Wildcat Canyon - Tilden Regional Park

The seasons are strange here in California. If the constant gray of Seattle makes people depressed, the constantly changing weather this time of year in California seems to make people edgy. People seem to get sick here more often, and the large range of temperatures that a day can fluctuate amongst reminds me that the climate is much more like desert here. But in these parts at least, the heavy rains make the landscape lush and rich which explains the wonderful gardens and produce. Don't hate on the rain.

This afternoon I ran what is one of my favorite runs in the East Bay -- an out and back climb from Inspiration Point to the top of Wildcat Peak along the Bay Area Ridge Trail. It is a rolling and undulating run with the option of both paved path and dirt trail for most of its length. It is nice to go back and forth. The landscape in Tilden is tremendous this time of year. It is an extremely rich green in parts, and there are many lovely fields of white and yellow wildflowers (or weeds as some might call them). There are many shades of green in the landscape here, something that wasn't the case as much in the Pacific Northwest.

As you wind around the Tilden hills, you run along a ledge above Wildcat Canyon, with views out over the Bay towards the Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco, the Bay Bridge and Oakland. For the final climb up the side of Wildcat Peak you are mirrored by this view as you suffer upwards along an uneven dirt path. Knowing that you get to bask in this view, and see over to the lakes and hills of the further East Bay keeps me moving diligently and focused up the short but steep climb. It is pure bliss, I tell you. Pure, unadulterated bliss. The fog and the wind today only made it more beautiful.

I thought today often of paying homage to the wildcat, and the Earth through physical exertion in the outdoors. It is sadhana, and it is important even if nobody else thinks so. Nature knows your path -- it just gives you the choice to struggle along it if you want to. It must be very amusing.

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The Three Bears

I had a major moment this past Friday in thinking about preparing for the Wildflower triathlon. Basically, I don't know that I am putting in the time and effort needed to actually complete it comfortably, and started looking into other events around that time that might give me a few more weeks to prepare -- the SF triathlon at Treasure Island is in late June, but it doesn't seem nearly as pretty as the Wildflower which made me think that I need to start busting some ass to get ready in 8 weeks. Still haven't swum in open water, and need to start doing multiple activities in a day to condition my transitions from event to event.

It really is amazing how much dedication and consistency it takes to train for an event outside of your comfort zone, and I am realizing that developing that consistency might take longer than I had thought. I am committed to doing an Olympic triathlon by this summer, and am happy with my progress thus far, but am realizing that I need to kick it into the next gear.

Since cycling is probably the activity I have been most consistent with over the past year, I have been prioritizing swimming and running thus far in my training. As those of you who cycle know, going for long bike rides can be a little bit of an ordeal from prepping your bike, getting your gear together and riding for many many hours to get in an acceptable workout. This Saturday I did my first long ride in a while, about 45 miles with extensive climbing and, as it turned out, a good deal of wind.

There is a very popular bike route in the East Bay called the Three Bears Loop, which entails a hilly loop around the San Pablo Dam Reservoir that has three major climbs (i.e. the Three Bears). I have done it once before with great joy, and so decided on this past Saturday (which turned out to be beautiful), to make that my reintroduction to long bike riding. One of the things I love about the Bay Area are the rolling undulating hills which, this time of year, are an iridiscent fluorescent shade of green and have all kinds of cows and wild turkeys and deer on them. I love talking to cows when I am out on my rides and big groups of them start to stare at me.

Although I am exploring a number of custom bike and run mapping tools (recently MapMyRide, everytrail.com and MapMyRun), I still find many of these tools to be cumbersome and a little unnecessary. Especially when Google Maps allows you to draw routes in maps and get distances (but apparently not elevations yet) without the need to sign up for another one of these services. I also think it is unfortunate that cue sheets in these apps don't seem to be easily exportable (I copied and pasted and emailed to my iPhone), and that I can't get a GPS-enabled cue sheet on my iPhone that would prompt me to turn where I need to.

In addition, embedding the MapMyRide map into a website or blog includes a whole bunch of extraneous marketing collateral outside of just the map, which I find to be visually overwhelming. Google Maps also allows you to view your rides in Google Earth, which is one of my current favorite ways to waste time at my computer. Am using Earth's new "tour recording" feature to do fly throughs of some of my routes, but still working on getting them tight.

And although there is no relation between the Three Bears Loop and the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, it is interesting that that story is very much about the Buddhist Middle Way (Madhyama-Pratipad) which emphasizes the importance of finding balance. I wonder if some Buddhist scholar or Western literary critic has written a paper comparing Goldilocks to the Buddha, and the Three Bears to the challenges posed to the Buddha by Mara when he was struggling to attain enlightenment.


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Finding Balance

So, back to training. Have been continuing to up my swimming, and yesterday did 5 400 yd segments in the pool at the Downtown Berkeley YMCA. I am not a huge fan of the pool there since it is a little grimy on deck and near the showers, but it does seem to be one of the few indoor pools in the area, and it is open for lap swim basically all day.

One of my major training efforts right now is to learn to breathe on both sides since this is very helpful in open water. In trying to breathe on my left side when swimming recently, I found that turning my head to the left that far started some wierd pressure pain in my left ear (I wonder if this happens to other people). It made me realize how lopsided my stroke must look in the water, since I am so clearly favoring the side I am breathing on. What I tried yesterday was using a kickboard with my head in the water, and only breathing on my left side. Interestingly, what I learned with the kickboard is that to breathe on my left side, I actually need to let my legs and hips rotate over onto their side as well. By not doing so, I can't get enough rotation to take a breath which is what was messing me up when swimming normally.

The second skill I worked on was the Balanced Body Position drill I learned a few weeks ago at TNT. This time I put a kickboard under my pelvis to give me a little more buoyancy to take breaths. It worked pretty wonderfully, as it was still incredibly challenging to stay moving with my hands at my sides and thrusting with only kick, but I was able to actually make it many lengths of the pool, thereby conditioning a lot of the core muscles I will need to do it without the kickboard eventually. Making up workouts and techniques to teach oneself new skills when training, particularly swimming, is a pretty fun little hobby. It makes the whole act of training feel creative and intellectual, something which I don't think most people realize that training really is.

Here is a shot of the Downtown Y in Berkeley:



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