Tri to Endure

No more weddings

The two big summer weddings are both over (see bachelor party entries below). Which means my Usher and Best Man duties have all been fulfilled, so I guess that means I can get back to training.

On the swimming front, I've still been attending swim 'lessons' with the Masters swim club at least twice per week. The coach has me doing flip turns now, and my 100m free is down to a new PR of 1:09.6. Not that fast compared to the real swimmers on the team, but that's very fast for me. I only wish I could keep that pace for more than a hundred meters.

Pismo Beach (Bachelor Party #2)

Another good friend of mine is getting married this July, just one week after my friend Joel is getting married (see Kern River) - so last weekend we all went up to Pismo Beach for the bachelor party. Many of the same friends who went to Kern River for the rafting adventure were there for the ATV adventure. Most of these guys have been friends for over 20 years.

We were even able to get one of our friends to fly in from Germany as a surprise for the bachelor. It's good to have old friends, and especially good to be able to get together for events like this.

Pat (the bachelor) is in the center kneeling down

ATV'ing on the dunes

It was a several mile walk back after ATV riding. Check out the kite surfer in the distance. These guys would get 10-20 feet up in the air when they jumped the waves.

Masters Swim

I joined a Masters Swim club this week. It's the first time in my life I've ever done any sort of organized swim training. My first swim with the team was on Wednesday. What a butt kicking!

The best thing about it was that I swam pretty hard for a full hour without getting bored at all. Normally the thought of more than 30 minutes in the pool bores me to tears.

I spent the evening in the #2 slow lane, so there's plenty of room for improvement. Coach Dan said I had a good fundamental freestyle stroke, but there were plenty of things he can help me work on to improve my speed and endurance.

Tombstone

This picture shows the boulder (called Tombstone) that flipped us. This picture was taken on our 4th run down the river.

You can't see me very well in this picture, but I'm in the front left seat wearing my Drymax trail running socks. They really had to work overtime to try to keep my feet dry that day. The bachelor (sitting front right) almost wore a pair of cotton socks on the raft, but I saved him at the last minute and gave him a pair of my drymax socks before we left camp.

Rafting on the Kern

A very good friend of mine is getting married in July. This weekend, I went with six of my best and oldest friends (since Jr. High) on a rafting adventure down the Kern River in California. This was definitely a top 10 adventure for all of us.

The pictures below are from our third run down the river. After each run, we'd switch positions on the raft so we each had opportunities to ride in the front, middle, and back of the raft.

The best part of the day was when we got high-sided on a boulder and the raft went completely upside down and dumped all of us. We got to ride IN the river for a few hundred yards while the guide got the raft back upright and we all climbed back in.

If you ever get a chance to go rafting, I highly recommend it.

(you can click on the images to see a higher quality version of each picture)