Dead Flies EVERYWHERE

Today Chris and I headed out for a long mtb ride with some buds. It was nice out too; I couldn't believe the weather.

Chris and I met The Chad and Warren near Park City and rode our hearts out. I was so gitty with excitement for whatever reason that our ride turned into more of a race. I kept attacking The Chad and trying to pass him while riding over the weeds and bushes. I was crazy today out there I do admit. I don't know what got into me but I just wanted to hammer and feel pain.....and it felt good!! Oh my goodness what is wrong with me!!!!? And, The Chad responded every time too which was fun!! Then just when I decided it was rest time and would be cruising along behind The Chad, he would look back and freak out cuz he wasn't expecting me right on his wheel and he'd surge putting my heart rate right back up to the red zone trying to stay with him. There was no way I was going to let him go!! Not letting that happen!! And he wasn't about to give in either which made for a fun day :) It was definitely a game of cat and mouse the whole day and that was a blast! We kept each other on our toes.

Once Chris and I got home, we were expecting a few overnight guests and as a last clean up suggestion I asked Chris to dismantle the fly trap that smelled like a dead carcass......you know, it was the least we could do right? It's just those small things that really make eating a dinner out on your deck pleasant. :)

But as Chris was removing it off of the deck, it snapped sending the 1/2 gallon bag of dead fly carcass's along with the juice that smells like dead deer (to attract the flies in) sailing down 12 feet only to explode with force and splatter ALL OVER the lower patio area. Oh GROSS!!!!! So much for getting rid of the smell. UGH. I am hoping for rain now.....

Only a Sherwin I tell you...

Early Trick er Treaters

USADA rung my doorbell looking for a treat. Wow- mid afternoon on Saturday.........surprised I WAS home actually and luckily I was. Then after I gave them my sample they got me all worried that it wasn't concentrated enough. Oh for the love of god people.....I know my body pretty well but haven't managed to tell when I have the perfect concentration for the peeing in the cup process. Good lord. So they checked it and luckily all was well and they didn't have to stay with us through dinner waiting for a perfectly concentrated sample. My goodness. Nothing like talking about your pee samples on the net eh? Such is my life I guess..... :)

Thought I'd check the radar quick......

Think this is going to clear anytime soon today? Ha!

Perfect CX weather!

"Eyes just tryen' to stay in my lain"

That is what the guy driving the utility service truck told me today after he got no more than 6 inches from my bars while trying to pass me. I was able to catch up with him because the school bus that was ahead of him stopped to let the kids off the bus. Yes!!

I asked him calmly if he saw me.

Yep.

I then asked him if he knew how close he got to me........ which is when he told me "eyes just tryen' to stay in my lain"

I of course reminded him that cyclists are considered vehicles and should be given the appropriate right of way and to please be careful next time.

Does he really think my husband, parents, family, and friends are going to go for that pitiful excuse after I go under his tires?

Notta Much Happenen'

I haven't been writing anything these last few days because nothing new is going on really. Just trying to work through my infection, heal my ribs completely, fight off a cold, train, recover and test the waters of how far I can push the 6 stitches in my back in yoga. You know....just everyday cyclist things that happened to all happen at once for me. HA!

Where there is a will, there is a way!

"Fire, Fire"

I just got back from el doctor after he dug in my back for nearly an hour trying to get at my cyst. I think the only thing that stopped him finally was that I started to feel the pain because the numbing stuff was wearing off. It started to feel like fire real bad there towards the end as he was snipping stuff. For almost an entire hour all I could hear and feel was tug, pull, snip, push, squeeze, dig. Eeee-oooooooh. It was yucky and not the easiest procedure for the doctor or me to have to go through. I guess the cyst had embedded itself in the surrounding tissues pretty well which is why the Dr. had to "explore" the entire area to make sure that he was getting most of it. No guarantees that the cyst won't grow back either. Great. Love that news.

Oh ya, I got to start a whole new round of antibiotics too because the second I got through the last bottle, the dang thing started infecting again. Love wiping out all the good flora in my body. That rules.

After he got the last of 6 stitches in (of which most I could feel going in) I was offered pain meds - uh, that'd be a huge NO THANK YOU from me, thank you very much. I will just deal with any pain that comes my way. Better than barfing everywhere.

So lesson learned for me is: find foreign object in body = remove it immediately not giving it time to fester to this point. What a pain in more ways than one.

"Pepe" Sherwin

My husband got a write up in the paper on teaching Spanish. Check it out here.

So, I go into the gym wearing shorts and come out needing a down jacket. Wow. Things can change quickly around here! That snow wasn't there 2 hours ago. Cool "change in season" leaves though.

Tricky Weather

Today forecast was for rain and such all day along with cold temps. Oh well.....have to suck it up and train still. It was raining like Seattle crazy in Heber when we left for Park City but once we started riding we lucked out BIG time and didn't even get a drop on us the whole time we were on our mtb's. In fact the sun came out and there was a halo of clouds around us the entire ride allowing for the sun to shine through and warm us up. NICE!!

Heber Valley

I went out for a ride today and totally forgot that the Heber Valley Century was happening today. It was cool to see so many people riding their bikes in the good ole Heber Valley. I think it is also cool to see the direction Heber is going because when we first moved here 10 years ago there were not really any events but now there are more and more all the time thanks to many different event organizers.......

The 2007 Tuna Mountain Challenge happened last weekend and we have Cyclocross races coming up here this Fall/Winter too. And then there is the Wednesday night MTB race series that happens over the summer. It is so neat to see all that!

Car Wash

I just wanted to warn you all that I washed my car today.

That means rain for sure...

CX Practice

I got to go to Cyclcocross practice today down in SLC which was fun. It was my first time going and doing that and it was a blast.

The only part that sucked horribly was the enduring the Indy 500 on I-80 on the way down to the park. I was horrified.......it was not only rush hour but good lord it was like Frogger out there (ooh, I think that just dated myself on that one). A bunch of people that couldn't hold their lines around the curves in the freeway who would speed past you ON THE RIGHT only to come upon a big rig too fast and have to slam on their brakes (duh!!). I am talking no depth perception here people which is bad news. Then that same person would try the same trick a half mile down on the LEFT side (thank you) only to slam their brakes on because the people in the left lane (if you had been paying ANY attention) were going WAY slow. Don't people look ahead for Pete's sake? Good lord. And I will tell you I am no slow poke on the freeway and what I witnessed tonight was flat out ridiculous. It was like shooting stars past me, in front of me, around me, with no one going anywhere! Just wait until the snow flies..........aye yie yie.

Here is a video of practice Sly took in hopes of someone crashing. None of crashed when he was taking this but, yes, some of us did crash (hey, that is why you practice!!):

Oh, and for all you that I know have to make that drive everyday.....will you PLEASE be careful out there? For goodness sake!!!

12th Week Mark

Well, ladies and gents, this is the official "12th week" of my rib injury. The point at which the doctors said if I hadn't raced and trained with my ribs and instead chose to couch it from late June on ..... I would be healed.

Couch it? Seriously? When I was at the peak of my cycling career and fitness, just having podiumed in the national XC 7 days before I did this? Nope, sorry, not a chance. I wouldn't have been able to live with myself knowing the fitness was there while just calling my season "done". If I had put the bike to rest in June I would have always wondered "if I could have" and that is not something I wanted to wonder.

If I hadn't had raced the rest of the season, for me personally it would have been a regret. Yep, I would have been THE ONE to sit back decades from now and wonder if during that 2007 season if I couldn't have pushed through the injury successfully. Well, the sentence "pushed through the injury successfully" probably doesn't ring true in a lot of cases and it really didn't for me. But most importantly I know that now and that totally satisfies me. No regrets.

But lord it hurt while doing it. I know cyclists are good at inflicting pain on themselves but throw in some nasty injury on top of that during a race and boy oh boy you have got some great misery ahead of you. IT WAS NOT FUN but I chose that path willingly.

That said, the ribs are doing better but they are still uncomfortable at night occasionally. What a godsend just being able to say that last sentence is! I am able to train and live my live normally for the most part, its just the night thing and that will get better with time.

So I got smart and have chosen to not attend some major CX races that are coming up this weekend in WA and the one in Vegas in the name of healing these things up for good by the end of October. Hard choice but a mandatory one. I like to think that I learn from these things you know?

And I do.


I am NOT saying push through your injuries by any stretch, but I am telling you where I am with this. Everyone is different physically and mentally and so are injuries. I mean you may break an arm but WHERE you broke it may change everything compared to the person next to who broke his or hers. Its all relative. As for mentally, we all need different things to put our head in a good spot and my choices have put me in a good spot which is somewhere I recognize I need to be.

Knowing ones self physically and emotionally is half the battle and thank heavens at this point I seem to have a grip on that.

Why do we live is such an ugly area? NOT!

Cyclocross Skills Clinic

Ali Goulet......clinician extraordinaire:

Bart, Ali and I had our 2 day Cyclocross Clinic this last weekend for any and all who wanted to learn more about cross and/or how to do it and what to do in order to do it! All skill levels were welcome and that we got, getting never evers to those that have raced a ton.

Practicing and refining your technique is highly under rated and I am not sure you can practice enough polishing those skills. Even if you get them polished in dry conditions.....guess what?....now you need to polish them in snowy conditions, rainy, slick, muddy, the list goes on. That's what makes it so fun! (Sick, I know).

Corning, barriers, starting techniques, run ups, braking techniques and a nice plyo/pilates/yoga routine were all part of the fun these last two days:

This picture below pirated from here:

We even discussed some nutritional needs along with how to lay out a good solid CX training plan for the season.

Oh and, of course, Ali had to break out the water so he could soak the area around the tree to practice slick cornering skills. He is too funny:

It was pretty amazing to see how everyone progressed so quickly. These guys and gals were killing it by Sunday afternoon. I was so proud of everyone. You guys were all amazing and your are all going to do so great at the races!!

It was an excellent weekend of making new friends and creating new skills. I had a blast with all you guys and will see you out there soon!

CX Nats Reg Opens!

I am such a geek but so it everyone else. Here I thought I would be practically the only one waiting patiently WITH NOTHING ELSE TO DO OR THINK ABOUT on a Friday night for the 11:01 pm CST open registration time (.......I know, I know - get a life Kathy!!!). Staging for the Elite Women at the Cyclocross Nationals in KS is based on first if you are the defending National CX Champion, then by UCI Points, then if you were top 20 at 2006 National Championships and finally by order of registration.

And, as it turns out I wasn't the only insane one waiting patiently for the open registration time on a Friday night. A LOT of people in a bunch of different categories were covering their tail this evening. Some categories even got 40 to 50 deep in 20 minutes time!! It was kind of funny actually to watch the amount of folks that were online doing the same thing I was in the late night hours. And considering some of those people people were on East Coast time. Wow - that was a late night for them indeed!

This just proves how obsessive /compulsive, anal retentive, detail oriented and focused a cyclist can become and sometimes needs to be (I would most definitely fall into this category). Here we all are making sure in stinking SEPT-FRICK-TEMBER (when cross season really hasn't even begun yet) that we are covered for call up at a National race in DEE-FREAKIN-TEMBER. Incredible!

Contender CX Skills Clinic

Today was the first day of the Contender Cyclocross Skills Clinic in SLC. I went but I didn't participate. I had just gotten back from the doctor who wants me to let my cyst heal up on its own and today was my day off the bike anyway. You have to take advantage of those days for sure because they are rare!

But I tell you, I am glad I left my cross bike at home (very on purpose) because had I not, I would have found myself suiting up and participating in the clinic... which isn't the idea of a day off the bike. It was looking like so much fun and was packed with people out there to either learn or hone in their existing skills. I was chomping at the bit which is good especially when the time comes later in the season when you need that extra push.

Looney Tunes

Whew. The antibiotics are doing weird things to me for sure. "Poor Chris" is all I have to say because for him it must be like living with an Alzheimer's patient to some extent.....I have been leaving things open, leaving things on, not able to complete my thoughts let alone sentences, I can't concentrate on whats been said to me - "What?", I am leaving things half done, half ready, half complete and then walk back into the room and think I haven't even started the project. On that score I have been trying to put so many things in the fridge. What is it about the fridge that makes me want to put a book or my keys in there? I don't get that-why the fridge? Plus I am finding things around the house that I placed there these last few days and I think when the heck did I do that? "Chris!!!!???!" Poor guy is going bananas while I am already bananas. Only one more week of antibiotics.

La La Land

Today SUCKED. I took the antibiotics and pain killers last night and this morning woke up white as a sheet, sick, headache, nauseous, light headed, not hungry, dizzy, and all the rest. It was TERRIBLE. So after 9.5 hours of relatively good sleep I went back to sleep for 3 more hours because I couldn't even stand up without wanting to throw up. Sweet.

I woke up kind of ok and decided NO MORE pain meds for me. I will just freakin' deal with whatever pain there may be cuz I am not going through all that again. As the hours past I was getting a bit better but really wasn't concerned about that because I was concerned about missing my second day of training now! I mean already missing a day? Come on!! Here I am NOT sick per say. Its the meds that made me sick and I wasn't about to put up with meds ruling my life for today so I got my tail moving and did my training. Even put the heart rate monitor right over the open (but covered) wound. Screw it. I can't miss a day already plus I was feeling better with every hour! Turned out to be a good choice too as things went well. Funny how the bike and just getting out can do that to you sometimes.

Right after that I went back into the doctor again and he said the area looked way better, pulled out the packing and repacked it and left it open again with bandages over it. It will be that way until Thursday when he will hopefully take out the packing again and let it heal totally.

I told Chris that now I am a true Chatty Kathy doll since I have a gauzy string coming out of my back! Sick but true!

Day Uno of Training

Training day #1 went super well.....yoga, weights, running and cycling. Whew, that sure was a change from sitting on my arse every day this last month. But I felt SO GOOD on the bike. I have to say I almost felt better today than I did in the latter half of my season. Probably for obvious reasons too -the ribs are better and I am sleeping now!!

The trail running was kind of eerie though I must say. It is really just that I am such a chicken is all. I have never trail ran before. I have run, just not on trails. And good lord when you are out there on the trails you can hear dang near everything....the lizards scurrying away, the cracks of fallen timber being stepped on by moose or deer, all the flies ripping past your face, all the bees buzzing, rabbits making a break for it. It all scared the bah-Jesus out of me too and it was something to get used to as I started to peak over my shoulder hoping to not see a bear or bobcat or something. I mean really.... I am not used to hearing anything while riding except my own breathing and now I have to hear all this craziness they call the wilderness. Yikes! Then I start thinking geez, its not like I can just pedal away quickly if I saw something dangerous because I am on foot! As you can see, my imagination was hard at work.

After this I had the luxury of heading unexpectedly to the doctors office with an infection that has been brewing for days. I have a cyst that formed right under my heart rate monitor strap that went from a pea size (in May) to a dime size (in Aug) and finally letting me have it this last week by becoming red, swollen and painful. Time to have er checked out for the 2nd time and pronto....

They cut it open, stuffed it with gauze and sent me home with an open wound (they covered it well) along with Rx's for some lovely antibiotics and pain meds (which I cannot STAND!!!!!). Not looking forward to taking the meds but I guess I have to. Yuck. Off to la la land I guess.....

When Did I Become "Math Stupid"?

Good lord I can't do math anymore. I thought I had a whole 7 days more before I started my training for the 2008 season but that all changed when I got my training sent to me today. I was first thinking that it was nice to get it way in advance; that it would give me some time to mull through it and get questions answered. Then when I opened it I saw that it was for Monday the 10th start!! Yes folks tomorrow. Then I thought - What the? Serious? You gotta be kidding me. No way. Not true. So I go back into my training diary and start counting the days I had off in my off season.....yep....28 days - could have fooled the fool! I still swear its been 21 days.

I guess it must have been wishful thinking or something when I had it in my head that I started back up NEXT Monday! I have been thinking it was NEXT Monday the whole time too. Oh well. So much for all that stuff I had planned this week in the way of projects that I never completed in my off season!! Maybe Chris will do them.............HA!

Yakima, WA

Last night we stayed at our buddies house in Yakima, WA. And after meeting their LIVING frog, Harold, that had been frozen in a school lab experiment and brought back to life and after loosing their cat behind the drawer (retrieved successfully):

We got to check out the car jump (yes you read it correctly):

that they take this car and jump it on for fun!

They are great friends that know how to have great fun!

The Random Sherwins

Today we headed out of WA on I -90 and on a whim we stopped off at the ski resort that Chris and I met at about 12 years ago. We met in the singles line at Alpental Resort and rode the little double chairlift to the top together and the rest is history.

Alpental:Chris then wanted to check out the end of a Canyoneering route that he had heard about that supposedly ended just down the road from Alpental. We ended up hiking a bit – I was in flip flops.

He found where the Canyoneering route ends here at Franklin Falls. The last rappel in the route goes right down the falls:

Washington is so pretty and .......ok......NOW we will actually leave....

Merry Go-Round

I haven’t posted this last week because I have been on a fun but tiring merry go-round at home in WA. That is what you get when you go home to see all your buddies and fam too!

I LOVE seeing everyone but between driving all around the Seattle/Tacoma area, changing cars a 1000 times, making plans to suit everyone's schedule and going out to eat almost everyday I am happy to be getting back to Utah and crawling into a hole! I had fun but I am tired and looking forward to getting back on my normal routine that is just as crazy sometimes!