So...An Update

So, I haven't posted in a while and I didn't come out with my January goals/resolutions for the year like I did the past two years. But, this year has been different. I'm closing in on the last few days of my final internship for physical therapy school. After my last day, I will have a week and a half before I sit for my boards exam, a 5.25 hour test that decides whether I can practice or not. Three days later I will be graduating with my Doctorate of Physical Therapy. I've also been interviewing for jobs, contemplating my offers and where I will begin my career, planning trips, and oh yeah, rehabbing another surgery!

I had hand surgery the day after Christmas in 2013. The procedure that was done in the operating room was the last resort that was discussed in the clinic and the recovery process had not been fully discussed. So, I was a little surprised when I was finally able to talk to the doctor and found out I would be in a brace for 8 weeks and not able to ride my bike for a full 10 weeks. This set me back a bit with all things cycling. However, this wasn't the first setback. The first was the burn-out and trudge through the burn-out at the end of the year in the 2013 season. I no longer had the drive and passion to get in the saddle like I did in the beginning of 2013. When you combine that with hand surgery limitations, working 45-50 hours a week (paying to work I should say), studying for boards exam, job hunting, and a few trips out of town, it's hard to get motivated to put in the required time on the bike to be at the level I would be satisfied with. I'm not going to half-ass it. I'm not going to ride just enough to show up to races and hang on. If I do it, I'm going to do it right and really commit to it.

So, that's what I've been doing recently and where my decisions have come from and the stance on racing my bike this year. I'm not giving it up completely, but I am definitely limited in what I will be able to do: because of the start to the year and some stuff going on in the summer, that's another post though.

I do still have some goals/expectations for the year, some I've even already accomplished.

1) Travel more, similar to last year, but I got to keep it going. Places I've never been. Things I've never seen. (Checking places off: Vegas, Grand Canyon, Antelope Canyon, Hoover Dam, Bristol, Asheville)
2) Complete the 'Chattanooga Things To Do' list before I move away (I've been working on it).
3) Graduate PT school and pass my boards exam.
4) Get my first 'real job' with a salary and benefits and all.
5) Watch 'Uncle Sam' take most of my money and understand the plight of the working man.
6) Obtain my Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist certification. (Done)
7) Move into an apartment by myself; oh the sweet serenity that awaits.
8) Be conversational in Spanish
9) Be a better Man


More to come.

Driving past the Ocoee on the way to Asheville, NC

Basilica of St. Lawrence in Asheville

Another Asheville church and my beautiful travel companion

Ambitious 2012

Just like everybody else, the new year brings new goals and ambitions for me. Unlike everybody else, I will actually follow through with them. Heck, I've already made progress on three of them.

So here are a few of them:

#1 Win Xterra Southeastern Championships, this is largely dependent on a good run which is where goal 2 comes in
#2 Put up a sub 45 min run split at Southeasterns

Now goal three is a little tricky. Yes, I want to just go ahead and commit to it, but I don't want to show up and be embarrassed and waste the money and time and time away from school. So goal three is dependent upon completion of goal 1 and 2

#3 Race (WIN) Xterra USA National Championship
#4 Claim the Xterra Regional Championship Jersey
#5 Race at least 3 crits
#6 Win the TN crit state championship
#7 Take a girl out on a real date, not just hang out at some party
#8 Eliminate irresponsible nights of mayhem
#9 Under social obligations I guess I must include do well in school and my first rotation coming up this summer

I found this article/list of pretty good resolutions too. Not saying I'm shooting for all of them, but I think numbers 4, 9, 11, and 15 are pretty good ones that I have incorporated into my life. (Supposedly there has been some confusion. I do know my math and that I haven't listed 15 goals here. The numbers are a reference to another article that you can find by clicking the hyperlink at the beginning of the paragraph, "article/list".)


There. So now that they are down on paper and displayed to the public, they are real goals. I can be held accountable and will hold myself accountable.


Forgot to put the goal of riding 5,000 miles. I did a rough collection of my actual miles from 2011 and came up with 3,125 miles ridden. I didn't set up my training log to tally this so this is what I could come up with retrospectively. It had to be at least this much. Should make for some fun time in the saddle.

Grad School Update

Wow, it's been quite some time. I have neglected my posting for "higher education" and "more important" endeavors. Not sure I agree with all those terms. I really miss racing right now and writing about the great times I had. Since I originally said this blog would be about my racing and my schooling, I guess I need to include some posts about graduate school.

Far too many things have occurred since my last post and the beginning of semester to attempt to summarize the trip it has been, but I can say it has been busy and very informative. Just this afternoon I had my hands in a man's chest and cut out both of his lungs. Yes, we are doing cadaver dissections in my gross anatomy class. That class is where 78% of my attention and studying has been going over the semester. I have done exceptionally well so far. Well, except for the most recent test. Not a great showing for me, but it will do. My dissection group is great. Thankfully, it consists of three amiable girls that let me do all of the fun, nasty parts of dissection. It also means that we have great gossip around the tank and get to discuss who looked super cute that day in class. We started on Bobley and then moved to Betty Sue. Betty Sue is textbook perfect and was a great time. Tina was not as easy to handle, but we ended up with a very easy dissection for her. Now wrapping the semester up I got to use the bone saw last Friday to cut through ribs, sternum, and the clavicle to reflect the thoracic cage. Lab has been an amazing tool to help me understand the body and get a very firm grasp on muscles, nerves, vessels, fiber orientation, fascia, and of course subcutaneous fat. My mental visualization of muscles in people and the workings of their skeletal system is at such a higher level now.

Occasionally, we have to leave lab and learn other subjects. We've learned how to walk with crutches, do wheelies in wheelchairs, and how to do posture assessments. I learned how to do a back tuck for professional communication and I mastered how to make a powerpoint for evidence based practice. In kinesiology, I've learned that TR (a.k.a. Trent Richardson) can squat 600 and bench 450. My teacher still wants to be him when he grows up.

I've taken the things I've learned in the classroom to my everyday life too. Trying to be more like TR to ensure an A in Kinese, I started uping my weights when I do squats. I've been trying to hit the gym every Tuesday and Thursday morning. I've been making some progress now that I'm really trying. Last week I did 20 reps of 315, 15 reps of 405, 14 reps of 455, 20 reps of 315, and then 25 reps of 315. Then I went upstairs and busted out 100 lunges with 25 pound dumbbells. Watch out TR; I'm coming.

I applied the anatomy of the hand in my most recent set of injuries. I've come up with the diagnosis of a torn posterior joint capsule of the first MCP. I finally got into the doctor so I can get a referral to the hand surgeon and see what he says. Radiographs from this visit pretty much confirmed my suspicion and also showed a subluxation of the first CMC joint and a possible dislocation of the capitate bone. Should be a really fun office visit next week.

I did manage to have a little fun the past two weekends. I went fly fishing with the school (we saw a whooping 0 fish the entire trip) and went camping with some classmates. This has been the extent of my outdoor excursions since I have not been biking in such a long time. It's hard to go when I'm so tired once I finally get home from school everyday and the weekends have just been occupied with other things. It's an insult to my bikes to be neglecting them like this. I must do better.

Quite a few of us have also picked up rock climbing. We've spent several afternoons taking study breaks at the bouldering wall in the student rec center. It's a fun sport that is pretty challenging. It's always good to be humbled by a 110 lb girl that scales the wall you've been working on for 20 minutes.

All in all life is passing. The sun rises and the sun sets. I'm trying to make the most of it and include as much as I can in every day. I don't always succeed, but that's what tomorrow is for. Like I said, too much has happened to include it all, but that's what I got so far.

Why I Need More Days Off

Today was another great day off. I woke up at 5:26am; my alarm is set for weird times. The clock is also set about 7 minutes fast; nothing is precise in there. After turning the coffee on, Scrappy and I went out to breath in the morning air. Breakfast done, I was on my way down to the U of M pool for an early morning swim. The swim could have gone better. As I noted earlier: "My shoulder joints feel like they are filled with mud and my arms are moving through sand, not water." But the day goes on. I traveled down to the American Red Cross to begin my CPR / 1st Aid training that I need to complete for PT school. The program went a little long due to some recent changes with the Red Cross and a lack of updating the website. 


I managed to make it back home in time to head out to the Millington Navy Base; although, lunch consisted of pretzels, peanut butter, and nutella eaten in the car on the way out there. I made it close to on time for my eye doctor appointment. After an hour there and having my eyes dilated, I headed over to the Millington DMV. It was a challenge trying to read my phone or fill out the forms at the center. I had to hold the forms out at arms reach to try to read it, but I still had to wait an hour or so before I could manage to squint to make out all the words and fill out the form completely. 


I got home after 6 and really just wanted to sit down and take a nap. Instead, I went out to the garden to improve my cucumber situation; they are growing all over the place. I set up some more frames and tied up some of the plants. It looks better. I also found two decently sized cucumbers. They could have grown more, but I couldn't hold back. I had to pick them. The first one was delicious and the whole back yard now smells like cucumbers after working out there for over two hours. 


I went for a four mile run to get in a little more mileage and then cut my hair on the back porch. Maybe now I'll get around to eating another solid meal; probably just another cucumber and then some sauteed squash and zucchini. The garden is flourishing!


Only one thing could make today even better.....