Good Feeling!!

On September 30th was LA Triathlon day!!

It was not one of my best races in terms of performance, but surely a great one as far as sensation concerns. I felt great, and could push a strong race pace, besides I was not at peak of performance, I had not felt this great in ages!

On the picture above I am with my dear friends Bobby, who raced as well, and Valerie who was cheering for us!!

I finished in 7th place, and was very happy specially on feeling no more injury signs, after 8 months fighting with knee and hips.

The weather has been great here in Los Angeles, and with a great physical harmony I can't wait for every other training day!

On the following week (Oct 6th), I also joined the Santa Monica 5000!
I ran 5k in 16'01" (click here for results!)

A great fator on feeling so healthy for sure was the contribution of the nutritionist Megan Forbes, who I had the chance to meet while staying in Boulder, Co.

Since then, I have a very interesting meal plan. After a blood testing I got a food panel, and all the bad foods were excluded from my menu, as they could react negatively to my blood. So now, my recovery system will not lose time fighting food inflammations, whereas will boost muscular regeneration after hard workouts. 

The bad news is that I can`t eat more cashew, strawberry and malt!! I have also to be careful and use a rotation plan for another 30 foods that I have a moderate sensitivity.

A great thing about having Megan Forbes as my dietician is that she also does online consultations and follow ups, so if I have nutritional questions or even need to re-test my blood, I am covered in any US city!! #Prettyawesome!
For more info, check her website out: http://www.forbesnutritionalconsulting.com/

Back to races, due to a change of ITU (International Triathlon Union) calendar, I am pulling out from Oceanside and San Diego competitions. And now on I will be focused entirely on the Colombian World Cup to be raced on the new date of October 27th.

Hasta pronto Guatape!!

Photo Shoot in Curitiba by Studio Gaea

A whole month at my hometown Curitiba, and it feels like no more than a week.

The days here are flying and I am very excited specially about running, as I was injured for a long time, and finaly I am being able to build the workouts volume.

I am doing this post in between some amazing pictures made by Studio Gaea.

 Alexandre Carniere, the photographer, its a great friend of mine and he was my training mate when I was taking my first steps into the sport!

 The images were taking in Curitiba, mostly at Parque Tangua, one of the postcards of my hometown.

Curitiba its a very touristic place, and I could really check how incredible this city is while my girlfriend was visiting here a few days ago. (I guess no one would ever do tourism on their own city just by themselves! :/)

 The cold and hot weather are alternating a lot, so I have been training indoor a lot, on an attempt to not get sick in between races.

 I am finishing this season in California, where I am traveling to on the next week.

 Next races on my schedule are: LATriathlon, LifeTime Fitness Tri, Fearless Tri.  

 See you out there!!

Top 3 at Rio Triathlon!

Race at the Marvelous city is to join the useful to the pleasant!

 

Besides taking advantage of the awesome turistic spots, the race is really well organized and this event was a special celebration to Armando Barcellos's 30 years of dedication to the sport.

We raced the Sprint Distance (750m, 20km, 5km) in Recreio doso Bandeirantes and as you can see in the pictures it was a very tipic sunny day in Rio.

The water was amazingly clear!! I had a hard time on the start with more than 500 athletes, but soon I was around the leaders.

The 20k of bike was draft legal (although it was allowed to use a time-trial bike). I did a strong rhythm with Ascenço, but we couldnt catch the two guys ahead.

Just getting healthy after a long time injured, I suffered to run in a fast cadence for the 5k, and I was really happy on placing top 3 with that big field, where Bruno Pais got first.

Victory on my injury!! :)
Results: Rio Triathlon

From now on I have 3 more weeks in Brazil, intense running and focusing on my next race to be hold in September 29th, the Herbalife LA Triathlon.

Running Days!

How good are the running days! :) My last days in Boulder were kind of busy.
Starting with a hike on the Mount Edwards, in five friends we left from Boulder to conquer the mountain at 13.895 fts. We had to start in the early morning, so the day before, we camped on a base 30 minutes away from the beginning.
The camping was super cool. Pio, a Polish guy, save us with a camp fire. Then we added a guitar, a harmonica and the creativity of Sara to compose the song Alaskaaa, from where she comes from.
On the next day we walked around 7 hours to get to the peak and despite we were only walking, it was enough to make the lungs to work faster, as there is not much Oxygen after 10.000 fts height, but very rewarded with the stunning views!

A week later I traveled with another friends to Steamboat, where I raced an olympic distance triathlon at 6.700 fts height. The race was a lot of fun, on a beautiful venue. I leaded the race the whole time, although the Estonian Kristov arrived only 91 seconds behind. I felt amazing while racing, can't remember when was the last time I felt this good. Hips like brand new, instead I felt my knee a bit sore.

Getting back from Steamboat, on the next day I was already at Denver's airport heading to my home-town in Brazil, I stayed for 3 days in Curitiba, before another trip, this time to Brasília where I raced the Ironman 70.3. 

The main goal on this last Sunday was to finish the race with no pain, as I have just recovered from a big injury and I didn't know what to expect. In the last 6 months my volume of running workouts were nothing more than 25k per week, which usually are around a 100k. 

(At least on the pic I am the first, from left to right!! :p)

I swam, rode and started to run feeling great, but when I was already on the second mile I had to stop with strong cramps on my quads. I thought I would not be able to finish, but with a bit of walking, slowly I got back to the race, There were only 5 guys ahead of me, and as I was hoping to hold that position as only 6 athletes would be at the podium.

I was alternating going fast and holding the pace back on an attempt to control my cramps (not craps, as I told once to my good friend Magali lol). But at the end I could not take it easy with those cramps and I had to finish all out, as my friend Guto Antunes was approaching very fast. Another dificulty was the narrow path on the last kilometers, filled with age-groupers being lapped, so I had to scream asking for excuse! I was happy feeling that competition fright where you give all you have trying to go as fast as you can, and nothing else matters!!

Happy with the result, overcome injury and very excited to go back to workouts. Next week I will be continuing the running weeks, heading to Rio de Janeiro to race a Sprint Triathlon at Recreio Beach.

Looking forward to be in Rio!!

Be Like Water my Friend!

Not easy to write about races when it do not go the way you have planned.
I hate giving excuses, but on the lack of results, I have no other option... Anyways, my optimism doesn't make me sad when talking about my defeats.

I would have updated my blog earlier, but I had some events going on, plus a fun trip with some friends to a 7 hour hike at the Rocky Mountains, which I will be posting soon!

A few days ago I loved to watch a documentary show about Bruce Lee, I didn't know he was also a philosopher and developed big thoughts about the chase to be a virtuous fighter. His conclusion was that should be no pattern to reach the perfect punch, and each self needs to find his own way to get the best that he could possibly be.
"Be like water my friend!". Lee describes that you must free your ambitious mind and like water, be formless, shapeless and find a graciously way to pass through any obstacle you may find on your path.

On my way to contour the injury I still have for almost 10 months, I have been researching and looking to improve on all the ways I could imagine. I reduced running volume and started working hard against my hip soreness, sometimes doing 8h/week of pure stretching, yoga and a bunch of exercises to stabilize the core muscles with PT, TRX and other functional activities.

Here in Boulder, I had a great evolution working with one of Siri's Team partners, Integrative Healing Acupuncture. Todd Plymale-Mallory did an excellent job with acupuncture and deep tissue massage.

While I was feeling healed I had the chance to start running earlier with the help of Altitude Physical Therapy, so I could run on a last generation anti-gravitational treadmill, which defies gravity by applying a lifting force to the body that reduces weight on the lower extremities, so its possible to train with the natural gait and rhythm.

And the crucial point was my last race, where I could finally figure out this issues and had a turning point on my healing process...

Ironman Boulder 70.3 

With all the treatment and care around my hips, I was getting excited and thought I could finish that half Ironman. I was also rested and with my tapering up to date!

After a good swim, I hopped on the bike and just after a few miles my glutes were already in pain, I thought about quitting and like I struggled last month on Boulder Peak Triathlon, I was several times in between quitting and going as hard as I could.

Getting close to mile 25, I was getting used to that pain and could make a reasonable effort, pushing the rhythm with two other athletes. Ended up doing 2:16:04 for the bike leg, which is not a bad time for 56 miles. So then I started to run, and my ass was just like a rock, I started to walk while massaging it and this was the time my coach passed me by on her scooter motorbike and told me to quit. I was ok with that, because I didn't want to irritate any injury again, so I got a ride back to the transition area, and that was it, no more racing on that Sunday.

The good news, is that with all the treatments and pushing that pain to the extreme, it was really easy to detect which muscle was hurting (gluteos medium) and I could also determine that the injury wasn't coming from the run, but actually from the bike.

I spent some time researching about bio-mechanics and bike fit. And discovered that glutes are a very important part of the core, and helps to stabilize the hips, offering a more efficient pedal stroke and running stride.
Overloading it on the bike I could only hurt the muscle, but once my feet were touching the ground and generating impact, that imbalance could cause bigger damages on tendons, ligaments and fascias.

Researching for the most likely way to overload the gluteous medium, I discovered that the seat positions is a really important thing to look at, and the most further back it is, the more glutes will be required.
So maybe, if you girl wanna build your booty, you may want to keep your seat further back! :o) But you will also lose a lot of quads power... Not worth if your plan is to go fast!
So right after studying it, I moved my saddle forward on an attempt to use more quads and find a good equilibrium.

I am feeling a lot better on these next days, and today I just finished a run with my teammate Super Bird!! It was 10 miles with just a bit of pain at the very end! Probably the longest run I have had in the last 6 months!

Advancing like water flow and being supported with an amazing team, I am making my path towards to the next challenges!!

Boulder Peak Triathlon 2013

Not much to tell about my last race in the Boulder Peak Triathlon held on this last Sunday.
The idea was to do it more like a race test, to see where my performance was after such a long time without racing due to a hip injury.
I didn't know what to expect, also because I was still not 100% adapted with the altitude effect. And I did feel breathless just after a couple meters of the swim start.

(chilling a while before the start!)

By the end of the mile 24 on bike course I was not even hitting my worse expectations, and some days you just need to accept defeat. One of my favorite authors, Paulo Coelho, has a brilliant description for it:

“Defeat is for the valiant. Only they will know the honor of losing and the joy of winning
I am not here to tell you that defeat is a part of life: we all know that.
Only the defeated know Love.
Because it is in the realm of love that we fight our first battles – and generally lose.
I am here to tell you that there are people who have never been defeated.
They are the ones who never fought.
They managed to avoid scars, humiliations, feelings of helplessness, as well as those moments when even warriors doubt the existence of God.’’
Manuscript Found In Accra – Paulo Coelho”

Therefore being defeat as part of victory, on that day I was far from any good result and I was nothing excited to start those 10k run. And also motivated by the recent injury to not push that run.
I stopped at the end of the bike course, and right there was Siri, my amazing coach, who didn't let me look down, and pointed out some important details for my next races. The new goal is to have my body 100%, injury free, and ready to load it with wkouts and next races!

If defeat is necessary, this was the first time I considered myself out of dispute. Before I could be happy just by doing my best and would considerate some facts as a lack of luck. But on this time I didn't see any advantage of giving my best effort to reach maybe 60% of potential. The goal now is to reach those 100%!

When facing major defeats, beyond the lessons sometimes you also get rewards from fantastic friends!! lol
Thanks Sara!! I loved the note and fancy beer!! #surprise :)

Working out in Boulder!

Two weeks of acclimating and the workouts are almost like in the NTP pattern!!
Actually we are suppose to crave for Oxygen while doing any workout, the difference here is that the breathless sensation starts way before any sign of muscle fatigue, what it makes it kinda funny!

(Ward, CO - @ 9.440ft, pic: coach Siri)

The good news is that I'm already running 50k's per week, and adios to that hip injury! So the expectations are getting bigger (not much tho!) for Boulder Peak Triathlon in a few days.

(Heading to wkout at 5:15am)

Well deserved day-off yesterday, for the reason of two days ago... It was tense:

From bed to swimming pool, starting at 5:30;

Swim done, ate and took a nap;
Woke up, ate and went for a bike ride;
120km's later I was like trash!
The plan became short and clear: food and sleep. I didn't even have time to shower, and so, to keep the sheets clean I slept on the floor!
I blacked out, drooled, dreamed, and woke up thinking that someone was calling my name! Lol. It was already 5pm and I made a huge effort to wake up, as I had made plans with some friends, to explore a bit of Boulder that night.

(At Downtown with Gui, Pati and Alexandre!)

Today I am feeling way better! Just smashed another 5k swim at 5:30am again! And later Im going to do a run at the Reservoir, where the race is going to be held at July 14th!!
Can't wait!!

PS: Thanks Valerie for reviewing my grammar!!