I’m pretty proud of this solution that I came up with at work. We had a server that is over 5 years old, but it’s mission critical. Upgrading the hardware on it would be a nightmare, because support for the application is spotty, and it would also be highly time consuming. Instead of doing that, we chose to virtualize the server by using the vMware vCenter Converter.
I’ve used the Converter before to quickly transform a physical server to a Virtual Machine, and get rid of the hardware. This thing is awesome, it even powers the physical machine down at the same time as it turns on the VM, which results in less than 5 seconds of downtime.
This old server was a separate beast though. It has 2 hard drives, the OS drive being a regular thing, but the data drive weighing in at 1 Terabyte. If we were to use the Converter, it would take so long to convert to a VM that by the time it was done, it’d have to re-sync all the data that changed (because this is a live production server), and the chances of that going well were too small to risk it. So instead, we decided to get smart about it. After a lot of discussion and testing, here’s what the plan ended up like:
First of all, we’d make a temporary VM server. Give the VM its own C: drive, but create the D: drive on the SAN as a big 2 Tb drive, so that there’s room to spare. This is easy to do through vCenter, and it took all of 2 minutes to create it and format it.
Using our backup solution, we started a bit by bit duplication of the server’s D: drive to the temp-VM’s D: drive. This could take as long as it wanted, because it wasn’t affecting much. Sure, the production server slowed down a bit with all the reading activity going on, but that’s what scheduling is for.
After the duplication of the D: drive was done, we effectively had an exact copy of it on the SAN. To make the abstraction easy to understand: It was the equivalent of having the physical drive cloned. Now the disk could be taken out of the temporary VM server and plugged into anywhere.
So, after this is done, the next step was to run vCenter Converter. However, we ran it to only convert the source server using the C: drive, ignoring the D: drive. Much faster, and without worrying about live data being changed as the conversion happens. The VM came up with the same name and IP as the old server, which was now shut down.
The magic happens after, where we disconnect the D: drive from the temporary VM, and connect it to the new VM server. Just like that, the server now had both its drives, and it only took a fraction of the time it would have taken to run the conversion using both drives.
Here's an artsy rendition of the steps taken.
Some extra notes:
The duplication of the D: drive was ran a handful of times. The duplication only copied new data, so it wasn’t running for a long time. We ran the duplication one last time before we declared the VM’d server “good to go”.
The vCenter Converter does have an option to “sync files that changed since the start of the conversion”. We chose not to use that because we wanted more control on the timing of the different steps.
The 2nd step could happen anytime after the duplication took place, which allowed us to time it for a weekend when the impact to our business was minimal (as in: zero).
If everything failed, nothing was lost. The only thing that needed to happen was to power on the original physical server, and try again some other time.
This year I finally got into cooking like I’d been wanting to do for years. Thanks to a few cookbooks, E-Mealz, Saveur Magazine, and the inspiration from friends I’ve gone from being able to boil some water and throw some pasta in it to spending hours in the kitchen in order to prepare just one meal. My upbringing definitely had something to do with how much I value home cooked meals. My parents cooked 2 meals a day for at least 95% of every single month, and I’d been missing that too much when I was eating out more than at home. When I read Anthony Bourdain’s book “Medium Raw“, I particularly enjoyed the episode where he talks about how much of an elemental skill it is to know how to cook at least a handful of basic meals -and agree with it. Even though I’d already started my culinary efforts, I think that it’s a good motivator and that it’s a great mindset. People should know how to cook things that are more involved than unwrapping something and nuking it for a couple of minutes. I’m not saying that everyone should be prepared to feed everyone for Thanksgiving, but that making dinner once or twice a week is a good investment of time. I say that from my experience. It’s satisfying, gratifying and fun. And, once you’ve gotten the hang of it, it can even be delicious.
Athletic accomplishment. For unexplainable reasons, I’d always wanted to do a triathlon. Last year, I got my feet wet in the field, and in July I did my first olympic distance triathlon, and it was an exhilarating experience. I can still remember the moment when I sprinted through the finish line with a fist in the air, feeling pretty damn tootin’ good about myself. But the accomplishment wasn’t just about finishing the race in less than 3 hours. The training that went into it brought me much joy as well, specially with running and swimming. Every time I went out to train for the race, I looked forward to it, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. Getting ready for the race was beyond a task that felt like a pre-requirement, it was fun and gratifying in and of itself.
2010 also changed my work environment for the better. If you asked me what I liked about my job 3 years ago, I would have answered that I liked the people I worked with. I was very lucky to be in the company of 3 guys who made every workday fun, and their friendships made my job feel like not much of a chore. There were certainly times when we were stressing out, but being in a team with them made it all more of an adventure and less of a sucky task. Fast-forwarding to now, a lot has changed. My workday is a lot more professional, I handle a much bigger responsibility load and while I do have a friendly relationship with my co-workers, I’ve found friendships outside of work, making it easy to focus on my job while I’m doing my job. One of the biggest mental landmarks that makes me feel more “professional” was when I learned to configure hanging protocols for the radiologists, and I started talking their talk. Something changed, I think I earned a bit more respect from the radiologists when they felt like I knew what they wanted to accomplish and I was more into their world, even if it was just a miniscule amount.
On July 24th of this year, I married my other. That day is forever etched in my memory, with lots of visual and emotional queues riding along in my synapses somewhere. Even though Kelly has made me happy for over two years, this was the year that I started calling her my wife, and our love for each other was recognized in the form of matrimony. The week leading up to our wedding was wonderful. My parents stayed with us and we shared many good moments, including me welcoming them with a nice home-cooked meal that surprised both of them because it was actually super tasty! (full-circle post right here). Our honeymoon was incredible. Definitely one of the highlights of this year: New countries, exotic experiences, my wife and me. Nothing better than that.
2010 was good to me. I’m looking forward to the next year!
On the 1st of the month, I shaved off the goatee I’d sported for the last 10+ months. Kelly was there supporting me, and she shed some tears as I immediately aged 15 years backward and I looked 13 all over again.
The whole point of this ridiculous effort is to get the word out about cancers that affect men. People ask about my looks, and my answer is clear: the hair above my lip is my ribbon in show of support for survivors, and my desire to find a cure and better treatment.
If you’d like to make a donation to the cause in the name of my Moustache, just click right here. Your donation is tax deductible, and will certainly be put to good use. It’s not just about giving men all across the globe an excuse to look dapperly handsome, the Movember foundation is certainly making positive outcomes a reality.
Last year, we started the City of ReMO team, and reached out to hundreds of citizens of our little city to raise just a bit over $11,000 for the cause. It was great, and we did a good job at getting the word out.
Building on what we did last year, this year the City of ReMO is a network of teams, covering over 400 people with one common goal: raising $25,000 in one month. As of this writing, we’re right on track, but check out the network’s official page to see the amount raised live: http://us.movember.com/mospace/network/remo.
This year I’ve been interviewed a lot, which has been fun! See for yourself:
The Nevada Sagebrush wrote a pretty good article, and I’m quoted there for yet another bit of immortality.
Chris Payne from 100.9 KRZQ FM hosted us for a 15 minute PSA that aired on a Sunday morning. It was great chance to spread some information, and you can listen to it here: http://tindeck.com/listen/egej.
Channel 2 news (KTVN) interviewed me and I was on TV three times on one day (slow news day, yay for me!). I can’t find the video up anymore, but a transcript of sorts is available right here.
The other cool side-note about Movember this year is that I’ve taken the opportunity to take some creative self-portraits. It’s been a lot of fun, getting goofy in front of my camera, and you can witness the full set here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nicoyogui/sets/72157625283171459/
Seriously, if you think any of this is interesting, cool, funny, innovative or worthwhile, please make a donation to the cause. Even though I put humor into it, it’s a serious fundraiser, and I’d appreciate your support of my efforts. Just go right here and donate what you can. Even a dollar makes a difference.
Kelly and I went to Burning Man again. It was my 4th year going (in a row!) and Kelly’s 2nd time. It was also the best year yet for both of us, as a couple and for each one of us as individuals as well.
First of all, our camp was fabulous. The Black Rock Center for Unlearning (BRCU for short) ended up being a great area to hang out in, and when we showed up on Thursday evening we were amazed at the set-up. A semi-circle of carports facing in with a big shade cloth joining them together like a circus tent was the main area; in the middle, a bar and some sound. The camp was most active during the lazy hours of the day, with people relaxing on the many pillows and chairs, and lots of interesting/weird conversations.
From what we experienced, it was drama-free and everyone made us feel very welcome. That’s always nice, and makes a difference in making one feel comfortable and at home.
The rest is hard to explain. It is, after all, Burning Man! So, here’s a list of things in no particular order that made this burn jump to the #1 spot:
We ate really well. Not only had we planned and stocked much better than last year, but our camp-pate Jerry delighted all of us with his superb culinary skills. Out of nowhere, like a rabbit from a hat, delicious food was being offered and shared between everyone at BRCU. Such a treat! We didn’t even finish all of our food, because we didn’t have to eat it all.
Our sleeping arrangements were much better than ever before. Even though our plans to borrow an RV fell through, we got a nice tent (as in, bigger than a 2-person backpacking tent where we couldn’t even stand up) and some cots to sleep in, which made a world of a difference when it was time to sleep. Apparently, sleeping well enabled us to have a lot more energy and motivation to enjoy the time we were not sleeping. Who would have thought of that?
The weather was much nicer than last year. There were no dust storms that lasted more than 4 hours, but we still got plenty of playa everywhere.
After the Man burned, we went and partied at the Root Society. There was a 200-foot wall where video was being projected, and easily thousands of people dancing. At one point, we climbed onto an art car called The Jellyfish, and found it mostly to ourselves on the top. We danced for over an hour, looking over the crowds and soaking it all in. It is now one of my best memories of Burning Man, and if you click here, you’ll see a picture of me basking in that glory.
Like in 2008, I got to hang out with my good friend Cory and explore some of the art in the playa. Like back then, this was also one of my favorite things… but this time we both had our significant others with us, which made the shared moments and sights much more valuable.
Having Kelly with me always makes things better, and we did lots of silly things together. We got ice-cream in the middle of a hot day and pop-corn in the middle of one night, we took pictures and wrote shmoopy things on places where such things could be written. Since this wasn’t her first burn, she had a much better idea of what to expect, and I think that made everything a bit better. Or maybe it was just because we treated Black Rock City as our second honeymoon destination.
Ideas and plans are already in the making for next year! We’d like to have something more to contribute, hopefully in the form of an art car or something small yet interactive. Just because this year was the best, it doesn’t mean we’ll sleep on the laurels. Quite the opposite! The goal for next year is to make it even better. The bar is just a little bit higher now, so that just means we’ll have to work a little harder for it.
Our honeymoon in Fiji was everything that a dream honeymoon includes: warm weather, sunshine, the beach, warm water, friendly people and lots of fruity drinks.
The main lasting impression about Fiji in itself that I can share is that the people there are wonderful. From the moment we stepped in the Nadi airport, we were greeted by genuine smiles (saying Bula!).
We were at the very end of the customs line, so we were one of the last people from our flight to get out to the transportation area, where a van was supposed to pick us up to take us to our hotel for the night. But since we were holding up the van with a few people, the van left us behind… and one of the manager from Rosie Holidays took us, and was totally cool about it.
But anyway, more to the what-when-where of the trip report, as it should be!
The first night we landed into Nadi after dark, so we couldn’t go to our resort because it was on another island, and they don’t navigate to small islands at night. So we were taken to a hotel in the mainland, Sofitel. We didn’t really get to enjoy it much, because we were so tired from traveling that we pretty much ate, went to sleep, woke up, ate, and left.
After an hour-long boat ride in the Captain’s lounge, we arrived at our destination: Tokoriki Island Resort. Our boat was too big to come near shore, so the resort from the island sent a small boat to pick us up. About 12 people fit in the boat, with our luggage and all. Getting out of the boat, my feet landed on the beach, where I got my feet both in the soft sand and the warm water at once. I probably smiled from ear to ear.
The next thing that happened was the welcoming. While our paperwork was checked, a fresh fruit beverage was handed to us, and the manager Ramsey gave us a welcome speech. The end of the speech consisted of him and most of the staff within earshot singing to us. Check out this video, which even though is not us, shows you just how happy everyone that is greeted in such a way looks. We sure were!
From there, we were shown to our room. Ramsey himself (who I found very appropriately named akin to Ramses, because he is huge and imposing) showed us in, and told us “Welcome home”.
The decorations in our cabin bure had fresh flowers as decorations everywhere, but what they did to our bed took the cake. Kelly was speechless, and we were both feeling indeed very welcome, and at home as well. The magic had started.
Our daily activities consisted of sleeping in, enjoying our delicious meals from the very tasty resort kitchen (which is a VERY good thing if you’re going to an island that doesn’t have anything but a hotel on it!), sunbathing by the pool or on the beach, taking pictures and enjoying each other.
One of the most unique things we did was visiting Yanuya village, where most of the resort staff live and commute to and from by boat every day. We took a small boat with a few other people and a couple of “guides”, who were actually young men who live there and do work at the resort.
We were shown around the village, had a Kava ceremony with the Chief, checked out the women’s art market and visited the school.
Most people would say that Fiji is the 3rd world. This island only has electricity from 6 to 9pm, most houses consist of metal sheets nailed together to form a one-box room, there barely is phone service and you can’t even think of using the internet. But they seem so happy.
We saw three toddlers playing together, with a plastic yellow toy bucket full of sand and dirt. It was so simple and just plain awesome. That kind of thing really makes you think and wonder about some of the things that we see everyday in the “first” world and we accept to be the norm.
This all ties in with how nice Fijians are. They’re well aware of how much they depend on tourism, but I don’t think that’s all there’s to it. Take for example tipping, which is not expected nor demanded; people are nice to you not because they’re trying to get some extra coin out of you. Also, even when we saw them talking in Fijian amongst each other, there was always laughter, smiles and a jovial tone. I might have a skewed point of view, but I’m comfortable in saying that Fijians are easily some of the nicest people on this planet. Whatever they’re doing as a culture, seems to put a lot of value on respect and friendliness, and many other cultures could stand to learn from this one.
On a more personal level, my favorite thing about our entire honeymoon was spending it with my wife. It seems obvious, but it’s also important. The moments leading up to our wedding were busy, and we didn’t get to enjoy each other as much. Having two weeks to ourselves, where we spent every minute next to each other, was the perfect way to start our marriage. We shared many memories, and we’ll always be able to look back on when we got married and remember the dreamy honeymoon before any of the busyness of the actual wedding.
We took lots of pictures, but there are some particular special ones there. We took pictures at sunset, every night. I’d set the camera on a tripod, place Kelly somewhere on the frame, get all photo-nerdy with aperture and exposure settings, set a 10 second timer and run to get in the picture. We would do this at least a handful of times, to make sure we got at least one good picture for every night we spent in our little paradise island.
Looking at those pictures makes me happy. I’m a lucky person, and the pictures remind me of it. I’m very lucky and very grateful of being able to experience a place like Fiji, with its wonderful people, incredible landscapes and warm weather. But above all, I realize that I’m the luckiest (and most grateful) when I think that I’m sharing all this with a wife that surpasses any dream I could have.
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Oh, one last thing which is just a funny anecdote: When we were leaving Fiji, on the boat ride to the airport, something strange happened. A song that we heard at a most random time in our trip to Argentina came on the radio: Gangster’s Paradise, by Coolio. We looked at each other in disbelief, and agreed that from now on, we’re bound to hear this obscure hit from our youth when we’re abroad, traveling together. Which we hope is often, and plentiful.
On our first morning in Sydney, we took a ferry to the Taronga Zoo. There, among many things, we saw this Koala eating some eucalyptus, and just as I was taking a picture, a little Australian girl very excitedly said: “Look, mum, it’s having its brekkie!”. It was quite endearing, and what started our collection of overheard Aussie expressions that we’d tirelessly repeat for the next two weeks.
Cute, right? Don’t eat your heart out yet, and save room for dessert! Just a few steps from the Koala, we saw a kangaroo that seemed to be a little bit on the fat side. Just kidding, we have no idea what magazine-cover kangaroos look like! But this one sure did have a pouch, and a whole lot in it: A joey!
One of my favorite pictures I took at the Zoo involves animals that don’t actually live in Australia, but I still quite like it, so here it is:
I like the contrast of city vs “nature” (because it is, after all, a zoo), and how the giraffes are like nature’s skyscrapers. For a better idea of what the giraffes are looking at, check this one out:
Now, I also mentioned that we did other things in Sydney. Of course, the most outstanding one (and a must-do if you ever visit!) was to see the Opera House from as many angles as possible. We visited and took pictures at morning, at midday and at night. We also went inside it, on a fabulous tour. It was definitely interesting, and I’m going to probably read up more about all that went on with the construction of such a landmark. – –
We also enjoyed some of the other sights of Sydney. One day, we went on an adventure to find Cuban cigars, since they don’t have an embargo against a totally chill country. The trip was all on foot, and we just walked around like tourists with a tiny map and BIG eyes. Kelly and I like being in big cities, there’s so much to look at! We tried to go shopping one day, and at the end of the day we were empty handed. Things were either too expensive or not of our taste, but the window shopping in itself was top-notch. We walked into the biggest department store cosmetics department that Kelly had ever seen, and walked out of it smelling like all sorts of samplers and testers. Good times!
Since we stayed at the Marriot at Circular Quay (pronounced just like “key”…), the district of The Rocks was really close to us. It was yet another place to discover by walking, getting lost, and checking things out. We walked so much that Kelly had a pain on her knees!
In Port Douglas, things considerably slowed down. Our lodging wasn’t a fancy hotel, no. Instead, it was a fancy “boutique apartment” with the soothing name of Shantara. This worked quite well for us, because we got to go to the Aussie supermarket for things to eat, and to the “bottle shop” for things to drink.
Port Douglas is a cute little town that has an incredible 4-mile long beach, locally owned shops (not a single chain restaurant, even!) and is much warmer being just 1500 miles north of Sydney (Australia is pretty damn huge, just in case you didn’t know). Just what we needed to slip away from the see-it-all tourist mode and into the chill-out vacation mode.
Taking advantage of my still slightly whacked out internal clock, I was able to wake up very early to take some pictures at sunrise. It was a great time, seeing the sun come up! The pictures I took don’t make it much justice, but they’re still something to look at, so here:
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One of the selling points of Port Douglas is its proximity to the Great Barrier Reef. We had a day planned to go check it out, so in the morning we got aboard a nice sailboat and headed out to the Low Isles.
Unfortunately, the weather wasn’t great and it was pretty much overcast most of the day. It even rained a little bit on us. Boooo!
That didn’t stop us, we went in anyway. Kelly lasted a good couple of minutes, and the sheer size of the Pacific Ocean stopped her from going any further. Cute.
I snorkeled my ass off, and probably spent a couple of hours coming and going, literally soaking in all the sights. I’d never snorkeled before, let alone in one of Earth’s snorkeling paradises.
We had a little bag so we could take Kelly’s small camera underwater, and I took hundreds of pictures, hoping that at least a few would turn out. Not a lot of them were keepers, but this one definitely was one:
Nemo!
Something else we both got to do once back on the mainland was eat something new. I ate kangaroo twice, and Kelly tried it for one dinner opportunity. The meat wasn’t bad, but nothing to write home about – specially for a spoiled meat eater from Argentina as myself. But hey, we get to say we’ve eaten it, so that in itself is pretty cool.
All in all, Australia is a country that I would love to go back to. There are so many things to see, and just not enough time! Kelly and I talked about going back in 5~10 years, renting “hiring” a car and driving cross-country… but then we realized that we’d have to drive on the other side of the road, and we quickly turned our attention to the beers in front of us.
The first part of our honeymoon is coming to an end. It feels like it’s been a long week; our arrival to Australia seeming so long ago yet only less than a week ago. I like that, it tells me that a lot of memories happened in a short ammount of time. We first spent 3 days in Sydney, the cultural capital of Australia (because the actual political capital is Cranberra, just in case you didn’t know). Sydney is a beautiful metropolis, with countless things to see and do. Among the things we were able to do in our short time there, one of my favorites was going to the Zoo and seeing some of the autoctonous fauna. A Koala having “brekkie” (Aussie slang for breakfast) and a Joey, also known as a baby Kangaroo were the definte highlights. I also enjoyed checking out the world famous Opera house, being able to check it out both out and inside. Of course I took pictures, but it’s going to take me a while to go through the hundreds of shots I’ve taken so far. After Sydney, we traveled up north to Port Douglas, where I write from at the moment. It’s a little tourist-centered town, quaint and very friendly. The main reason why we came up here is because this is a launching area for tours to go check out the Great Barrier Reef… and that we did. I got to snorkel around with fishes and coral, enjoying every second of it. I even saw a few clown fish, what Nemo is! They are very tiny, a couple of inches at the most, but super cute. Tomorrow, we leave Port Douglas -and Australia- to head to our next destination, Fiji. Even though Australia has been wonderful, and it’s now marked in my mind as a must visit again, I’m ready to not have a schedule anymore and enjoy a week with my wife on a true tropical paradise. The forecast tells us that it’s going to be nice and warm, and that’s just wicked awesome, mate!
Kelly and I got married on July 24th. Our ceremony was incredible, our reception was unforgettable, and I am now officially the luckiest man on Earth.
Tomorrow, we leave on our honeymoon. The destination: Australia (Sydney and Cairns) and Fiji. Oooooh yeah!
We’re packing our suitcases right now, so I’ll have to share about our wedding day when we come back from our honeymoon, in a couple of weeks.
As promised, here’s the recap of my first ever Olympic / International triathlon.
Pre-race
Kelly and I left for San Jose the day before the race, Saturday. We stayed in the very nice Dolce-Hayes mansion, getting a chance to enjoy the great weather and their swimming pool.
I went to pick up my packet and to also take part of the course description talk, where I found out all the small details about the race. It wasn’t anything major; the highlight was when the guy said that Almaden Lake was at its best this year, with the lowest levels of E. Coli on record. GREAT!
I tried to go to bed at 9pm on Saturday, but I wasn’t able to fall asleep anytime near that. I woke up once in the middle of the night, at around 1am. Just as I was starting to fall asleep again at 2am, my phone rang, apparently because someone in India pocket dialed my Google Voice number. Super strange, and very annoying timing.
Race-day
The alarm was set for 4:45am, and by then I was already awake and ready to go. I wanted to make it to the race site by 5:30, so I could set up my transition and not freak out about not being there on time.
We made it there a little bit before 6, but this was still plenty of time, and everything worked out perfectly, with a good parking spot and all! It was quite the juxtaposition of energy levels, with me ready to bounce off a wall and Kelly fighting off her instincts to sleep for a few more hours. I set up my transition area, and did some warm up running drills, while Kelly sat on a chair and watched hundreds of people at least as crazy as I was.
I was going to be in the 2nd wave, which started at 7:04am. I was able to do a little warm-up in the lake, which was also my first ever swim in a wetsuit. The warm-up swim felt pretty easy, which was probably because of the extra buoyancy from the wetsuit, but I also felt like a million bucks. I was just happy that I felt ready for what was to come!
Swim – 1.5km
The swim started right on time, and I tried to stay at the back of the group. There were about 60 people in my wave, and I wasn’t planning on racing anyone but myself.
I got passed a couple of times, but I also passed a couple of guys. Mostly, I remember getting grabbed, hit and climbed on. I can’t complain, because I did a little bit of that myself! The water was pretty murky, and it was impossible to see through the water more than a couple of feet in front of me.
The biggest issue was swimming in a straight line, which didn’t really happen. Every now and then I looked ahead to find the buoy that I was supposed to pass, and it turned out that I was swimming a little too much to one side or another. Whatever, it happened, and I corrected my trajectory without thinking about it too much.
I ended up finishing the swim portion in 34 minutes. That was a LOT faster than I had predicted, I was expecting to finish anywhere between 40 and 45 minutes!
Transition 1
From the time I got out of the water and the time I got on my bike, 2:43 minutes flew by. In what now seems a blur of jittery legs, excitement and going through a mental checklist; I got out of my wetsuit, half-assed dried off, put on my helmet, sunglasses, jersey, bike shoes and ran from the beach to the start of the bike portion. I do however remember seeing Kelly as I was changing, and giving her a sloppy and wet kiss before taking off with my bicycle!
Bike – 24.9 miles
The bike was sadly my big let down. I expected a lot more out of me, but make no mistake in thinking I’m not proud of what I did – because I am.
Since I started on the 2nd wave, a lot of the extremely in shape people from waves behind me started catching up with me, and passing me. I only passed a couple of people, but I’m sure I got passed by about a hundred people.
I focused on keeping my cadence in the 90s and staying hydrated, and letting my speed fall into whatever that meant. I enjoyed the bike course a lot, it was flat for most of the first two thirds, and there was a small climb with some nice downhills to pay off after it. (I got up to 35mph in one section!)
I ended up averaging 18.2mph, which is not too bad, but I wish I’d been a bit faster. I took me 1 hour and 22 minutes to finish the bike course.
Transition 2 – 1:19
I speedily ran my bike into transition, took off my helmet, glasses, bike shoes and my jersey. It was getting nice and hot out there, so I was going to do the run shirtless. I had some trouble putting on my socks because my legs were a bit shaky, but I was overall pretty speedy about getting out of there ready to go on my run.
Run – 6.2 miles
The first thing I remember about the run section was looking up as soon as I left transition to see Kelly smiling at me and taking some pictures. I was very happy that she was there cheering me on, it made me feel very special and gave me some much needed warm fuzzies to embark on what was to come.
Immediately after that, my quads started cramping. Ouch! I guess I should have done a few more brick workouts! I didn’t walk, I instead took very small steps and kept on jogging. I knew my legs would transition from bike mode to run mode eventually, so I just had to get my legs to know that with some high cadence running.
Some guy ran past me and suggested I punch my legs to get them to cooperate, so I did. Placebo or actual remedy, it kind of worked and I was able to speed up a little bit more.
For the first couple of miles, I nursed my aching quads with a slow run. I was probably doing 6mph, and getting passed left and right all over again. I didn’t care, my goals were to never stop, never walk unless it was at a water station, and to keep pushing until my legs responded like I knew they should.
At mile marker 3, I was running. It felt awesome. I set my sights on a couple of people in front of me, and made it a point to catch up to them and pass them. I did just that.
Mile marker 4 came and went, and I stepped it up to what I was going to consider “giving it all I’ve got left”. I got passed by a dude with long gray hair. On his calf was written his age with sharpie: 61. Hot damn. That was some pretty strong motivation to keep pushing, I knew it was almost over, and that the faster I went, the sooner it’d all be over!
When I got in the last mile, it was basically time to go a half loop around the lake. I could see the finish line from across the lake. My heart started beating faster, even though I wasn’t running faster. It was asking me to push harder, and it took me a while to figure that out, but when I did, I went as fast as I could.
I finished the last hundred yards in a full-out sprint – the kind of run that I did in the past when a dog was chasing me or when I was trying to catch a bus to get home because the next bus wasn’t coming for another 30 more minutes.
The finish line was there! There was music, there were tons of people cheering. I couldn’t hear or see anything, I was just focused on every step I took and every breath I took…. until I looked up and saw the clock by the finish line. It said 2:58, and I was suddenly overcome by a feeling unlike any other: I had made it, and I had beat my goal! I unconsciously punched the sky as I ran past the finish line.
I finished my run in a 54:22. I could have done that a lot faster if I hadn’t cramped up at the beginning, but I finished as strong as I could, and I have no complaints about that!
Total time: 2:54:26
Right after finishing, I stopped running. My legs were about to give out, and cramping pretty hard. Or at least I think so.
I can’t remember what they were doing, because what I do remember is how damn good it felt to have made my goal, to have finished strongly and how much fun it all had been. I tried to focus on my breathing so that I could catch my breath, and noticed that I was smiling. I couldn’t even control it!
A small moment later, Kelly came out from within the crowd, and that completed what ended up being an extremely wonderful experience for me. She saw me running, she saw me doing my thing -and even got some great pictures of it all- and I could feel how happy she was for me.
I’m extremely grateful to all those who have shared encouragement and shown support to me. Even if I’ll never be a triathlon superstar, the gratification that the whole experience yields is indescribable, and a lot of that has to do with all the people that helped me get there. You know who you are: Thank you!
Above all, I’m endlessly grateful to Kelly. She gave away her first weekend in her summer break to spend it with me, driving 10 hours, waking up at a strange hour on a Sunday, standing around for 3 and putting up with all the shenanigans of my training. I couldn’t have done it without her, that’s for sure!
I just went to the Cal-Neva and put 2 bets in for this World Cup. One betting that Argentina will beat Nigeria on the opening game, and the other for Argentina winning the entire thing.
I had no idea what betting in a sports-book would be like… and I still don’t. I just talked to the attendant, told her I wanted to be for Argentina to win the thing and tomorrow’s game, and that was it. She took my money ($5 on each bet), and gave me two tickets.
All I have to do is go back and claim my prize when it’s all over. Yeah.
I’m waking up at 6am tomorrow to watch the game against Nigeria. I don’t think Kelly understands how watching soccer games is rooted in my culture , but hopefully she won’t be too surprised or annoyed when she wakes up after me to find me in the living room in a situation not too different from this:
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