Meet my Heros!

I am training for Ironman with TNT for 3 very special people. The following are a little bit about each of them. 

Tony Peyton

I have been given the honor to train in honor of my friend Julie's dad who lost his battle to cancer 1 year ago this May. He was a wonderful man, and I am proud to train in honor of Tony. Tony was diagnosed in January of 2008 with mesothelioma, a form of lung cancer. His doctors here in Louisville gave him 3 months to live. An expiration date was not what he wanted so he fought for a better answer. He found it in Dr. Sugarbaker at Brigham women's hospital in Boston, MA. He was getting to be well known for a radical procedure to treat Tony’s specific cancer. After all was said and done, they removed most of what the cancer infected, which included his entire right lung, 1/2 of his diaphragm, 2 ribs and the lining from the bottom of his heart and they did a chemo wash while he was in surgery. He recovered well and after a few weeks they let him go home. He would fly back and forth every 3 months for labs and PET scans. Everything was great until a year later when the cancer had come back in his adrenal glands. Treatment was chemo every couple weeks. Tony took it like a champ entertaining all the oncology nurses! But after several months, chemo had to be stopped due to the damage on his already weakened kidneys. He had suffered from diabetes for years. For a couple years it was a healthy, joyful time. Then all of a sudden, Tony started feeling bad. He was having back pains and trouble walking. He went to the doctor and MRI after MRI showed nothing. He knew something was wrong but no one not even his family believed it. There was no proof. After trying to maintain care in my home, we had to rely on outside care. Tony entered the Masonic home in April of 2012. Therapist from all disciplines worked with him. He was losing feeling and sensation in his legs. But he pushed on through therapy. He would go to the hospital and back to the Masonic home. Finally, the nurse practitioner ordered a specific MRI. Part of the cancer crept back to his spine and formed a tumor. It was inoperable. And the thinking was shifted from treatable therapy for his legs to we need to start thinking about what if. That was on a Thursday. On Saturday the MD said we may just have a few days to a few weeks. Tony passed away at 10pm that evening.

The battle against cancer is an unimaginable fight. One that words can't even begin to describe for those that fight it, and for their family members that experience that fight while standing strong by their side. Hopefully one day noone will have to fight, suffer, adnd then fight some more. Hopefully the word cancer will one day be a memory that is no more. That is why I train. That is why I raise money. For it to be a memory. 

 

Ava Lucille

I want to introduce one of the bravest little girls or for that matter person I've ever met! Her name is Ava Lucille.  Ava was diagnosed at age 3 in May of 2011 w/Wilms tumor(Nephroblastoma) a form of kidney cancer. The disease occurs in about 1 out of 200,000 to 250,000 children. It usually strikes when a child is about 3 years old. After undergoing aggressive surgery in which she lost her left kidney and 21 weeks of chemotherapy she immediately relapsed with metastatic lesions to her lungs. In November of 2011 she had a section of her lung removed and then proceeded to go through the most aggressive 7 month, round the clock impatient chemotherapy. Can you imagine when you're supposed to be playing, and enjoying being a child, undergoing chemo? Thankfully Ava never stopped fighting and she has now been cancer free for 8 months!!! Ava's mom, Allison, is a dear longtime friend of mine. She is a photographer, and wanted to document Ava's experience. She had a friend document the struggle via a blog that you can visit here http://avalucille.tumblr.com/ Ava is a gift, and I am honored to be training for her, and fundraising to help beat cancer! This is why I train, to help more little girls and boys be able to say they are cancer free!!!!

Barbara "Granny" Bishop

  I was extremely close to my Granny.  I spent a lot of time with her in Mt. Washington as I was growing up. I have her to thank for my complexion. :)  I loved coming to stay with her for a week or several days at a time. She painted me in Calamine lotion when I had the chicken pox. My mom had to go to a teacheing conference in Louisville, so I stayed with Granny in order for her to ensure I didn't scratch my skin off. She made me wear white dress gloves the entire 3 days so as not to leave scars when I scratched. She's part of my wanting to pursue a career in nursing. I use to go with her to people's houses. She would check on them and help them when they were sick. She had a huge heart, and wanted to help everyone she met even though she didn't have much herself.  She use to tell me we were related to Pocahontas, and I was fascinated. People would call me that from time to time growing up, and I always pretended to be her when I was daydreaming.  Granny was diagnosed with Lung Cancer at age 55. She smoked for years and years. She had a lobe of one of her lungs removed, and we thought she’d beat Cancer. Unfortunately, the cancer spread to her brain 5 years later, and it was too much for her to fight. She was diagnosed in June of 1992 with metastatic brain cancer. She fought hard for 6 months, but she passed 3 days before my 9^th birthday, and was buried on my 9^th birthday. I think that was her way to tell me that we'd always be connected. :) Raising money in her honor, is how I keep her heart and spirit alive. 

 

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This week was another recovery week. 53 miles total with 5:30 minutes of training time. 

Running=1 hour 24min---8 miles.

 Biking =  2 hours 27 min -----43 miles 

Swimming = 1 hour 40 minutes ---2 miles. 

My run total should have been 14 miles, but 4 miles into my long run Saturday my left foot started hurting. It felt like someone was stabbing me in the lateral aspect just in front of the ankle. I think it's tendonitis. I'll be making a trip to Dr. Bee of Occupational Kinetics this week in hopes that he can work it out with Active Release Therapy (ART). It did wonders for a strain I had before the Chicago Marathon. For now, I'll be replacing all of my runs this week with bikes and swims, in hopes that it just needs some time to recover. Thankfully, it only hurts when walking or running :)  Oh I also swam my first 1650 yards straight! 

Just say no to Trainers-Bike trainers that is!

Oh man I can't tell you how happy I was to ride outside on Sunday! I'm ready to ditch my trainer! Riding inside for 2 months 3 days a week is enough! Sunday, we had our first Ironteam outside ride! We met in Prospect at our coach's house so we could organize everything and talk about the course. Each Sunday we'll be riding part of the Ironman course, until eventually as our time increases we ride the entire thing :) This smiley face may not be smiling come the middle of July haha, but for now it's awesome. We rode 35 miles a loop starting out on 42 to 393 to 53 and back to 42. The first 20 miles were awesome. I was really happy with my cadence, and my speed was great at times, but part of this was due to an amazing tail wind. I was able to keep up with the guys in the pack, which I can't always do, but I try my hardest. I think I surprise people at times when I'm able to.

When I rode my first century ride a couple years ago. Around mile 30 or 40, my friend Beth and I were riding with two guys. There were 3 distances to choose from, 35 miles, 65 miles or 100 miles. I asked one of the guys which distance he was doing hoping to find a few others doing the Century. He said the 100 and then asked me. When I replied, "100," he said in a surprised tone, "are you really." Well, if I hadn't decided to before that moment, I decided then. :) We rode together the rest of the day, and I even led some. 

Anyway, back to our ride. The last 8 miles were hard. We were riding into a headwind. At times the wind would blow so hard I thought it was going to blow me off the road. That's always fun when you're on a two lane road and the wind is blowing you back and forth, you just hope that it blows you to the right and not to the left into traffic. I knew I was getting close to turning back into Dee's subdivision, but I had one more hill to climb. It was at the top that I really realized just how much the wind was affecting me. As I crested what seemed like the longest, tallest hill imaginable at that point (it wasn't that bad, I was just exhausted), I felt relief as I saw that I'd be going down finally. I prepped myself to race down the last hill. My fastest decent that day was 39.4mph, and most of the downs were at least 25+mph. I started the decent, but I didn't feel like I was going anywhere. The wind was blowing so hard that I was only travelling at 16mph, DOWNHILL!! On a flat I am usually around 18-23mph. I was ready to be off the bike at that point. Made it back to Dee's and then ran a mile to get my legs use to running on tired legs. I did 35 miles in 2:05. Very happy with the first outside ride!

My totals for this week of training were: Total: 8 hours and 33 min= 83 miles!
Run = 2 hours 22 min= 15 miles
Bike = 4 hours & 15min= 66 miles
Swim = 1 hour 53 min = 2 miles

Rough Week

The last week of Feburary was an extremely tough week as far as training goes. Not the amount, but I've been so physically fatigued, that I had to skip a few key workouts. I hate skipping workouts, and it's even something my coach had to convince me to do. If I missed a particular workout, I would just move it to the next day in order to get it on. Dee has taught me that it's ok to miss a workout, and that's just it, if I miss it, it's over. This week I had to. At first I thought my thyroid might be low, but I think I may have been sick, and all my energy was going to fight whatever was trying to wreck it's havoc on me. Saturday the first day of March I didn't get off the couch all day. I was tired the entire week. I stopped sleeping well, so I was tired during the day too. I started to get worried I had over-trained a bit so I took Friday and Saturday as rest days. When I woke up Saturday, I headed straight for the couch, and that's where I laid until I had to get ready for one of the fundraisers organized by Team In Training, which was awesome. I had a great time with friends, but I'm pretty sure I could have melted into the couch and never gotten up that's how tired I was. Resting was the right medicine, though. I woke up early the next morning and got in a great spin with Coach Dee at her house, and felt back to normal.  

Besides the fatigue wrecking havoc on my training, my fundraising kicked into high gear this week! I passed the halfway mark! You know what else is really exciting about that fact? I earned a free sweatshirt for it!! I love free things! I am so humbled that everyone has been so generous with their donations. I am so very fortunate to know so many caring souls.

Now for my Feburary monthly totals! Drumroll please... I ran a total of 54 miles in 11 hours and 9 min, I biked 183 miles in 12 hours and 29 mins, and I swam 9 miles in 7 hours and 24 minutes for a total of 246  miles in 32 hours and 40 minutes!