2017 Arizona "Training Camp"

After race season last year, Anthony and I both had a fire in our bellies. We talked about the next few years and our goals and we decided we were ready to be "all in."  This meant that we had a lot of things to evaluate starting with coaches, how many races, which races, long term goals, and short term goals.  And we have to respect and support each others schedules, goals, and progress understanding that we each have a different journey.  Lastly, we had to accept that being "all in" is darn expensive. 

We both started building our foundation for 2017 on November 1.  We've both been extremely consistent and we've been having so much fun individually and watching each other grow both mentally and physically.  It's not been easy trying to find the balance that is needed to be all in while respecting each others different schedules, but we seem to have found a pretty good balance.  

With the consistency and dedication, my confidence has grown, my relationship with my coaches has grown, and as I prepare to start my first ever training camp, I feel healthy,  excited, and ready to overload my body with lots of swim/bike/run fun in warm and beautiful Arizona! 

After about 7 hours of work on Friday, we drove about 5 hours to start our trip with a stop over in Santa Fe, NM.  Santa Fe was never a place on my radar, but what a cool city.  We are looking forward to stopping over on our drive home.  We had just enough time there to take Brutus on a short morning jog to get the driving out of our legs from the day before and get some authentic New Mexican breakfast (burrito for Anthony, Huevos rancheros for me).  

Brutus was such a good road trip buddy for both legs of the trip.  After our morning run and breakfast in Santa Fe, we showered and headed off to finish the drive - about 7 more hours to Tucson.  We stopped at the Whole Foods in Albuquerque for some good driving snacks and lunch for later.  The drive from Santa Fe to Tucson is nothing to write home about, but it was seamless and went by fast with some chatting, some podcasts, and some tunes.

For our stay in Tucson, after much research on options for places to stay, we opted for an airbnb.  The only questionable part was the owner was going to be home - he just opens his house to guests.  After talking to him, he was ok with Brutus, ok with us taking over the kitchen, and extremely laid back and kind, so we felt very comfortable.  When we arrived, Charlie was doing yard work and welcomed us and made us feel like we were right at home - like family.  I am really happy with our homestay so far!

After getting everything moved in (we had to bring a lot of stuff!), Anthony hung out with Brutus (who LOVES his backyard for the week) and Charlie and I headed to the grocery store to get all of our fuel for the week (A LOT!).  Now just time to have some dinner and relax before the work starts!