Bikes and Triathlons

Other than swimming in shark-infested waters, you may wonder what we do to stay fit here in Brisbane. Mark got a new mountain bike just before Christmas and has been going on early morning single track rides in the Mount Coot-tha area near our house. Although (or perhaps because) he comes home muddy with cuts and bruises, he seems to enjoy riding the trails and often goes for rides along the river in the evening too. I'll try to get his to write a posting about his bike, but don't hold your breath.

I mostly hit the gym and do classes to stay in shape, but with my 40th birthday looming ahead in February, I signed up for another mini triathlon (750m swim, 20km bike, 5 km run) to mark the occasion. Although it’s not until March, I looked up some of the times from previous races to get an idea of where I would place with last year’s Danskin time. It was a good thing I checked because these women are serious, no “feel good - just try to finish” in this event. I will really need to get into top shape and work on my speed if I want to finish in the upper half for my age division. Marie, Michelle, PJ or any other swimmers out there, we can have a challenge for the best 750m/820yd time by March. I’m starting at 15 1/2 minutes with no dive or flip turns. I know it’s slow, but there’s much room for improvement.

Erik, on the other hand, has a totally different fitness routine, which mostly consists of jumping from couch to couch and wriggling around as much as possible during dinner. He also loves diving for rings on the bottom of the pool. At one point he wanted to be a “French diver” à la Big Blue (I can’t remember the exact film title but it’s about the guys that go to amazing depths without air tanks), but then some days he wants to be a submarine captain too. In any event, he is the thinnest of all of us and has boundless energy, so he must be doing something right.