Sisi's Rookie Year

My sister and I are seven years apart. Given my amazing youthful looks you might never know that I'm the older one, so I'll go ahead and clue you into that.  Growing up, my sister used to follow me around and irritate me to no end.  Oh, how the tables have turned.  My mom always used to say, she just wants to be like you.  Have mercy on her naive soul.

Left to Right: Older-Younger

 It's possible I've used this 'she just wants to be like you' leverage when I want to rope her into something.  Rewind to a little over a year ago, I started throwing out commentary about IMAZ.  My sister had grown up swimming like me, had been doing endurance bike racing for two years, and had sprinkled in a few half marathons.  Side note: Who rides her bike for 200 miles and calls it fun?!  I thought she might be a hard sell based on the marathon, but there wasn't much convincing needed; we signed up.

The next year was fun and exciting having my little sister racing with me.  She's a coach's dream. She puts her head down and gets the work done.  Being that we don't live in the same state, I don't see her as often as I would like.  We got to race together a couple times throughout the year.  First, we went to Portland for the Rock 'n' Roll Half.  Portland was not an easy course, but she PR'd by seven minutes.

Next up, we got to race a triathlon together at San Diego International.  It was her first international distance race and on a big stage to boot; she placed 10th in AG.  So proud!

We really wanted matching kits; this was the best we could do. 

In August, I headed over to SoCal and we raced the Santa Barbara Triathlon.  This was her first 'longer' triathlon and she did awesome.  We were both lucky enough to place 3rd in our respective AG's.

Twins?! I kid.

She came out to AZ to do the Women's Half Marathon a couple weeks before IMAZ.  Unfortunately, I didn't get to race with her because my foot was already in the boot.  She'd been nursing a bit of a knee injury, due to a bike fit, so we weren't sure how it would play out.  The PR Queen came through again and knocked it out of the park.

The Athlete

                                                                 

The Gimp Sherpa.  We love us some Zoot.

The big dance.  After this amazing year, words cannot express the disappointment I felt to not be racing with my sister at IMAZ.  However, this post is about her and not my pathetic injury me.  I couldn't have been more proud! We started the race together and then I met her at the finish line and put her medal on myself; it was very bittersweet.

Thank you TYR and Nineteen for speedy swims.  We LOVE our wetsuits.

The family likes cheering for her more than me because she smiles and waves at them.  She's much more relaxed than I am.  I should take some tips from her.

Giant should be knocking at this girl's door.  She's even been a model in their catalog and on their website.

Love it!

She nearly broke my heart here; telling me she only wanted to finish and make me proud. 

My sister is an Ironman!

She accomplished so much this year and I'm so proud of her.  With one year under her belt, she's got a bright triathlon future.  She doesn't even have a triathlon bike yet; I'm not sure I want her to get one.  I can already hear the footsteps looming behind me. 

My First Time

I intended on beginning this blog many months ago and I could never quite find the time.  As I sit here with my left foot in a boot, about ten days before what should be my A race, I suddenly have all the time in the world.  It's bittersweet.  In the time I would normally be fighting the taper, I have no choice but to be sidelined.  I know, cry me a river.  Trust me, I am fully aware that it could be so much worse.

Let's not get off on the wrong foot.  I grew up swimming competitively from the age of nine until eighteen when I decided eating Papa John's Pizza and drinking Zima's were too cool for school.  I quit swimming and gained the freshman 15 50, or as my almost-brother-in-law likes to call it, I ate my twin.  Somewhere between smoking Virginia Slims and attempting to mix in a few more salads, I joined the local masters swim team.  After swimming off my twin, I met some local triathletes at swimming who suggested I do a triathlon. 

I was somewhat familiar with cycling as my crazy Dad was into it and riding 200 mile races.  But, wait...triathlon involves running?  I don't even know how to do that.  Someone suggested I try running for one minute and walking for 30 seconds and repeating for 30 minutes.  Needless to say, that's how I started running.  I'm sure it was slow as molasses, but I didn't have any fancy watch contraption to tell me the pace; not that I would've known the difference. 

Needless to say, I signed up for a sprint triathlon, but before completing it, I had the braniac idea of signing up for Ironman Arizona 2006.  This is NOT something I would advise a sane person to do.  Yep, it was one of the most impulsive moves of my life and trust me I am anything but impulsive.  For the most part, I can't make a decision to save my life, but I am so happy my friend Susie talked me into that crazy adventure.  That one race I planned to do has turned into a crazy endurance athlete lifestyle.  This is my story. 

**Procrastination should be my middle name.  This was intended to be posted back in November, so use your imagination and pretend it happened.  I'll carry on from there.**