CalebKeiter.com

I know, I know, it has been a while. It has been a while since I have done a lot of things that I love. Time seems to be flying by me and I cannot seem to keep my priorities straight. There is a lot on my mind. That is no excuse though because we all suffer from biting off more than we can chew.

I miss:
- The feeling I get when I leave work knowing that I accomplished something meaningful that day.
- The sound of my camera’s shutter releasing turning light into memories.
- Pushing up the fader of an instrument or a vocal and getting chills from the sound emitting from the speakers.
- Endless Friday nights with friends going to shows, or movies, or just hanging out.

I LOVE:
- The sermons at church lately. Excellent stuff!
- The smell of summer coming into the air.
- The progress we have made at work toward a bigger and better dream.
- The growth that I have seen as an athlete, but more importantly as a person and a Christian over this past year.
- Her.

Life is give and take. I am just trying to balance the scales for now. Focus on one thing, meet that goal, go onto the next. One day at a time. One minute, one mile, one stroke, one footstep, one note, one sound, one kiss, at a time. I’m not going to worry about it. There is no room left in the day for it. I will enjoy the roller coaster, get off when my turn is over, get back in line, and wait for the excitement to befall me again.

I am blessed. I am ready. I serve a MIGHTY God!

Blessings and Ramblings.

Hey gang. Sorry it has been a while. Sometimes things get a little busy and my blog is one of the first things to get cut from the weekly to do list. At least I update more than J Garber.

Vineman training has been up and down, to be honest. My runs have been almost non existent due to some IT Band issues I was having. They seem to have subsided so I hope to pick the mileage back up again slowly. As far as distance is concerned, I have only been able to get in a couple 6 mile runs lately without pain. I am hoping for an 8 this weekend. The Computrainer classes at Coastal Sports have been great lately and I am definitely seeing a lot of improvement on the bike. Some friends of mine and I decided to ride the Great Western Loop last weekend (44 miles with 4,000 feet of vertical climbing) and I finished it in 2 hours and 40 minutes. It was a beautiful day so we followed it up with a 4 mile run. I am feeling a little more comfortable in the water and even swam just under 2 miles a couple weeks ago in the ocean. We swam from La Jolla Cove to La Jolla Shores and back. It was beautiful and I cannot wait to do it again.

I have also added some Strength Training into my routine. I am still working out how to fit all of this in but I will find a way. It is a boot camp style workout that consists of lots of push-ups, squats, crunches, and other exercises that just uses body weight to strengthen core muscles and stabalizers. This should help increase my speed, strength, and endurance over the next couple weeks.

Here are the training weeks that I have not posted yet:

Training Week 6


Training Week 7


Training Week 8


Training Week 9

Total Miles for all of these workouts is: 288.76
Total Training Miles: 730.72

The total amount of money raised for Mountain View Christian Academy has been updated on the site as well. You can see the progress by clicking on the Vineman Training link at the top of the site.

Thanks for all your support. I am still hoping to reach the goal I set of $2500. It seems like a long way off but we can do it!

So I need to make an update. The official race results were posted and I placed 10th of 44 in my age group.

Nothing gets me more pumped about racing longer distance courses (read HIM and IM) than placing top ten in my first Olympic.

If only u could shave some time off the swim. Hmm.

A lot of people have also made contributions or donations to my MVCA Fundraiser and I greatly appreciate that. I am sitting in the JFK Airport right now (I love my iPhone) but when I get back to my computer I will add up the totals and update that page here on the site. This past week has been a lite week for me since I was on the East Coast but I plan on getting some longer distances in coming soon.

Thanks for playing.

Well, I have not met you yet. Though I plan to be dropping by your establishment during the weekend of May 1, 2010.

Will this be for vacation? No.
Will this be for business? No.
Will this be for family? No.
Will this be for the first ever Ironman St. George race? Yes, yes indeed.

Folks, I have gone and done it now. I signed up for my first Ironman race. “What is an Ironman?”, you may ask. Well, it is the ultimate little kids play day. You get to start off with swimming. Who does not love a good swim with 2,000 of your new friends you just made? After you get done swimming, you get to go ride your bike. Let me tell you, I LOVE riding my bike. Once you get off your bike, you get to go run around for a while. WOW! Doesn’t that sound like the greatest day ever? I know I cannot wait.

What’s that? I’m sorry, HOW long did you say? You must be joking! You mean to tell me that I have to swim 2.4 miles, jump out of the water and change clothes as fast as I can to jump on my bike for a 112 mile ride, and then get off my bike and run a full marathon of 26.2 miles? What kind of a person do you think I am?

…an Ironman.

Race Review:

First of all, this was my first race at this distance. An olympic triathlon starts with a 1500 meter swim, followed by a 40 kilometer bike, and finished off with a 10 kilometer run (.93, 24.85, and 6.2 miles, respectively). This race was along the Silver Strand in San Diego. There was a half-ironman distance (Super Frog) race going on at the same time which made for a little pre-race confusion but I attended the course talk at the expo the day before the race to make sure I understood the routes.

The .93 mile swim took place in the San Diego Bay. The water there was much warmer (mid 60’s I would guess) and also a lot calmer (read, no surf) than the long course which was an ocean swim in upper 50’s water with decent surf. The two races shared a transition area which was closer to the long course swim exit. That just meant the Seal racers had roughly a quarter mile run from the swim exit to T1…barefoot. The swim is still my weak point though I have plans of hopefully fixing that before Vineman. I am not positive of my splits because they have not posted them yet but according to my watch, I left T1 on my bike around 33 minutes into the race. That was the swim, the run to transition, and the transition time itself.

The 24.85 mile bike was along the Silver Strand highway and Seals had to do 2 complete loops to get our miles in. Frogs had to do four larger loops. I ride the Silver Strand every so often and it is notorious for having high winds. Wind is a killer when on a bike. When it is windy, it takes all that much more power output from your legs to even maintain a medium-high speed. If one is not careful, they can blow up before the run even starts. Luckily it was not warm and the sun was hiding behind some clouds. The cooler temps made the ride a bit more comfortable. Again, I do not know my splits for sure but from T1 to the bike, to T2, I came in somewhere around 1:07:00 which was averaging around 22 mph.

One I hopped off the bike, I threw on my hat, socks and running shoes, grabbed my race number and some Clif Shot Bloks and I was on my way. My T2 times are usually under one minute or so. I ran out of transition and my right IT band was feeling a little tight already. I told it to simmer down because we had 6.2 miles to go and by 1/2 a mile into it, he was behaving. The bigger surprise was the ‘hard-packed’ trail the run took place on. Where I am from, hard-packed trail does not mean loose sand. It was impossible to get my footing at first since I have no experience running in sand. I use the cement when I run as a spring board and bounce off with each push. This was not happening here. By the second mile, we were back to solid terra firma and I was getting my running legs under me. I finally felt normal around mile three and started picking up the pace. By the last mile, I was running around 6:30 miles and feeling super strong. I sprinted across the finish line, because you simply have to look good in front of all those people, and smiled when I saw my babe there waiting for me.

Carrie took some photos of the race but it was not a very spectator friendly race so it was difficult for her to see very much of me. The official race photos should be release on Saturday so we will see if anything good comes from those.

Overall, I came in around 2:27:06 which put me 11th of 45 in my age group (Males 25-29) and 128th of 500+ overall. One thing I am always confused about is the final number of finishers. The race was almost sold out at 800 racers and it says only 519 finished. Do folks just not show up? Do they not finish? What gives? It would make my percentage look a lot better if all 800 folks completed the race. At the same time, maybe some ‘faster than me’ folks did not show up and that is why I did so well? Who knows? All I know is that I have a taste now for longer courses and I must admit, I liked it a lot better than a sprint. That just makes me all the more excited for Vineman 70.3.

Ironman, look out!