Sunday, August 15, 2010

Week In Review :: August 9th - August 15th


Claire is 25 weeks old and hates being on her stomach........wait a minute.......here she is sleeping on her stomach in the mountains??  She must have been super tired from the ride up there.  The only reason they let her sleep on her stomach was because she was supervised.  Otherwise, it is suggested that babies sleep on their back.


I didn't take any photos this week.  Here's a shot from Beth's camera in the mountains.  I missed all the action because things have really picked up at work and I'm slammed.


What a nice view from their cabin.  Jen and I will be going back here later in the month for our anniversary.


More mountains.  I wasn't there.  Bummer.


Ernie hooked us up with VIP treatment at "The Madhouse".  Ernie's brother-in-law runs the show at Bowman Gray stadium so we had the best seats in the house right by the press box.  Here's a shot from the roof.


I wanted to fit in as much as possible so I went with the Science Diet (cat food) mesh trucker hat and an Iron Maiden t-shirt.  When you're going to watch some short track car racing you better play the part.  I would have grown out a mullet or rat tail but Jen wouldn't approve.  Speaking of mullets........can you pick out the mullet in this photo?


RECAP:
Jen, Beth, and Claire went up to the mountains from Monday through Wednesday while I stayed home.  Work has been very busy lately so it was actually good timing that they were gone because I ended up working late from home both nights.  That didn't stop me from grilling a steak and taking down a couple of glasses of wine in the process though.  On Saturday Jen and I went to Winston Salem to watch some short track car racing and we left Claire with Julianna.  We want Claire to get used to hanging out with other people so we're trying to find things to do each Saturday.  Julianna is from Columbia (the country...not SC) so we asked that she speak to Claire in spanish so it might be easier for her to pick up on later down the road.  On Sunday I ran with Jordan as usual and then helped Watty with his deck for the remainder of the afternoon.  I think we will only have one more weekend before his deck is complete.  After that, Sundays will go back to being "family day" for the Frank household.

TRAINING:
Running: 42 miles @ 6:19 pace average :: 4 hrs 00 mins
Cycling: 99 miles :: 4 hrs 47 mins
Total: 8 hrs 47 mins

Training was business as usual this week.  I'm trying to hover around somewhere in the 40s for weekly run mileage and I added in another bike ride on Tuesday night to increase overall aerobic hours.  I haven't found any studies on the subject but I'm a believer that cycling hours do benefit running in some fashion or another.  Since I wouldn't be able to increase my run volume any quicker than I am without getting injured there really is no downside.  Plus, I've been enjoying the bike lately and it's nice to see the guys again.  I really needed that 4-5 month break from endurance training to realize that I actually do enjoy it.  That being said, I don't foresee myself doing any triathlons in the near future.  I don't miss the pool one bit and don't have the necessary time to designate to the bike in order to get into triathlon racing shape.  For now, my competitions are The Saturday Morning Shootout and any running road races that I decide to jump into over the next few months.

This week's training was nothing special.  Basically just trying to keep 5 of my runs at around 145 bpm and my Tuesday and Sunday runs closer to 160 bpm.  I'm just slowly building my base and the 160 bpm runs are meant to get my legs moving at a faster pace without major risk for injuries.  Along with that, even though it's well below lactate threshold they will still help to push the LT upwards.  Here's what the notable sessions looked like this week:

Tuesday: 8 miles @ 157 bpm ave :: 6:15 pace ave
Thursday: 4 miles @ 5:49 pace on treadmill
Saturday: Shootout Ride :: 3T beat NTT Nation by 35 points
Sunday: 12 miles @ 153 bpm ave :: 6:20 pace ave

Sunday, August 08, 2010

Week In Review :: August 2nd - August 8th


Claire is 24 weeks old and is getting tall.  This week Claire and I started to do what I call our morning tumbling routine on our Tempur-Pedic mattress.  The routine consists of rolling her around, placing her on her stomach and cheering her on when she rolls onto her back, and guiding her in the crawling motion.  She seems to really enjoy it and she's gotten so much better in just a couple of days. 


Jen's friend from high school, Beth, came into town for a quick Sunday through Wednesday visit.  We had steaks and wine on Sunday and then they all left for the mountains from Monday through Wednesday while I stayed home and worked.  That's right, I'm a work horse.


Jen having some laughs with an old friend over some steaks and wine.


Steve got the floor boards down on his deck during the week so all we had to do when I got there was to lay down the boards on the steps leading to the upper deck.  I thought we would plow through it but it actually took a while and I was heading home by 5pm for dinner.


His deck is looking nice and is going to be quite large and in charge.  Looking forward to their first deck party.


RECAP:
Aside from the mentions in the photos we had quite a busy Saturday.  It started off with a wedding shower for Kelley & Matt, followed by the criterium hosted by Sir Clarke Rodgers, and last but not least we made our way over to an 80s themed 40th birthday party for Jen's client.  Quite the night.  Unfortunately, we spent more time driving around than actually hanging out.  On the flip side, I was inspired to throw another 80s party sometime in the near future because the outfits were hilarious.

TRAINING RECAP:
Running: 47 miles @ 6:36 pace average :: 5 hrs 12 mins
Cycling: 63 miles :: 3 hrs 15 mins
Strength: 20 mins
Total: 8 hrs 48 mins

I'm still hanging around in the 40 mpw range and continue to make my 160 bpm runs my focus for now.  My aerobic abilities seem to be developing well so I just need my leg durability to catch up.  Once the two mesh I should be able to kick things up a slight notch.  It's been really nice to run with Jordan for my Thursday and Sunday runs.  Time flies by and I don't even realize that we've put in 10+ miles.  I'm looking forward to being able to do workouts together but I need to be patient or I will most certainly get injured. 

The Saturday Shootout was fun this week.  3T had their first designated bye week so The NTT Nation had a scrimmage.  My team was down by 8 points at the end of regulation and somehow we pulled out the victory with a late breakaway to win by 2 points.

For some reason I get sucked back into endurance sports no matter how hard I try to just live a normal life.  The good thing is that running is not as demanding as triathlon in the form of hours training and set up time.  The bad thing is that I'm OCD when it comes to training and hitting my specific paces and goals.  I'm trying to find that delicate balance between wanting to compete at something and still living an enjoyable life with balance and loads of fun.

Sunday, August 01, 2010

Week In Review :: July 26th - August 1st


Claire is 23 weeks old and is quite the joy.  She's starting to hold onto things and likes being rolled around and really enjoys pullups and bicycles.  She is smiling non-stop.


Claire decided to invest in her education and bought some books this week.  Her favorite by far is Skippyjon Jones.  Actually, that's my favorite one to read so it's now her favorite too.  My neice, Savannah, was repeating the words to this book while we were in Clearwater and now I actually know what she was talking about. 


New training partner :: I ran with Jordan Kinley on Sunday for the first time and the pace was perfect along with some great conversation.  Time flew by on the run and I hope we'll be able to push each other in the upcoming months.  I won't be much help to him in workouts right now but can fill in the gaps on some medium to long runs where the pace isn't too hot.  He's a rep for a vast product line including Karhu shoes, Craft apparel, NUUN, Fuel Belt, etc.  On top of that.......he wins every race on the local circuit.  I always think it's best to surround yourself with top performers in any field whether it be sports, work, etc.


Steve did a lot of work this week so all we had to do when I got there on Sunday was to hang all of the joists.  This took from about 10am until 5pm and I was a bit dehydrated from the run so I was on the edge of cracking at any moment.  We got it knocked out though and hope to be completely done by the end of next weekend.



Above is Jen's 10 year anniversary gift.  Jen has had her eye on the Volvo SUV for quite some time and we have our 10 year anniversary coming up at the tail end of the month so I put my viewpoints aside and took one for the team with this purchase.  I'm not all that big into materialistic things and for the most part neither is Jen so this went against the grain for us.  It was quite a challenge for me to buy something that is expensive, heavily depreciates and just gets you from point A to point B.  Since it will be a company vehicle the tax savings made it more appealing.  On top of that, a wise woman (Jen) once told me that a happy wife is a happy life.

RUNNING RECAP:
* 31 mi running (6:37 pace ave) :: 3 hrs 23 mins
* 60 mi cycling :: 3 hrs 9 mins
* Total Aerobic: 6 hrs 33 mins

This week was a scheduled down week to ensure that my legs recover before the next increase.  I'm continuing my climb to 60 miles/week with 3 hrs of cycling and am keeping everything pretty easy.  I did an aerobic assessment on Thursday where I run 3 miles @ 160 bpm and take the average of my last two miles to guage my aerobic development.  It's a short and easy method to guage development any day of the week.  I was 15 seconds faster per mile during this assessment (6:01 pace) than the last assessment (6:16 pace) on June 30th.  I'm still looking for this assessment to drop down between 5:40-5:45 pace before I get started with any kind of real workouts.  Once I can hold that pace without an increase in HR for 10 miles I will bump my efforts up to 170 bpm and add in some neuromuscular workouts to work the turnover.

My notable sessions from this week were the aerobic assessment on Thursday, the Saturday Morning Shootout and my Sunday run with Jordan.

Sunday, July 25, 2010

Week In Review :: July 19th - July 25th


Claire is now 23 weeks old.  Her neck is getting stronger and she loves to color coordinate her dresses with her blankets.


It's only fitting for the "Claire Bear" to have a bear's head on her butt.  She's starting to tolerate tummy time but still doesn't like it much.


We broke ground on Steve's deck on Sunday and were able to get the framing completed for the "upper deck".  His deck is going to have two levels.  The first level is ~8ft X 8ft and the second level will be two steps down and will fill out the complete 24ft X 24ft deck.  We got a lot accomplished on day 1.


RUNNING RECAP:
* 40 mi running (6:23 pace ave) :: 4 hrs 15 mins
* 68 mi cycling :: 3 hrs 11 mins
* Total Aerobic: 7 hrs 26 mins

My main focus is to build my base miles slowly until I reach 60 miles per week.  To kickstart the aerobic system I've added in a 60 mile bike ride as well.  Most of my runs are done between 145-160 bpm which correlates to around 6:40 down to 6:00 pace.


Sunday, July 18, 2010

Week In Review :: July 12th - July 18th


Playing around on the blanket with my little girl.


Jen's parents came for another short visit from Illinois this week.



Claire giving me the staredown while hanging out in the baby bjorn.


Claire showing her support for the largest mammals on land.


Clarke & Katie came over for dinner on Saturday night.


A nice shot of a beer that tastes great and is less filling.

RUNNING RECAP:
* 36 mi running (6:36 pace ave) :: 3 hrs 58 mins
* 60 mi cycling :: 2 hrs 59 mins
* Total Aerobic: 6 hrs 57 mins

Sunday, July 11, 2010

Week In Review :: July 5th - July 11th


Claire is laughing a lot.  She's got a really funny laugh that makes me laugh and then she laughs even more.  I say she laughs like Frankenstein.


Claire and I were playing Charades.  It took me a while to figure it out but she was playing out the Leaning Toward of Pisa.


Mom playing Pat-A-Cake with Claire.



Dad and I made 4 corn hole sets while he was here.  Marquette colors!!


We made two "Extreme Cornhole" sets and two regular sets.  The extreme cornhole attachment adds a 10 point hole and a couple of drink holders.


Dad holding Claire before they headed back to Wisconsin.


We moved Claire up to the level 3 nipple this week because she was taking an hour or so to eat.  She's eating much faster now.


RECAP:
The photos recap most of the week.  I also changed web hosting companies from WebHost4Life to Arvixe because WebHost4Life "upgraded" their systems and ever since doing so our websites were having uptime issues.  I had been using Webhost4Life for 7 years and told them I would continue using their service if they could fix the issue but after a few weeks I decided to make the switch.

We also moved Claire to a 4 hour routine instead of her old 3 hour routine and it seems to be working just fine.  She's sleeping between 7-9 hrs each night.

TRAINING:
Total Aerobic Hours: 3 hrs 38 mins
Running: 32 mi :: 3 hrs 38 mins (6:47 pace ave)

I've set some goals to get back into running shape for next year (2011) so I'll start posting progress here again.  This was my 3rd week of running over 20 miles.  My previous two weeks were both 23 miles.  I plan to slowly work my way up to 60 miles of running with 3 hours of cycling and hold there.  Right now I'm just trying to build a solid foundation of aerobic miles so won't really be doing much work above 160 bpm (lactate threshold minus 20 bpm) until I see that my pace and heart rate remain constant during my 10 mile run test.  I also won't be working above that level until my paces at 160 bpm are between 5:40-5:45 pace.  I suspect that will take another 2-3 months of aerobic development.  My plan is to run 2-3 runs per week at 160 bpm and the rest between 145-150 bpm to ensure that I'm working the lower aerobic zones as well.  The heat is definitely slowing these paces at the moment but I'm in no rush to start any faster work yet anyway.

Sunday, July 04, 2010

Week In Review :: June 28th - July 4th


My parents were in town this week.  They were really excited to get to meet Claire.  I hope we look that good in our mid to late 50s!!


My mom, Julie, relaxing and enjoying our dinners out on the deck.


My dad, Mike, thinking about getting us another Miller Lite.  He eventually did.


We made sure that my parents got a chance to feed Claire whenever she was up for a pull on the bottle.  They did a great job!


Here's my mom making Claire smart by reading to her.  I think they are reading a Math Physics textbook.


Jen and Claire on Independence Day.  Claire is sporting the red, white, and blue.


Nice family photo before the 4th of July deck party.


RECAP:
My parents were in town this week and I think they came at a great time.  Claire has more of a personality now and the deck is done so we got to spend some good time outside.  It's great to have them staying with us and getting a chance to spend a lot of time with Claire.  During the week my dad and I built 4 corn hole pits for the party.

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Week In Review :: June 21st - June 27th


Claire is 19 weeks old and is 12lbs 13oz.  She's getting really long and aside from her cheeks she doesn't look chubby anymore.  This week she started to give out her version of a laugh and it's pretty cute.



Claire and Jen wore matching outfits on Saturday morning.  How will I ever be able to say no to that face??  I'll find a way...


Jen and I have really been enjoying the deck.  We eat out there every night.


We had Brooke & Anne over for dinner and margaritas on Saturday night.  A good time was had by all.  Here is a photo of them from 2008 at their wedding.


Brooke is one of my old Norman Tech co-workers from the early 2000s and we hung out with him a ton back then and have been great friends ever since.


RECAP:
Aside from the photos above I was also sorting through all of our old photos this week to try and preserve them in a ditigal format.  We've got some great photos and I was laughing outloud while looking through them.  I was able to stain the deck and prime and paint the walls this weekend.  I didn't quite get to the trim work yet but hope to have that done by the weekend.

Jen, Curtis and I have a little competition going to see who can run at least one mile every day for the longest stretch of time.  Week one is in the books and I ran 23 miles for the week.  Competition brings out the best in us.  I'm still having some hamstring discomfort but I know that I just need to spend a few days in a row doing my maintenance routine.


After taking down some margaritas on Saturday night all of the sudden my armpits started itching really bad and then I was itching nearly everywhere and had hives all over the place.  My lower face started to feel numb and was a little puffy.  I must have had an alergic reaction to something and I just pray that it wasn't the tequila!!  I applied a bunch of Benadryl to nearly my whole body and was able to fall asleep thanks to the ritas.  On Sunday I was still very itchy up until around 12pm.  This caught me off guard because I've never had an alergic reaction to anything before.  I'll test out the margaritas again next weekend to see if I have a repeat occurance or if it was just a fluke.

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Week In Review :: June 14th - June 20th


Claire is now 18 weeks old and is 12lbs 4oz.
  She's a very talkative and happy baby.  She smiles all the time and is an overall great little baby.  She brings us much joy!


Here's Jen with Claire rocking her Claire Bear 10 jersey that Kate made for her.  She later went on to stain it after William Shatner gave her diaper a visit.


Claire prefers eating her hands over her bottle of milk.  They do look tasty!


We replaced the window with a sliding door this week.  It's so much more convenient to walk out the door versus climbing out the window.


All that's left is to prime, paint, install trim, and stain the deck.  I'm hoping to get that all done next week.



We had the Houser's over for dinner and drinks on Saturday night.  They live two doors down and I run with Curtis.  It just so happens that their baby Rosalie Marie was born two weeks after Claire.


Their dog Lucy was send home for breaking deck rule #23: Barking too much.  Luckily she only had to travel about 75 feet to get back home.


This Sunday was my first Father's Day.  I can't speak for Claire but I was a little tired from having a few margaritas the previous night.  We'll make naptime a Father's Day tradition.

Sunday, June 13, 2010

Week In Review :: June 7th - June 13th


Claire has a Christmas outfit that won't fit her by the time the holidays come around so we figured we'd take a photo now for our Christmas cards.  She's growing quite a bit as expected.  She's 17 weeks now and weighs 12lbs 4oz.  She investigates and looks at everything and loves her talking stuffed animal "Violet" and her Disney mobile.  Jen and I are only allowed to turn the mobile on for one nap each so Claire doesn't associate the mobile with sleep and have issues sleeping without it.


The deck is done and passed inspection.  We got some furniture for Dave & Laura's side of the deck to match ours.


We'll be spending a lot of time out here.  The next step is putting in the sliding doors and then staining the deck.


I finished the stairs and stair railings.

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