A plan to fail

There's that old saying "A failure to plan is a plan to fail". Well, it sort of looks like that's where I am right now. You see I got all excited about Rev 3 Anderson, got signed up, started training, and in my thought process for the race I kept thinking about the fact that I was getting my first full paycheck prior to the race, allowing us to do all the things we needed to do, including pay rent, buy a couch, etc. and still allow me to race.

Not so, it would seem.

After realizing I had misread the payroll calendar, I actually will only get one weeks salary, which while enough to pay the rent, etc. may not include enough funds for us to afford to drive 5 hours each way to the race site, plus eat and stay overnight on Saturday. We bought the couch last weekend, and even if we could cancel the order, I wouldn't. You don't know how much you value furniture until you don't have any. So, it's now just waiting to see how much my check is to see if we or even just I can afford to go. If not, I can defer my entry fee til next year, but I was really looking to get in at least one more race this season.

Training lately has not been without cost either. If you remember, I flatted on my road bike just a 1/4 mile down the road from our house in the days leading up to Cedar Point. Yesterday I had 15 miles planned on the bike, and was using that time to explore new roads in the area. Everything was going great until mile 10 when I heard that familiar sudden hissing sound out of the front tire. In the battle of $80 race tire vs. chip seal   pavement, I guess we know who won. Plus, there's a small gash in the tire itself now, so I think I'm pretty much done with the expensive-y (yes, it's a word) race tires. I do have a spare tire to ride for the time being, until I can pick up a couple of stronger tires (Gatorskins probably) later on in October.

Speaking of picking up bike stuff, there are several Performance Bike's in the Raleigh area, which I'm excited to explore. There's also a triathlon shop called Inside Out that we're going to visit as well probably sometime in October. If nothing else, we're probably going to need a bunch of tubes.

To end on a positive note, the training has been going pretty well in terms of recovery from Cedar Point, and in pushing myself a little. Even with some small hills (200 ft of climbing over 10 miles) both of my past 2 rides I've been able to average over 15 MPH. I'm running today and start swimming tomorrow. The pool at Rachelle's work is free to staff, and very inexpensive to spouses, so we're happy to be able to have access to a nice facility just a couple of miles down the road. And tonight I try out my new running shoes which were desperately needed as my old ones had over 400 miles on them and were completely worn out.