30 degrees out, feels like 23, according to Weather.com.
MAC Championship race at Reston. Going to get my ass kicked.
The back is in the midst of a 3 day spasm. It's eased off slightly but is going away the way a guy walks away after a fight - it keeps throwing glancing pain at me.
I feel like ass because of the low carb Paleo Diet that I'm on.
My hands are cold because I was outside for 30 seconds and when you're dieting, you freeze easy.
There's a lot of snow on the ground but the turf won't be frozen yet, so it will be freezing mud conditions. Y'know, where it's not black ice / plain old ice.
Not even sure I'm going to be able to race.
Going to show up, ride some warmup laps, if that works, then pay for the race, go as hard and as far as I can.
Seems senseless. But I have to go. I feel like there isn't really a choice.
Good shape or bad, good results or bad, I go unless I can't.
I won't go well today, but I can in fact go, at least until I can't.
So I will go.
I am a racer.
It's what I do.
10 comments:
What did you end up choosing to do? Race or not race? I can't imagine racing in those first few weeks of Paleo. I would have been crawling. Hope you are doing okay!
Raced.
Oh my goodness was that a tough decision. It was super icy in warmups and I wouldn't have gone at all but Shiecken and Cernich sort of shamed me into it. It was warmed up a little for the B Master creating peanut butter mud in some places but treacherous handling elsewhere.
I actually rode pretty well for 2.5 laps, and was racing around people I have no bidness racing with. As Joe Jefferson put it, "McNeely is mid-pack. He's usually on the back!" Quite a vote of confidence there...
A bit of asthma and utterly cracked legs - like a bonk but without the mental derangement - completely destroyed me toward the end of the third lap and I limped back to the car to cough for a while, take hits off the asthma inhaler, and ponder what it would be like riding the same course while being 35 lbs lighter. More fun, I concluded.
The diet is working okay so far. I'm not being super strict - I'm aiming for "level 2" compliance with the basic plan because with a kid's birthday and Christmas coming up, some modest (half servings) of carbs will be in order. Can't not eat at least a little of my newly minted 6 year-old's birthday cake, right?
The pounds are coming off though. Going to focus on L2 L3 riding right now.
You ever try low sodium v8? 12 ounce can has about 70 calories and a crap ton of potassium. I drank those when I was trying to lose weight and lower my blood pressure. I'm not sure if was just mental, but it really seemed to help counter the "ass" feeling high protein low carb diets always leave you with. They sure dont taste the greatest though, and can be kind of expensive if you drink a lot of them, I found them at a wholesale club for about half the price they were at the local grocery chain.
If you add lemon juice to those low sodium V8s, they taste pretty awesome
I find that if you add salt they taste pretty good too.
Jonathan
Johnny - "ass" describes precisely the feeling I'm getting. I may try your recommendation, though I admit that I am opposed to low sodium on principle. You don't hear about people being the Mrs. Dash of the Earth, do you? And you wouldn't set out a Salt Substitute Lick to bait some deer, right? So, we'll see about all that.
Beth, Jon - Personally, I think Low Sodium V-8s are pretty sketchy unless you add Stoli, horseradish, Worcestershire sauce, and a sprig of celery, at which point they are delightful. Perhaps that's the secret.
Jim, Jim, Jim...you have to open your mind, my brother. Embrace new ways! Low sodium is good (unless your cardiologist tells you it's not!). You definitely want to replace some sodium after hard rides, so salt your recovery drink (I recommend something other than a V8, and certainly not a stoli with Worcestershire sauce.)
Well Beth... thankfully, you're a friend and mentor, and not my bartender...
I have cut back on sodium. Thing is though, I'm a sweaty bugger, and do lose a lot of it. I have it on pretty fair medical advice - an MD buddy who races - that a symptom I describe after hard rides where anything I taste damn near burns my tongue, signals a too-low level of sodium, and also maybe explains my post-ride cramps. This is more of a problem in the summer than winter. So I'm leery about cutting it out nearly completely, given my ability to sweat out actual ribs on hard rides. Lower sodium for now, and I'll try lower yet if this pans out.
How cool, someone called me their mentor! Awesome. I'm going to go to bed happy tonight. I trust your assessment of your sweatiness. Go with it. How is your BP?
BP - normal. Usually about 115-120/80 or so. A little higher when the doc gets on my ass about not exercising.
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