Maui Livin'

Aloha from Maui! With the XTERRA World Championships being less than two weeks away, training has wound down only a little bit. Quality is more important than quantity at this point. I've been paying close attention to my swimming, biking and running forms and making small adjustments to become more efficient.

I have been enjoying our stay here since day one! Hawaii is truly one of my favorite places in the United States. All of our soaking up of the sunshine and swimming in the ocean is refreshing to our souls as well as our bodies!

This picture was taken just before a training ride on the trails of Makawao Forest. In the center is Fred, our friend who came from Alaska to participate in the XTERRA also.

Practicing one of my "Conrad Stoltz" moves....

On one of our training rides, we started at over 5,000 feet up the slope of Haleakala and climbed to 8,000 feet and below us it's a cloudy day! In the distance you can see the Big Island, which is where the Hawaii Ironman World Championship is to take place the next day.

On October 9, 2010, all of us took a day off and watched the Ironman World Championship on the big screen TV hooked to the laptop via HDMI. The live webcam stream was good. Chris Lieto is pictured above, who got 11th place. My coach, Amber also raced there and finished in 10 hours and 50 minutes. And this was only "practice" for her Ultraman World Championship race also taking place on the Big Island in November!

Ah, the warm ocean! This beach is on the northern shore of Maui which is always very choppy but there's a coral reef blocking the big waves and creating a tide pool which makes it nice for little kids like my niece Setra to play in. It's a great natural swimming pool too, but if you're feeling wild you can always walk 50 meters down the beach to where the reef ends and swim in the choppy water and strong currents!

I'm doing one of my running speed workouts on my favorite soccer field with a great view of the ocean and lower slopes of the island below the town of Makawao where we are staying.

Earlier we went to the Maui County fair. (I know, seems like we go to fairs all the time) It was a good time, I went on a few rides! My first ride was the Inverter. I'm on the 2nd seat from the left. It's like the 1001 Nachts ride, except this time you're spinning upside down at its apex which is 8 stories above the ground. This ride is crazy because you feel comfortable when you see the shoulder restraints so you think that you won't be moving around or anything. But then when you're hanging upside down all of a sudden you're off your seat and you realize that those restraints are the only things holding you....

Another ride that I went in was the Scrambler with my aunt Elyssa, who also came over to Maui to visit for a week.

For all of you fans of the "Lost" TV show, this looks familiar doesn't it? You can just imagine Hurley driving through in the blue Dharma Initative VW bus.

This will probably be the only blog that I will be able to write until after the XTERRA race unless I come across some interesting material. Then after XTERRA, I will work on a website with my bio, race info and resumes, blog, the works etc. Till then, I will be training and preparing for the race. Physically, mentally, emotionally and of course spiritually I'm doing great. I'm so grateful for the great opportunity to be here on Maui, and I'm looking forward to the race. Thats when I can play, have fun, and see all of the benefits of a long (but adventurous) season of training and racing unfold!