As I sit here on my flight from Denver to Philadelphia I can’t help but think about how much I have learned in the past four months. About myself, about the human body and how it works, and so much more.

In late August I started my journey towards my doctorate in physical therapy. The first day of school during the orientation the dean told us about the academic policy. We had to keep a cumulative average of over 3.0 and had to get over a 77% in each class or else we would be on academic probation which could lead to expulsion from the program. “I totally can do that” I said to myself. I did really well in undergrad and although I knew this was going to be harder, 3.0 seemed doable.

Then classes started. Many of my classmates have backgrounds in physiology, athletic training, pre-physical therapy…and then there was me. The girl that could put together a set of financial statements but couldn’t tell you squat about physiology. After the second anatomy lecture I went home and cried. I didn’t know what a spinous process was, or how many ribs were in the human body, or where your radius was in relation to your ulna (I know all of those things now). It was then that I was sure that I was going to be the student in the class that didn’t make it to second semester.

I studied hard. I read the books. I googled things I didn’t understand. I talked to professors. I watched YouTube videos. I spent many Friday nights in the cadaver lab. I did whatever I could to try and get a grasp on what we were learning in class. Before midterms I went and talked to a professor about feeling overwhelmed and scared of failing. She told me “Lauren, it is impossible to know every detail of everything that is being taught in every class. You have to get comfortable going into tests knowing that you don’t know everything but that you studied hard and understand the bigger picture.” Those were very true words. Midterms came and went and I wound up doing well on them which gave me confidence for the rest of the semester. Maybe I wouldn’t fail out after all.

After midterms, on the one weekend that I didn’t have to do any homework, Phil and I planned a trip to the mountains. We hadn’t been spending much time together and a relaxing weekend away was exactly what we needed. On our way we decided to drive over Loveland Pass and enjoy the view. We got out of the car and walked around enjoying the amazing views of the mountains. Phil turned to me and said “Do you know what today is?” I replied with “Friday?” Phil then told me that on this day (October 19^th) last year (2011) we left DC pulling a Uhaul trailer on our way to Denver. We talked about how amazing the past year has been (moving, Ironman, school, work, friends). He then grabbed my hands, said some very sweet things and dropped down to one knee and asked me to marry him.

right after he asked!

If you have been following my blog since the beginning you know that Phil is my biggest supporter and always encourages me. He encouraged me to apply to PT school, he encourages me to study hard yet demands I take a break when he knows I need one, and he will still give me a kiss when I came home after hours of being in the cadaver lab. We will be getting married in August 2013 during my summer break and I could not be more excited.

The rest of the semester came quickly and before I could even grasp that classes were over, studying for finals began. With the snap of a finger, finals were over and I survived my first semester of PT school. Not only did I survive, but this accountant turned SPT did quite well. I now have the confidence that I know I can do this…even if I didn’t know anything about anatomy on my first day.

Reflecting back on the past several months allows me to really comprehend everything I have learned and achieved. And you know what? I am really proud of myself! While I may be homesick and miss east coast friends while I am living in Colorado, I finally feel that where I am in life is exactly where I am supposed to be.

Oh, and on the triathlon front…I did the aquabike for a 70.3 in September and took 3rd in my age group which was my first time placing. Since then I have struggled to even get to the gym to run on a treadmill. Endurance sports are going to just have to wait but I do think I will sign up for a half marathon or two this spring just to give me motivation to stay in shape and a finish line to look forward to.

Ok, enough reflecting…time to drink wine, get back into shape (my goal next semester is to make time for the gym!), plan this wedding, and enjoy time with family and friends! I hope all of you have a wonderful holiday

I made a pretty big decision this past weekend during my sprint triathlon about next season.

I did my first triathlon in October of 2010 and then spent the 2011 season training for an Ironman. I made a very quick jump to the longer distances and I loved it. All i know is endurance. All I can do is long and slow for hours on end.

It was very clear this weekend that I have a hard time pushing the pace. Speed is my weakness. Granted, my slower speeds may have had something to do with the fact of doing two hard hikes 2 days before the race which lead to awful calf cramps, but still.

I have toyed with the idea of doing another Ironman next year. I asked a few people about what they thought about me balancing my first year of PT school with Ironman training. While many said it would be doable, they also said it would be hard. Some said it was just plain stupid and I would be spreading myself too thin.

Ironman training takes heart. It takes every ounce of energy you have. It requires 8+ hours of sleep per night. And it requires a nice chunk of cash.

Next year, I need my heart and my energy to be focused on PT school. I need shorter workouts and races with cheaper entries due to my non existent income as a student.

Due to all of these factors, I am saying “see ya later” to the 140.6 distance and hello to sprints and Olympic distances for the 2013 season. I plan on doing another Ironman. I plan on doing more than just one more. But I respect the distance and the next time I tackle the 140.6 I want to be able to put my whole heart into it.

I hope the season of shorter training will allow me to become a faster and stronger triathlete.

What do you think? Am I less of a triathlete because I am choosing to race shorter distances?

What do you get when you combine several thousand people focussed on fitness, the most beautiful concert venue in America, and bumpin’ music (and then beer and food)? Fitness on the Rocks! It is the largest group workout that has ever been organized that is taking place at Red Rocks on July 21st. Oh, and it’s FREE! With my grad school budget (read: no money) free is the magic word.

There is something for everyone: yoga, turbo kick, boot camp and Zumba.  Stay for one class or stay for them all. And after you are done working out, grab some beer and food from local Denver food trucks and other vendors. I can’t think of a better way to spend my Saturday morning.

 and again, it’s FREEEEE.

The same people that put on Fitness on the Rocks also put on bootcamps, Zumba, and other classes (soon to be cycling classes too!!!!!) in downtown Denver called Fitness in the City.

Make sure you register soon before the classes fill up! So who will I see there??

I realize that the title of this post may have many of you tilting your head to the side saying “huh?”. I bet you look like this:

Your daily dose of the most magestic dog ever. You're welcome.

Let me explain. Last night I set out on an easy little jog around my new neighborhood. During the three miles at 9ish minute pace I started thinking about the sprint triathlon I have coming up in three weeks and I began to get scared. Really scared.

You see, for the past year I have focused on long distance endurance events where I never worried about speed or finishing time. I rarely ever pushed the pace. During ironman training when my effort got too hard or my heart rate got too high I simply backed off. But with a sprint, you bring the intensity the whole time. Balls to the walls.

The only experience where I really pushed hard was the Broad Street 10 miler where I both peed my pants and threw up at the finish line from running the last mile so hard. To be fair, my sisters engagement party was the night before and I may have had a little too much to drink. And I didn’t have a chance to use the bathroom before the race. But point is that I’m not used to being uncomfortable while racing or training. I need to become comfortable with feeling uncomfortable if I want to increase speed and become a better athlete. This ain’t Ironman training no more.

So last night once I spent 3 miles scaring myself about a sprint tri, I used my 4th mile to test my ability to be uncomfortable. My run already felt strained as my legs were sore from the many hill repeats we did at the spinning certification class in Sunday. I reset my Garmin to 0, and promised myself I would run as hard as I could until I heard the 1 mile alarm go off.

I started to run fast and immediately felt like I was going to die (exageration for drama but I did feel pretty bad). I felt like I couldnt hold the pace anymore and looked down at my watch which said .17 of a mile. Then I had this train of thought… “This is stupid. I cant do this. Im going to slow down. NO. Keep running hard. Oh my god this hurts. Thats a cute dog. Im hungry. Deep breaths. This is what the sprint is going to feel like. Pretend you are winning. Pretty flowers. Im hungry.” And then I heard the 1 mile alarm go off.

1 mile PR!

That is a 5 second PR for the fastest mile of my life. It hurt physically but was a huge win mentally. I can push my speed to the point of uncomfortable and as long as I stay mentally strong I won’t slow down. This being uncomfortable thing is new for me and Im not sure I like it but I know it will make me a stronger athlete.

How do you guys stay in the zone when you are pushing hard to the point of being uncomfortable? Does “Call Me Maybe” help? Because it totally helped me. Don’t judge.

As I sit here and type this I am about to fall asleep on my keyboard. This past weekend was INSANE. I didn’t stop until my head hit the pillow on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights.

Phil and I moved into our house on Saturday! We had wonderful friends help move the heavy stuff and then it turned into a backyard BBQ with 3 dogs running around, burgers on the grill, a fridge full of beer, and beer pong. Nothing was unpacked, boxes were everywhere, but I was so happy that our friends got to see our new house! We still have a ton more to do before we are fully settled in.

I think the pups were pretty tired too.

sleeping on the patio table

 On Sunday Phil and I were both up way too early (5am to be exact) to go ride bikes. Phil did the Denver Century ride because a weekend of moving without riding your bike 100 miles would just be too easy. And I headed to Fort Collins for a 9 hour class to become a certified Spinning instructor! The class went by really fast and it included two 1 hour spin sessions. I learned a ton and I am excited to start teaching! One certification down, one more to go before PT school starts in August!

I didn’t get home from the class until after 7pm and then Phil and I went to Home Depot (again) and unpacked more boxes before crashing into bed at 10pm.

I wish the boxes would just unpack themselves. Lazy boxes.

I can’t believe I have been in the Mile High City for 6 months already! I feel like it was just yesterday that Phil and I crammed most of our stuff in a Uhaul trailer and lugged that sucker clear across the country.

Meeting friends quickly as well as having many visitors throughout the 6 months has made the adjustment to moving much easier. People in Colorado are very welcoming and friendly- my kind of people! I was homesick at first for sure – and sometimes still am – but being surrounded with amazing people makes it easier.

Colorado friends!

East Coast visitors!

Making the move thousands of miles away from DC also had its hard parts. The hardest being a plane ride away from my family and best friends. I missed a few engagement celebrations and drunken nights. Luckily for me I have the best family and friends ever and they always drunk dial me so that I stay in the loop- oh, and they all made plans to visit.

Other than being far away from many people I love, a hard realization when you move (or get older in general) is that many of your friendships change. Some for the better, some for the worse. When I left DC there were some friends that I knew no matter where in the world I was, we would remain close at heart. And 6 months later, with thousands of miles in between us, my best friends are still my best friends- different time zones and all. (Thank you gchat, skype, Facetime)

 The hardest friendship changes to grasp are the ones where you put forth an effort to keep a close friend and that effort is not returned. Good friends while close in distance, but not from afar.

The most pleasant changes are those where you brace yourself to drift apart from someone and yet it doesn’t happen.

Many of my friendships changed within the past several months and while at first I was bummed that a few close friends and I drifted apart, I realized that my strong friendships are even stronger than I imagined and for that- I am one very lucky lady.

Here’s to many more happy months in Denver!

As a break from the swim, bike, run routine I decided to focus on strength training for a bit. Last week I finished phase 1 (of 3 phases) of P90x and I can see very visible differences in my body already- mostly in my arms/shoulders and abs.

P90x is a DVD home workout…but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Phil did a few of the workouts with me and we both agree that it is really, really hard. In fact I still can’t do all of the ab exercises without taking a break! The DVDs are mainly lifting workouts and since I don’t want to look like a body builder I used weights where my maximum reps would be somewhere between 12 and 15 (usually 5-10 lb weights depending on the exercise). Phil used heavier weights so that his maximum reps were 8-11.

The P90x plan also includes following a nutrition plan. Phase one calls for very little carbs and a massive amount of protien. I’m not one to follow a diet (if you tell me I cant eat something, it is all I want to eat) but I did lower my carb intake and really up my protien intake.

I’m happy with the results of Phase 1 for sure. The only thing that surprised me was that I gained weight instead of losing any. It was only 3 pounds and I cant argue because I see a six pack forming and I actually have bicepts and tricepts now. I’ll take the muscle gain as a win.

Phase 2 starts today and I will have to adjust the plan a little bit since I have two triathlons to train for- one sprint and one 70.3- in the next couple of months.

Its nice counting reps instead of miles for once! But now I’m looking forward to counting a little bit of both.   

Ps- I’ve been living in Denver for 6 months already- can you believe it!? I’m going to give a 6 month run down later this week. Moving across the country taught me a TON.

I rode my bike twice last week. TWICE. My road bike once and my tri bike once and guess what? I HAD SO MUCH FUN. Especially on my tri bike because I was decked out in my pink and black TriBella race kit riding my pink and black bike with my pink shoes and a huge grin on my face. I attracted a few looks from fellow triathletes also riding in the park…probably because they were mad that their race kit didnt match their bike.

Being back on my bike made me miss racing. ALOT. This lead me to sign up for the SheRox sprint tri in July. I haven’t done a sprint since my first ever triathlon and I am curious to see what I can throw down. Sprints hurt in a much different way than an Ironman. Sprint = high intensity for a short time. Ironman = low intensity for a looooooong time.

When I looked at the results from last year I noticed that I most likely would have placed in my age group. I told Phil that I would be pumped if I placed in my AG next month, but I don’t want to put that kind of pressure on myself and quickly dismissed the idea.

Phil told me that I need to go into this race with the attitude of winning because as soon as I let that competitive side go, I’ll throw in the towel. While I think he is right in many aspects, I have a hard time being a cut throat competitive athlete.

My plan is to go into this race with the mindset of pushing myself as hard as I can from beginning to end. I’ve never pushed my pace on the swim…I always hold back during the bike…and I always try and keep my heart rate down for the run. Not this time. I’m going at it 100% from beginning to end.

Depending on who shows up to race that day and how well I can keep the intensity up, my finishing time may earn me a trophy. And if not a trophy, a shiny new PR and a new love of the sport.

What do you guys think? If you thought you had a chance to place would you shoot for that? Or just be happy with whatever happens?

Let me catch you up on what has been going on in my life. I know I have been MIA from the blog world for a long while but apparently training for an IM, moving across the country, applying to grad school, taking prereq classes, and working a full time job all at once is all hard to balance and I needed a break. I needed time to get my feet planted in Denver. I needed time to not have many obligations. I needed to relax.

I’m back now.

So to catch you up to speed…

Phil and I bought a house! It is a beautiful home with a large backyard in a great area of Denver. I’m so excited for this next step in our lives. We move in in two weeks!

I am finished with all of my prerequisite classes for PT school! It took two years, but they are finally over. I am all set to start my doctorate program in August!

I finally feel comfortable and settled in Denver. It took a little while and it took some hard realizations. Luckily, I met some amazing people early on that made settling in a little easier. The hardest part about moving is having the realization of “who your real friends are”. My mom told me it would happen, and (like always) she was right.

I am only signed up for one triathlon so far this season. The reason? Money. Triathlons are expensive and with buying a house and taking out loans for school, I had to sacrifice quantities of races. There will only be one 70.3. But I will train hard and execute it as best as I can. I can still consider myself a triathlete even though I’m not racing every weekend, right? (Separate post to come on this topic soon)

I am becoming a certified SPINNING instructor on June 17th. I’m really excited. It will be a fun and great way to make some extra cash while in PT school.

I am spending the long weekend in the mountains with a ton of people this weekend and I am so excited. It will also be Brizzy’s first camping trip. I’ll let you know how a pug does with camping.

I am heading to San Fran with one of my closest friends, Kate in two weeks. The same Kate that broke her face when we wrecked our bikes. I am cheering her on during a tri and then we are spending the next several days drinking wine in Napa.

I get to spend 2 weeks at home in Philly in August for my sisters wedding. There is also a beach trip planned with my college roomates. We are all super close and it has been a long time since we were all in the same place at the same time. It will be epic. Yes, I used the word epic. Twice.  

That’s a quick summary but I’m excited to be blogging again be back next week with a recap of our camping trip!

I haven’t touched my bike in months. I’m scared to ride it. Here is the untold story of why…

It was three weeks before Ironman Cozumel and Kate, Nick, and I were going on our last ‘long’ ride of 45 miles before our bikes needed to be shipped to the race. We were riding safely in single file down MacArthur Blvd- a popular DC spot for cyclists.

We were desending down a hill - safely- all of us out of our aerobars and with our fingers tapping our brakes. There were cars in front, behind, and in the other lane so this was no time to try and fly down the hill. 

We had been following a black Ford F150 for the past several hundred yards. He knew we were behind him. Suddenly, without warning, the F150 came to a COMPLETE STOP. He slammed on his brakes to make a left hand turn. I was the front cyclist and I had four choices: 1. swirve to the right into a ditch 2. swirve to the left into oncoming traffic 3. slam into the back of his truck 4. jump ship…er, bike.

I chose option 4. I tried to stop but as I saw myself getting closer to the truck I made the decision to hit the ground. I went down onto my right hand side and began sliding. I heard Kate scream behind me and then heard her crash.

All of the cars around us stopped. Except for the F150 who clearly saw us all wreck, and he proceeded to make the left hand turn, never to be seen again. I laid there for a second trying to see if any of my bones were broken…they weren’t. Luckily I was wearing long sleeves and pants because the whole right hand side of my body was scraped and the clothes were ripped. I can’t imagine what it would have been like had I not been covered with clothes.

When Kate saw me bail, she also had to bail but she had to go OVER her bike to avoid hitting me. She landed on her face- chipping her front tooth and hitting her chin on the pavement so hard that we all took a trip to the emergency room for her to get stitches.

Nick, who was behind both of us, said it was the scariest thing he had seen. He though both of us broke several bones and that we would be watching Ironman from the sidelines. By some grace of god, neither of us broke anything, but we were both severly bruised- Kate more so than me.

We were both scared to get on our bikes after that. In fact, the next time I rode my bike outside was during the race. In case you didn’t know- Kate and I both finished…bruised bodies and all.  

But the memory of that wreck plays over in my mind often. So often that I have a very real fear of riding outside. I love my bike…I love riding it…but I’m scared that the next Ford F150 that comes along, I may not be able to walk away as lucky.

What advice do you have for me on how to get back out there? The weather is nice and my bike is starting to hate me for letting her sit inside all the time.