Just one of those days....

hahahaha.....

That was the sound of the uncontrolled laughter that took a hold of us yesterday, as Justin Park (speaking of which, you should check out his new website at http://www.justinparkracing.com/) and I concluded the day, sloshing home in the rainy streets of Calgary at 9:30 p.m.

That wet walk home fit perfectly into yesterday's general pattern.

The day before had been great, it ended at a barbeque at Lisa Mensink's place....mmmm

Lisa cooked us up something goooood! She made sure even Justin had enough to eat!

Lisa's husband, Richard, was a great host too.

The day had started out perfectly, we had gotten some great sleep, decided to start the day late and -sleep in-... luxury we hadn't savoured in a while with the training camp in Victoria!

We ate and headed out to the pool, it was a nice morning walk through those same Calgary streets. We made it to the pool, where I was glad to have Justin's draft for the swim workout.

Oh, the only strange event at the pool was a woman in the locker room who didn't speak one word of english had lost her glasses in the steam room and was crying, running around naked hollering words of desperation. We ended up finding those glasses, and I then remember thinking to myself how lucky I was NOT to be having one of those days...like the woman in the locker room seemed to be having. Little did I know...

So I met Justin, we swam a good set of activation, noticing that as we had predicted, we would feel the effect of the slightly higher altitude in Calgary. Times were good but the effort felt slightly harder. That was fine, and it was precisely why Lance had sent us to the race early. No problem. We stay positive. Knowing everything would be back to normal by race day.

Heading back home, we went for more FOOD. (Thank goodness I dont hang out with Justin more often, I would take on a couple of pounds).

We then realized performing the rest of yesterday's training would be quite challenging.

We had to go for a long ride on the bike course and then a run brick off the bike... we needed to start the training at T1,which was, apparently, a ways outside of Calgary. We were supposed to get a ride out there but were told it was not possible after all. I told Justin, the best idea would be to rent a car. We were told that there were some agencies in walking distance, so....we walked...and walked, then realizing we had been given the wrong directions...

We finaly made it to Budget and were told that...they were out of cars, and that the other agency within walking distance was...also out of cars.

So, we forced the employee at budget to finaly admit that there was an Entreprise car rental agency- not too far away- but there was no way to get him to call them. So...We walked. Again. For quite a while.

Enterprise car rental has always been my saviour and they were once again yesterday. Justin and I were running late but, thanks to Enterprise, were now in a Jeep heading out to pick up our things at the hotel and head out to the workout.

We drove, following the directions from the mapquest copy we had handy which....for some odd reason confused southwest with north. (Long, very funny, story).

This clip will give you a better idea of what was going on in our car, 50 minutes upon our departure from Calgary yesterday, on the way out to T1:

When all of a sudden, a glorious afternoon gave way to dark hominous skies....

We ended up pursuing part of that training through the storm....that bike ride finished late...

The last detail of the day is that our ride could only be a one day rental so we had to unload the bikes and bring the car back with a full gas tank. Apparently, there are not too many gas stations downtown Calgary....we ended up finaly finding one....each of its pumps posted a big -out of gas-sign. Seriously, I am not joking.

We found the gas later, dropped the car off, walked home in the rain and went to bed. Yes, it was just one of those days....that help you appreciate all the others...

CHEERS! RACE COMING UP VERY SOON!!!