Rio 2016 Season!

This is the beginning of a new season, and maybe my last season as a profe, or better, a sacrifissional athlete, I mean, with no sponsors... 

In the next year, I will be completing 18 years of triathlon. Starting my adulthood in the sport, it will be time to review the idea of exclusive dedication, and maybe start a new career while I can still playing as an enthusiast athlete. 

(pic: mundotri.com)

Many stories, lessons, achievements and also frustrations, that Im sure magnified big time my life. I don't regret any step. Some were wrong and encouraged me to mellow out, many were right and also encouraging mellow!

As Paulo Coelho wrote in "The Alchemist", in the journey to reach the treasure of our dreams, we discover what treasures really are.

I will dedicate one more shot at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, but on this time there will be no frustration! At first, I never felt so close to be an Olympian, and second, is that my goal is to enjoy this journey and not only to be racing in Rio.  

It could seem that Im already resigned in case of defeat, but a really defeat would be not to take advantage of everything the sport has to offer. Im very optimistic that the results will come as a consequence of my efforts, and the main reason for my excitement is that I finaly figured out why in the past 4 years I had this "slow down" feeling, discovering that my thyroid was underactive (hypothyrodism), which I am planning to talk soon about it.

Yes, talk about it! Instead of mostly writting in here, I want to start posting more videos, I think it is a fun way of blogging, or vlogging (as video-blogs are called). Meanwhile I warmup the Cavanha's Entertainament Production du Brazil, LOL, I would like to hear suggestions of what to post or talk about! 

I will take advantage of this post to wish a new year plenty of strength (not luck) to reach all your goals (not dreams)!! ;)

Merry Christmas and a 2015 of Pure Life!! 

Catching up on the Blogosphere!!

Hello There!
Today I will summarize the last races, training and trips.

The blog ended up with a good delay, as I didn't want to rush any post. Instead I wanted to find the best pictures and describe every detail about my journey. But with so much traveling, pics and stories I was getting overwhelmed and demotivated to write about stuff that happened 3 months ago.
So today I wanna leave my blog up to date!

In the last post, Florencia, the Isuzu and I were arriving in LA, after racing in Las Vegas and in Pacific Grove. 

I ended up getting a cold and had an easy week, trying to recover myself to be racing again, this time was the LA Triathlon, which has actually happen in the city of Torrance. 

For sure one of the most challenging courses ever, and Im pretty sure that if they could, they would have us climbing in the swimming too! Lol

The race was a sprint (750m, 20km, 5km), and not only the ascents and descents on the whole course, but we also had half of the footrace over the soft sand of Redondo Beach, where soft was hard! 

(by Florencia Patat!)

I did a great race, I had no expectations and finished 6th, pretty happy with that, as I made the prize money cut! 

In the sequence I had to do another adjustment in the Isuzu. At this time the driver's window was stucked right open. Im seeing myself becoming a good mechanic pretty soon!! haha

We had a few more days enjoying LA, and it was really nice seeing friends, doing some workouts and showing this city I love to Florencia.  

In the last week we went to Hollywood, I drove also a Colombian friend who was visiting U.S. for the first time. Florencia was very excited about Hollywood and when we were just getting there the Isuzu couldn't keep up! Damn, it was smoking pretty hard, and I remember Florencia's scared face saying "OMG! FIRE! We should run, this thing is about to explode." haha Now its funny but I confess I was pretty concern too, I thought she had actually seen the fire!

Well, I parked the car and we all cooled down, the Isuzu was overheated. I decided to leave it there, so it could get cool while we could still visiting Hollywood. I was kinda glad the Isuzu had endured until then, we drove about 3.000 miles and this could have happened in so many worse situations. 

On the way back the car was cooled and the plan was to drive back stopping as many times we needed to avoid overheating again. I did it and we could drive back to my friend Bobby. And like that, I left the Isuzu in Los Angeles... That means more mechanic service awaiting for me in LA, I think this time I have to replace the thermostat. 

From LAX we flew to Cozumel, Mexico, where I raced a World Cup placing 62nd. And in the following week I placed 47th in another WC, this time in Catagena, Colombia. Both weren't the results I was aiming for, I didn't race well, didn't get any points in the World Ranking, didn't win any prize, and didn't had the media return I wanted. The only thing I didn't waste was the trip! :) We had been in such amazing places like the chichen-itza pyramid, a cool sinkhole, and got stuck on the mud only while visiting the Totumo volcano!!