
It was pretty heartbreaking to make that decision but the last few months have sent me on an emotional and physical roller coaster. In that roller coaster, I haven’t had the motivation or been able to physically to keep moving forward, so I finish my 2018 Triathlon season this weekend with Pumpkinman 70.3. We’ll see what’s left in the tank and hopefully it comes out with a great end result.
What I have been doing that’s been SO FUN are the New Hampshire Motor Speedway Cycling Races on Thursday nights put on by Sunapee Cycling. They’ve been totally getting me out of my comfort zone – think crit style racing with mostly men. I even had to get my wheel fixed once because one of the guys’ kept leaning in and his skewer kept hitting my spokes (I’d also like to say I kept it upright and rubber side down!)! HOWEVER – these races have been super fun, helped my confidence on racing and I was even able to make some moves and grab some points. I started later in the season but here’s how the racing played out:
- Dropped by the lead pack but a bunch of us rallied and started picking off stragglers.
- Dropped on the first hill of the third lap – HAHA. All I could do was laugh.
- With the lead group the whole time and finished in the top 10, this is where I first made some moves to try to help the ladies. The races are co-ed with like 20-25 men and 4-5 women.
- Was in the breakaway and scored some mid races points before getting caught and racing with the group the rest of the way.
- On the same course as Race 2 – I was holding my own until someone in my line hit some cones which caused the whole line to hit cones. Pulled the plug on that race because tri season isn’t over. Overall it’s so fun and I can’t wait for next year’s season!
I also did the NH 10 miler – boy 10 miles is a lot easier to manage than a marathon 😉 It was fun to do this race with friends and as a workout. It was a confidence boost a few weeks out from Pumpkinman.
Moving forward goals: find happiness in training, spending some QT time with my mountain bike, racing for fun with friends and spending more time with my family and friends in the off season before I hunker down and get after it for 2019 stay tuned!
In the meantime, here are some of the amazing things I did this summer!
As always, I’m super grateful for my amazing loving, caring, supportive friends, family and athletes, and the companies that keep me going: Coeur Sports, Drink Maple, Skratch Labs & my favorite bike shop – Fast Splits!
run, tri & smile 