Better Late Then Never...

I ran for the fifth time since arriving in Abu Dhabi. Yes, Scott, that is what I said, 5th time... I'll need another week of low volume, "get-in-the-flow" workouts. It was 8pm when I left, the sun had set and it was only 33 (97 F) 63% humidity and "feels like" 40 (111F). I ran for 35 mins. My HR was fine for about 5mins, ~150bpm then it slowly crept up to where I was slowing down and still was ~165 at times over 170 as I ran across the street or almost tripped while running in the grass. Not pretty. Im going to buy a scale tomorrow and log water loss and various other metrics. Should be interesting as the summer gets worse before September.

Finally paid my membership to the Officers club. Very nice place. Very clean. Swam there today too, ~2500m. I tested out my new toy, H2Oaudio "Natalie Caughlin" iPod shuffle waterproof headphone setup. I had high hopes, but then I used them. I couldn't even get a good fit on dry land, so getting them to work in the water wasnt going to be easy. I was able to hear the music, but not very well. It wasn't muffled, just couldn't get a good seal. The earbuds provided are too big for my little ear canal. I'm thinking of ways to fix this...It's really nice to have music while swimming.

What else? I hope to have my Thule rack soon. My dad will ship it over next week after he finishes STP. He says he's out of shape...he's been putting in more miles than I have in the past several months, I have no doubt he will do fine.

Work is finally picking up as things begin to pile up...rather I keep asking for things and sticking my nose in all kinds of places. Sometimes I feel like a consultant...that might be my exit strategy...

I tried to sign up for Frankfurt today...no go, all full. So, now what to do? China will not close for a bit, so I can wait for that one. I'm thinking Switzerland now. It's the following week after Frankfurt. Still a nice course. And a great country. It's on my list and a place I have always loved since grade school. Might have to retire there.

Speaking of retire, Billy is on sabbatical now, lucky bastard. And nice race in Lake Stevens Bill. Looks like the bike course was longer this year. I was hoping you were going to crush my bike split, and you probably did if it was the same as last year.

Oh shit, I did my first "race" here last weekend in Dubai! It was swim/run/swim/run. Swim 1 was two loops around the bouy (~700m) followed by a 1.6k run, one more lap of the swim and another 1.6k loop. About 29mins later I finished, ran down and finished 4th. The run hurt, it was hot, even at 7:30am and the water, holy shit was the water warm. Like a bathtub, which made it not easy to push the swim. There was no cooling off in the ocean afterwards. But I did meet some cool people and had a good breakfast at Limelight Cafe. From what I saw of this area of Dubai, it was nice. A fabricated "beach town" feel...they tried. The beach was close to the Burj al Arab, the sail looking hotel. Apparently there is surfing by the hotel, but when there is surf, its super packed.

I've watched the first season of Burn Notice and Flight of the Conchords, up next, season one of The Wire. If you any suggestions for show I should watch I may have missed and they are on iTunes, let me know! My cable/satellite situation isn't solved yet, and I dont care. I get TdF on either Italian Rai or German ZDF, so I am good. Peace.