This Post is Brought to You by the Letter B!

 The Letter B: Balance, Balls, Banana Seats, Baseball, Bronchitis

...guess what, it's already near the end of August. Rev3 Maine is this weekend and I once again have a crew from across the country coming to Maine for the EPIC race. This is truly my favorite race of the year and I am so excited to once again have a blast.

3rd Place overall, 2013 "Team Small"

with Angela, who will be back this year! 

Scott (Train Fat Boy Train) returns to Maine this year! 

This year has been one of transition and struggle for me. Trying to balance all the balls in my life: work, family, clients, nutrition, and training. It has proved difficult, and it has been a bit of a struggle for me to put my own needs aside for time to train and work so many hours. SO much of who I am is tied up into training and racing and triathlon. I'd be lying if I said at times, I feel lost and incomplete without hours of riding, running and swimming. I miss it so...and as Cedar Point rolls around, I am engulfed in plans for one of my athletes racing the full there. I recall last year and remember with fondness the training, the chats with Coach Sharpie and the excitement building to perform. And I simply miss it.

CP 140.6 2013 at the finish with my INSPIRATION, Lola

However, I refuse to let the family ball drop. I am getting to the small amounts of free time I have with my daughter, who is growing up way to fast. I am so lucky to have been able to witness so many firsts with her this year. No more training wheels. Swimming like a fish. Running her first mile. Reconnecting with my childhood best friend, Beth, and watching OUR kids play together.

my little fish

I have always loved biking and my Dad saved my very favorite bike from my younger days in hopes that someday I would have a child and he or she would ride it.

Hello 1978-The Cactus Flower, complete with banana seat.

We had an amazingly relaxing family vacation at a lake house this summer, with lots of swimming, kayaking and canoeing. It was a little slice of heaven!

not a care in the world...laying on the dock

Family time was a big theme this summer and we had a blast at the local baseball games. Lola also won a heated game of "musical chairs".

I also spent a majority of the summer with a bronchial infection that just would not go away! Three rounds of antibiotics, inhalers, allergy meds, chest x-rays...you name it, they were trying it. Finally, I am getting some relief and things seem to be clearing up. I certainly lost a ton of fitness this summer (isn't it usually the other way around?). It is what it is...perhaps this was the Universe's way of shouting "SLOW DOWN JEN"

So with Rev3Maine weekend here, I am racing the oly and I will have fun. I will enjoy the swim in my beautiful Maine ocean, ride the rollers of the country bike course and will smile and cheer others on during the run. I don't care about the clock, PR's, Podiums or anything else. I will stay at the finish line and cheer until the last finisher of the day crosses (because it is my favorite part of the race!!).

Lola and her friend, Bella doing tires flips at one of my bootcamp workouts

I have been able to help so many OTHERS this year and that makes it all worth it. I am able to give back in ways I never imagined. Sharing my own story and journey is inspiring others to change their own lives. Through coaching, personal training and nutrition, I am helping others reach THEIR goals.  I love being able to do that and believe that is my mission in life to help others feel awesome. Just like I do every day.

I know what it feels like to be the before...and I know what it feels like to be the after. Every person deserves to feel amazing in their own body and to have the confidence to chase their dreams! 

Rev3 Maine

I wish I had an assistant who could run or bike with me so I can dictate all the marvelous blog ideas that percolate in my head while training but never find the time to sit down and put on "paper" and hit publish for...

As I have mentioned, trying to balance everything this summer has left me neglecting my poor little blog which totally bums me out. So since I am on taper, I have tons of time (ok, not really) to do some posts!

Race Morning with Angela!

REV 3 MAINE
Aug 25th

What a difference a year makes. Last year my husband begrudgingly made an appearance at the race and we spent the entire weekend with a great amount of stress and animosity between us. This was literally the beginning of the end for us.

Luckily, things have changed.

This year? Dude was along for the ride AND the other half of my relay team, A Small Team.

The idea of a relay started what chatting with Coach Sharpie about how the race season would play out. With Cedar Point just two weeks after Maine, we were considering the Oly or an aquabike option. There was NO WAY I was sitting out my favorite race on my home turf and I had to be honest with Coach, there was no way I could "take it easy" on the bike at a home game either.  That's when the idea hit me...we could race TOGETHER> I'd swim and bike, Casey could run.

Coach gave me the greenlight on this idea, said I could chick as many fella's as I wanted so it was GO!
I checked out the previous years results for relay teams and they had some pretty fast times.
Sub-5 and the podium was the goal! 

I gotta hand it to the folks at Rev3 (Ashley, Jonathan, Charlie, Carole ??) ... not sure who is responsible for the perfect mornings on race day for Maine, but it was another amazing race start with a beautiful sunrise.

Beautiful Photo Courtesy of Chris Dodd

kayaks heading out to the swim course
Photo Courtesy of Angela Campos

Seriously--Ahhhmazing!
Photo Courtesy of Angela Campos

The Swim
Photo Courtesy of Hannah Heisler 

I was standing in the water with a new tri-friend, Leslie (Maine was her first half and she finished in 5:53) and I just stopped, stood there and took in the moment--and asked her to do the same. It was just breathtaking...

The ocean water was chilly (barely 60*) and there was a lot of grumbling and BRR's going on. With a wind change, the temps had dropped quite a bit over the last several weeks leading into race day but the water was actually a few degrees warmer than it had been all week.

...and the purple caps are ready!
Photo Courtesy of Angela Campos

There was nothing remarkable about the swim except I got up front, I swam and I rarely had anyone near me--very strange for a race! After the initial scrum of the start, I had clear water. Head down and swim. By the time I got to the final turn buoy, I could see no purple caps around me and I was passing the two waves ahead. My effort was steady but more paced for Cedar Point vs. a half. Upon exit of the water, Garmin flashed a 37:xx and I was like "crap" SLOW but apparently, the swim was longish (most report 1.4 miles and I was told that this was due to water level changes with the tide). I looked at some local "fasties" swim times and this longer distance rings true. Regardless, I was happy with my effort and my time.

SWIM 38:35
5th of 108 in my wave (F40+, Relays & Athena)
(1:32/100 based on my Garmin distance of 1.45)

It's a bit of a haul from the water to transition, but I don't understand why so many make a big deal out of it really...this year they offered a "special needs" shoe bag for those who wanted to put something on. Honestly, I don't remember thinking it was that bad in 2012 and again this year, it was not bad. Just a short jog to the best leg of the day....THE BIKE!

Ahhhh, the bike. My happy place. 
Onto my chariot and I was spinning easy until I was able to get away from the crowds. After I got thru town, across Route 1 and out into the "country roads", I settle into pace. Sucked down some Perform and popped a Powerbr Apple Gel. Up ahead quite a bit, I spotted a QT2 systems kit and let him be my "rabbit". I caught him rather quickly and we played a game of back and forth.

About 20 miles in, I dropped my chain (uuuggghhhh--c'mon Kid! rookie mistake here!) changing into my small ring and lost about a minute hopping off and getting it back on. Back on and GO!

The miles were ticking by quickly and I was on top of my hydration and nutrition (priority of the day) and there was not a female in sight. I was riding with a small group of men and there were two others that I'd play the back and forth game with through most of the ride. I finally saw a female (Veronica, Newton Kit) and we took turns passing the boys and eachother. We would all get clustered up on the hills but there was  no drafting going on. It was simply a testosterone festival with two chicks in the mix.

The bike route had a change this year, taking out Simpson Road which is under construction, and what a great change! You hit up some small rollers instead and I really liked the flow of the new bike route.

With about 10 miles left to go, this is when I put some power into it and tried to break away from this pack of fellas I'd been riding with for 40 miles. I broke away from them and spotted my superfast team mate, Alyssa, up ahead. My first thought was HOLYSH*T!! I can catch Alyssa!! (she was 2nd or 3rd OA)...and catch her I did. And then I passed her...
Highlight of my freaking race!! 
When Alyssa caught back up to me, she yelled "Girl, You are pulling 30 guys!" and I rolled my eyes and told her I was trying to lose 'em all! ha ha I chased Alyssa "home" and she entered T2 just seconds ahead of me and it was time for Casey to run!

BIKE 2:31 
2nd of 108 in my wave
I had one of the fastest female bike splits of the day! wooo hooo
My Garmin shows that I did the ride in 2:29 and I hope I did not lose an entire 2 mins messing with my chain!

Happy Happy Girl!!

**

Dawn, Me & Lola

Team Pace Booty! 

I said hi to my parents, got to see Angela come in and head out on the run and see my BFF for a bit while Casey did his thing. I got to hang out with Team Pace Booty and pick up Sara!


Before I knew it, Casey was coming in from his run (1:46) and it was time to FINISH!!

It is all very symbolic of how things have changed in the last year. We are finally a solid family unit, doing things TOGETHER. As a TEAM.

Hand in hand, we crossed the finish line!
5:02

Our Finish
Photo Courtesy of Michael Brillant, Brillant Images

I think my expression says it all

So our goal going into this day was to have fun and celebrate a year of change, for the better.
We also wanted sub-5 and the podium.

Well, we did have fun.
We ALMOST went sub-5 (and had soooo many discussions about those 2 minutes!! ugh).
We made podium, 3rd place Relay team. Taking 3rd place to two VERY fast teams with times of 4:20 and 4:40!!



Best of all, we celebrated being a family that now plays TOGETHER.

Next Stop: Cedar Point 140.6

VLOG: Rev 3 Adventure Race

You did get a chance to read about the Rev3 Pre-show, right?
Well, I have more pre-show leading up to the Maine Event (which is the race report).

Saturday morning was a little crazy and I found myself running around more than I had hoped. 
I had so many friends visiting and I really wanted to just hang out with each of them but there was just not enough hours in the day to do everything I wanted to.

The afternoon was going to be jam packed with stuff at the Rev3 race site and Lola would be doing her first Rev 3 Kids Adventure Race and I was pretty stoked.

Here's my attempt to get Lola to talk about the race but she had other ideas (as usual). 

So here are some pics from the race (courtesy of Scott at Train Fat Boy Train) 
Make sure you check out his version of events race report!


Now Scott seems to think that Lola is trying to cheat here by getting an "edge" on the other racers.  

Scott's POV: You can see in this picture Jen's child already trying to get an advantage over everyone else by starting over the line. 

Clearly, this is not the case. She is simply stretching her hamstring out before her rocket like take off at "GO". I mean, really...she's the smallest one there!! 

Again, Scott claims this occurred: My child..the law abiding one..showing Jen's daughter where her feet should be. Also note how seriously Kristien and Jen are mapping out their path to victory.

It's obvious that Laila noticed that Lola was lucky #19 and her Dad was red green with envy. 

In the end, all of the kids won because it was FUN. But here are the First, Second and Third Place Teams. 

It was all about TEAM WORK!! 

and as a team

we smoked everyone else by a lot of minutes...

Rev3Maine Awesomeness (and a winner)

I don't even know where to start on the chonicle that is Rev3Maine Weekend!

Wednesday night I went down to the race site to get in a swim and several of the Rev3 peeps had arrived and I was getting SOO psyched for the weekend. This race has been on my calendar since last fall when they announced it and it was finally HERE!

Thursday morning while out on my ride, I hit up the bike course for a final ride and the big Rev3 trucks had arrived! WOO HOOO More excitement. I got to chat with a couple Rev3 friends and knew I'd have to bring Lola right down to see her favorite Rev3'er, the beautiful and fabulous Laura!

Thursday when I got to finally pick up the friends arriving at the airport--but there was a small twist to the plan. Mama Bear herself needed a ride to the race site from the airport and I was happy to provide transportation!!

Jason and Scott did not get in for quite a bit so Carole made sure to make good use of the time by teaching Lola some karate.

Scott and his family, Kristine and Laila all arrived safely and then it was Jason's turn. One more Rev3'er needing help, Pat (could listen to that brogue all day long!). With the help of my friend/training partner/coaching-guinea-pig, Marc everyone was well taken care of and made it to the  places they needed to be!

Friday was promising to be a full day so it was time to get home and get to bed!

The first order of business was to get out to the Rev3 swim site and introduce Jason to (not-so) cold Atlantic ocean water. While the rest of us marvelled at how nice the water temps were, Jason was a tad cold but manned-up quite well and was swimming just fine.

At the swim I got to meet up with another team mate I have been dying to meet, Joshua. Who, in my opinion is just freaking awesome sauce. Not just as an athlete (congrats on London!!) but just an all around decent human being who has overcome his own obstacles in life and is living healthy now.

This is team mates Kristen and Joshua on race morning,
picture lovingly hijacked from Facebook :)

So Friday brought more fun at the Rev3 site, getting to see my team mates, friends and just enjoying hanging with some really cool people.

And speaking of cool people, two new cool people rolled into my life this weekend too.
Jen and Angela.
Jen is a fellow blogger and we have been in contact via social media for at least a year or a year and a half. Jen is the gal who invited me to be a part of the From Fat to Finish Line film and the Ragnar Relay team in the first place. Jen is also the Executive VP of Program Development at Media Meld Studios and Angela is the President of Media Meld, the company producing the documentary.

They were able to schedule a visit to Maine to get some footage of the Rev3 Maine race and start getting some back story on my journey (more on that later).

The best part of their visit is Jason had NO IDEA that Jen was coming to Maine for the weekend. They have gotten to know one another through this lovely little thing called social media as well.

I also got to experience THIS awesome bomb!!

with Jason (me) Heather and MATTYOOOOOO!
I seriously don't think I could have been more delighted to spend time with such awesome people. My energy was on EXPLODE and I was SOOO ready to race!!

Dinner was a crew of us at Jimmy The Greeks

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thanks to all who commented on the Caption Contest!


The winning caption is:

"Um, Mommy? I think you need to add shower to that awesome training plan from Coach Sonja!"

Wendy Nitschke please email me at jsmall14(at)maine.rr.com and I will get you hooked up with some Foggle and TriSlide!!

Millionupledly Awesome

Wow, what a weekend.
Some extreme highs and some extreme lows.
The good was really good and the bad was a downright suckfest for sure.
But rest assured that there is plenty to talk about and I cannot wait to share my Rev 3 Maine race experience with all of you.
It was sooo awesome.


Not only did I have some really cool friends come all the way to Maine to visit and race
Jason
Matt
Heather
Scott
Jen
Angela

But I got to spend the weekend with my amazing Rev3 Family! I really loved all things Rev3 before this weekend, but after this race weekend, all of that love just doubled tripled quadrupled millionupled. Yes, that is my new word.

I had a heck of a race (hello awesome bike split!) and while I am cherishing that almost-19 minute PR, I am already nose to the grindstone on my next goal:
sub 5:30
and
a marathon in 8 7 weeks.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The crew from Media Meld studios was with me all weekend taping my antics, the race and filming my backstory of how I went from Fat to Fit. It was a really cool experience and it's good to revisit those days and see just how far I have come in a relatively short time. I actually felt very comfortable talking in front of the camera and had a lot of fun!

This is where I reach out to YOU! My cyberspace family...

with less than two weeks to go to raise funds on the Kickstarter page, we really need to make this project a reality!

So what is Kickstarter?
Kickstarter is an "all or nothing" way to fund creative projects, which means each project must raise the full amount of funding they are seeking for the project to be backed. In the case of FF2FL, the producers of the film are seeking $50,000 in funding to make this project successful.
If you come on as a backer and we do not reach the $50k goal, YOU ARE NOT CHARGED A CENT.
If we are successful at reaching our funding goal, the project will continue and you will recieve your "backer award" depending on the amount you pledged.

For example, $25.00 in Kickstarter support will get you a copy of the DVD plus special features not available on the full length feature film, including training tips!

HELP US REACH OUR GOAL GIVEAWAY!!
Our fundraising efforts will end with Kickstarter on Sept 13th at 9:00pm.
I will be doing my own sweet little giveaway to help us get there.
This will include a bunch of my favorite run things include Powerbar products and much more!!
CLICK HERE TO VISIT OUR KICKSTARTER PAGE!
From today until 9/13 at 9:00pm, if you back FF2FL, let me know!!

Message me at jsmalltri(at)gmail.com and let me know you backed From Fat to Finish Line. You do not need to disclose the amount you helped with (unless you want to!) and I will put your name in the hat. If we reach our goal, I will pick THREE winners!!

Also, make sure you check out the FF2FL Facebook page, each Friday they are doing their own spectacular giveaway!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Speaking of winners...come back tomorrow to find out who won the Caption Contest!!

Tri for a Cure Weekend & A Contest

Tri for a Cure has come and gone~



Tri for a Cure is a unique event that is a woman's only triathlon that raises money for the Maine Cancer Foundation. This year there were 1100 participants and they raised $1.2 million dollars for MCF!



this is my third year in a row at the event and each year I am so touched by the strength of the people at this race. Stories of survival, strength and courage and so many people racing in honor of those who did not survive the battle against cancer. It seems each year the "survivors" wave gets bigger and bigger...so many pink caps!




This year I was repping Rev 3 and SBR Sports, Inc. all weekend which was, of course, totally awesome.

Rev 3 and SheJAM's have joined forces at the Rev 3 Maine race to introduce an all woman's wave of the Olympic distance race, which is a fund raiser for Maine Cancer Foundation.

A Revolutionary All Women's Olympic Triathlon to Kick Cancer. REV3 sheJams Triathlon is a unique race that will be limited to 300 women. REV3 will bring a world class venue to Old Orchard Beach and allow us the opportunity to create a life changing experience for women who participate!

Anyone can compete, but all must raise $100 for the cause! We all know someone who has been touched by cancer. Come out and show your support by challenging yourself and raising money for cancer research, education and patient support programs through the Maine Cancer Foundation.

It was great to hear so much buzz about the Rev 3 Maine and SheJAM's race!

The calm before the storm...literally.
Saturday's clear skies turned into heavy rains come race day

Even those who were not ready to tackle an Olympic distance course were excited to volunteer (if you want to volunteer, please visit http://rev3tri.com/maine/volunteer-me/training/


Saturday was a day filled with chatting about the Maine race and TriSlide, TriSwim and Foggle! I had some wonderful helpers who love Rev 3 and SBR Sports just as much as I do!

training buddy, Marc happy to help!

the BFF rocking the Rev 3 R

I also got to meet one really cool chick this weekend! She introduced herself to me on Saturday at the Expo and said she read my blog (but never comments! ha ha).

Meet Megan!!
and her super cute Dad, Ted.
Loved these two-they reminded me a bit of me and my own Dad. He was there as race support for Megan and THAT in and of itself it total rock*star status for sure.

As soon as I arrived to the venue on Race Day, I saw Ted immediately and then found Megan. I was really glad I was able to give her some good luck mojo!! It was all very romantic, right at the Port-O-Potties to boot :) (Or green tombs of death as I like to call them...these were SO clean, especially for a TRIATHLON! ha ha)




Megan is a Mom, wife, runner and now she can add TRIATHLETE to that resume.
Tri for a Cure was her very first tri and she did amazing!!

She was 47th overall with a finish time of 1:29:13! She splashed out 12:09 1/3 mile swim, rocked a 48:53 bike split (for an 18.4mph avg) and killed that run with a 22:24 5k time (7:14 pace) Congratulations Megan!! I better see you registering for more and more triathlons now! I am looking forward to seeing you at Beach to Beacon next weekend (as you run past me!).

CAPTION CONTEST!
Want to win some cool stuff?
Wanna win a can of TriSlide and some foggle wipes?

The BEST caption for this photo wins. What determines the best? Who knows! Make it funny, make it serious, just make it memorable!
I may open up the best entries to voting.

Disclosure: the SBR Sports prize of TriSlide and Foggle is totally funded by me because I love this stuff and I am sure you will too!