Family weekend

We had our granddaughter in Toronto for the weekend. She had a short visit with her dad on Saturday afternoon, but he had forgotten it was her weekend and was hosting a party that evening and working on Sunday. Work is good.

On Saturday evening we picked up a possible Hallowe’en outfit for her at Value Village, a for-profit thrift store that stocks new and used costumes for Hallowe’en. On Sunday we went back to Value Village for a very nice charcoal-grey satin formal that was just a little big for her but should be perfect about the time she graduates from elementary school.

On Sunday morning LotStreetWiz headed out for an 8-hour bike ride with only two protein bars in his pocket. If biking burns off a few hundred calories per hour, you have to eat more than that to stay caught up! Eating enough to stay fuelled is one of the challenges of the longer triathlons. After dropping off our grand-daughter, I drove on and picked him up in Niagara Falls, rather cold and tired but triumphant at riding 100 miles.

First kids’ tri of the year

We’re back from a very brief trip to Lindsay for AthleticKid to swim/bike/run a kids’ triathlon. This is her first one of the season.

She put in a respectable time and moved up three places from her performance last year — in her estimate, measured from last place.

Biking Saturday

Today we had a fun ride. LotStreetWiz, AtheticKid, SilentLight, and I all biked down to the Leslie Street Spit, around the outer road (three times for L & A), and back again. We put in about 17 miles plus a few extra for our athletes. We took the Don Trail both ways to find a gentler slope. I generally brought up the rear. At the entrance to the park SilentLight and I hung back to have something to eat. I felt more energetic after that.

The Spit had a community event with nature lookout points and bird boxes for swallows or perhaps bluebirds. Apparently it was part of Doors Open Toronto. At our turnaround point, just before the road turns to gravel, there was a display including some bird skins, so we were able to compare herring gulls, ring-billed gulls (a little smaller), and common terns (a lot smaller). We learned that a pair of great egrets are nesting, or at least hanging around, past our turnaround. That was about our only stop as the emphasis was on letting AthleticKid get in some training time.

still, we saw a lot of birds: cormorants, Canada Geese, gulls, terns, swallows–barn swallows?–and lots of smaller ones. We heard a lot of robins. The red-winged blackbirds are everywhere.

The beaver lodge in the big pond is higher and we saw freshly gnawed and felled trees back by the park entrance. So either there are two beavers with different territories or one wandering animal.

Biked to dinner

We biked to the Keg Mansion on Jarvis Street for dinner with family. Although it was only about 4km each way, I was quite warm by the time we got there. I missed the rain showers–or they missed me.

Bike ride, Leslie Street Spit

We biked along the north shore of Lake Erie Ontario to Leslie Street Spit. We avoided the gravel road at the tip. So we took the right branch out to the end of pavement, back to the junction, then up other arm of the spit, and then back home.

Looking across beaver pond and other branch of the Spit to Toronto

The weather was fine and sunny, but a little cold. First ride of the season for me: 14 miles. I’ve forgotten how to change gears on my bike.

Kids’ triathlon

I finally uploaded the videos of our granddaughter in the Orillia Kids of Steel triathlon.

Andie-tri-start, originally uploaded by monado.

The swim was 300 yards: three times around the short course.

The first one, the swim start, is the longest video at ninety seconds. The others are under twenty seconds: one of the 5-km bike race and one of the running finish.

Andie-tri-bike, originally uploaded by monado.

Andie-tri-finish, originally uploaded by monado.

Biking

This morning, I did a very slow bike ride, 2.5 hours accompanying LotStreetWiz while he ran. We went down into the Don Valley and then east to the Leslie Street Spit–and back, of course!

On Thursday I biked downtown and back. So I am getting in a little bit of cycling.

Exercising for health

It’s increasingly clear that to feel good and be healthy, a person has to get some exercise.

I’m trying to add some more activities to my modest mix of swimming a couple of times a week and doing Pilates once most weeks. For one thing, I can practice Pilates exercises at home. And I can switch the swimming from 1-hour skills sessions to 1.5-hour, coached lane swims.

I would like to add regular walking and regular bike rides, at least until the snow is on the ground. By that time my walking should be jogging or running. And I can switch to an indoor bike trainer.

There’s also contra dancing about three times a month, for the price of a movie and a snack. Indeed, there are other regular opportunities for folk or country dancing.

That’s one of the things I like about Toronto: whatever you like, you can find people to do it with.

I probably won’t be keeping detailed notes here the way I do with swimming. But in the background, I hope to be working out more. I’ve made a modest start with a very slow bike ride of about 14 km (9 miles) this weekend, in the Don Valley.

Ironman Canada is today!

Canada’s Ironman triathlon is running in Penticton, B.C. today. I’m watching the streaming video & audio (announcements and their choice of music on the speakers at the start/finish lines! Check it out at Ironman.com. Just keep following the links to live video. The results/transcription window pops up automatically.

The competitors are divided into professionals (pros) and amateurs (age-groupers). The pros compete for the overall win. The age-groupers have separate prizes for each age group (about a decade).

Ironman criteria:

• Swim 3.8 km or 2.4 miles
• Bike 180 km or 112 miles
• Run a full marathon (42 km or 26.2 mile)
• Cut-off time, 17 hours

The youngest competitor a woman of 18 and the oldest a 78-year-old nun. The oldest man is 77. I saw one man with a full grey beard, no one with large breasts.

I won’t be able to keep it on all day as I’m driving to Peterborough and back.

Invisible unicycle

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