Tereza Macel's Blog

The other night Chris and I were watching the movie a Christmas Story, my favourite Christmas movie. It is the story of a young boy, and how all he wants for Christmas is a bebe gun. Part way through the movie Chris asked me if I remember when I stopped believing in Santa Claus. Well, first of all in Czech there is no Santa. Our gifts were brought by “jezisek” which means little Jesus, but is pretty close to the Czech word “jezek” which means hedgehog. So when I was little I always pictured a little hedgehog bringing our presents. And no, he did not come through the chimney. We lived in an apartment building, as did everyone else I knew, and for some reason I always believed he came through the window, and he got there on a magic carpet. I don’t remember ever seeing pictures of the “Czech Santa” it was all part of the experience, having to imagine it on your own. There were no billboards, or posters or adds showing you who is bringing presents, or what you should ask for, or what everyone else is getting. Imagination.

Wish I had some exciting stories to tell about my past week or so. But I must admit that it has been pretty boring by the famous globe trotting standards most people expect.
I am lucky to actually be at home in Toronto for a while. I think I have spent less than 6 weeks at home all of 2009, so not packing a suitcase this month is a bit of a treat. I have been doing the Christmasy, family stuff, which is a nice way to enjoy the month of December.
A huge Christmas thing at our house is baking Christmas cookies. My mom has been a super baker ever since I was little. When we were kids and lived in Prague she would bake late, late at night so that we would not get in her way. Not just a few Christmas cookies, but dozens of different varieties, piles and piles of cookies. All very dainty, tasty, and perfect looking. The ones that were not up to her standards would get tossed in a bowl that we could eat before Christmas day, while the others were saved for the big reveal. As we got older, and moved to Canada the Czech Christmas cookies were still baked, still late at night for some reason. But each year there are fewer cookies and less varieties. And when I moved out I realized I really missed this part of Christmas and started recreating my mom’s Christmas treats.

My mom announced this year that she would only make a few cookies. However, both my brother and I have already had a bunch of friends put in requests for cookies. Each year most of the cookies are given away to friends, and it seems last year we slacked off, and now were being reminded that once you get a person hooked on Czech Christmas cookies you better keep baking each year. We divided up the job this year, I made some, my mom made some, and even my brother tried to help out. And although my mom says cookies are not about perfection, and there is no right or wrong, when she saw him cutting out pig shapes, and decorating them with lemon icing she looked at me, and said ” we’ll make proper cookies later “.

So we did. The hard work is pretty much over, and now the cookies are just waiting for Christmas day. Or to be boxed up and given to those who were smart enough to put in an order.

Last weekend I was in Phuket, and now am back in Toronto. There is nothing quite like going from +30 degrees Celcius to -3 and snow. But I must admit it does feel a lot more Christmas like when you are bundled up in a coat and scarf, and see Christmas decorations all over the houses.

Phuket was awesome. The race was very nicely organized. A unique swim that started in the ocean for 1400 meters, then a short jog on the beach, and then 600 more meters in a freshwater lagoon. The bike course had some challenging and technical hills early on, and then lots of flat stretches through quaint villages and a bit on a highway. And finally the run was pretty fun, taking us through the resorts, and over some grass and sand paths of the golf course. I did not feel too sparky, but enjoyed the atmosphere and the idea of doing a race for fun, with no expectations or pressure.
The highlights of my trip were definitely the pool villa we stayed in at the Banyan Tree Resort. I just need to say we had our own pool, right outside our living room door and I am sure you can imagine how awesome the rest of it was.

I did meet a few other athletes that I had not had a chance to race with before. And even more memorable was meeting a baby elephant. At first he just wound his trunk around my wrist- kind of like holding hands. But before I knew it he coiled his trunk around my neck- and gave me an elephant kiss. It was pretty much like sucking on a vaccum cleaner tube! I am not sure who was more caught off guard and surprised, me or Chris who stood by stunned.

Of course my least favourite part of the trip was the super long flight home. But I was lucky, since the first snow storm of this winter waited till my plane landed before starting.

I will now be creating my own little heat camp, in the basement, on my trainer. Nice and warm, and can step outside and enjoy the winter scenery any time I get a bit too toasty.

Just like my time here in Thailand is flying by so has the time since my last blog. Not sure how it has happened, but it is December already.
It took Chris and I two attempts to actually make it onto a plane to Thailand. The first time we showed up at the airport, 7 am on a Sunday morning, it was just to be denied getting a boarding pass because our passports were only valid for 5 months, 20 something more days, and apparantly needed to be valid for at least 6 more months. It was a bit of a stressful morning as we headed back home and I went about making arrangements to try and get new passports and a rebooked flight for a day or two later.

Attempt number two more successful, although still stressful, not sure why but it took almost an hour to check in it seemed we were each booked on a different connecting flight from Honk Kong to Bangok. Finally it was sorted out, and here is where the trip started to turn to a good one- upgraded for the 15 hour Toronto- Hong Kong flight to first class. Wow, super lucky, and super excited.
After 38 hours of travelling we did finally make it to Phuket, and stayed at Bangtao Bungalows, right on the ocean. Very peaceful, and I think I have caught up on my sleep for the year.

We also rented a scooter for a couple of days. There was a bit of a dispute as to who would drive. But after Chris watched me jump on the scooter, and fly down the road with me legs out outstretched, and not knowing which was the brake and and which was the gas the decision was made. Here everyone gets around on a scooter, it is not uncommon to see a mom with a baby, and a toddler, all aboard the scooter, running errands. The scooters must outnumber cars 100 to 1 at least.

It has been nice to be somewhere warm after taking a bit of a training break in Toronto after IM Hawaii. I have been trying to get into a bit more of a training rhythm, while still enjoying the relaxing atmosphere here. Yesterday we moved from the bungalows to the Banyan Tree Resort, accomodations provided by the Laguna Phuket Triathlon. Wow, is not a big enough word to describe how amazing our place is. It will take an entire blog to cover that topic I think.
So until next time, when I will give a tour of our “posh place” here in Laguna Phuket.

Well, life seems a bit too calm these days. I think I can count on one hand the number of weeks I have been home in Toronto this past year. But that number will surely grow as I have just taken some down time here. Abi wrote to me that Toronto sounds exotic to her, since she is currently in hot, hot Singapore, sweating it out, and single digit temperatures sound pretty interesting.I don’t often think of Toronto as exotic, so I looked up what exotic means- foreign, faraway, far-off, far-flung, distant, so guess that Toronto is exotic after all.
Being home meant that I took some time to slow down, slack off, and catch-up on “regular” life stuff. Unfortunately that included a few too many trips to the dentist and periodentist for work on a root canal that had become infected. Not a very fun way to spend time. But reminded me of Bella writing about getting her teeth whitened and getting an “American smile”. Funny, since when I was little I had crooked teeth, and it always really bothered my mom. In Czech at that time nobody I knew had braces, but in Toronto it seemed that every other kid in my class had braces, even the really evil torture device looking ones that not only were in the mouth, but attached to a wire that went around the neck or head. I think those are outlawed now as child abuse, but at that time it was just another thing pretty normal to do to get that perfect smile. I too ended up with a mouth full of metal for a few years to straighten out my chompers. So a bit of discomfort now and then to keep the smile is a small price.

Finally, this brings me to not being able to sleep the other night, so I got up to watch a bit of tv and empty my head. It was an odd show about women not knowing they were pregnant, and giving birth at home completely unaware what was happening. I know, crazy tv. The show had a re-enactment of the story, and then interviews with the actual couple. The very funny thing about this show was how the “re-enactment” couple was good looking, and kind of had some resemblance to the actual couple- just Hollywoodized. So tall, blond thin actor was actually blond, exceedingly gaunt, some teeth missing in real life guy. With each story the trend continued, good looking actors, with very similar descriptons to the actual people, just much, much better looking. Must be hard to find real looking people that can act I guess. Of course makes for a fun past time while on the trainer- coming up with actors to play each of the TBB gang when Doc’s stories become a book, and that book becomes a movie.

This past weekend it was Halloween here in Canada. I know Halloween is a very Canadian and American holiday, and probably seems a bit odd. When I was little and we moved to Canada I still remember I had trouble understanding the concept- dress up in a costume, wait till it is dark, and then go door to door, trick or treating, and people will give you candy? Very odd, but as a kid there is no need to explain anything twice when it comes to candy.

This year I had a chance to re-live it a bit, as I went to visit my cousin, and her four kids. The two oldest ones are old enough to trick or treat, so I braved the cold, and headed out with them. They were dressed up as Spiderman and as a Sleeping Beauty. Not quite scary Halloween costumes, but I think the scary concept when out the window when Disney started selling costumes to all their fairy tales, cartoons and tv shows. The rules are simple, if the house lights are on, if there are any Halloween decorations on the house, or a pumpkin carved as a Jack-o-lantern it means there is candy waiting to be given out.

Last year I gave out candy at our house. We bought a ton, so that we would not run out, the good kind too, lots of chocolate. As the night went on our door bell did not ring nearly as much as I had expected. But when I looked out there were quite a few kids wandering up and down the street trick or treating. I finally asked a princess who knocked on our door why there were not as many kids coming to our house. “Stairs” she says. The houses on our side of the street have about 10 steps to get to the front door, while the houses across the street have none. Wow, how lazy are kids now that they won’t go up a few steps for some free candy? Well, the ones who did manage to walk up some stairs got extra candy, since I gave them twice as much as I normally would.

Well, Austin Texas has been good to me in the past, and it has been quite a while since I have last been here. My wonderful friends Jamie and Andrea live here, and have always been amazing hosts and training buddies. And I can’t forget to mention their dogs Venus, and Mollie- who has a pb of 18:00 for 5 km by the way, and 3 cats.
So although I may not have been feeling too sparky 2 weeks after IM Hawaii, I decided to do the 70.3 race in Austin, and combine it with a fun visit with some great friends.
All I can say is that part way through the race all I could think was “this was not my most brilliant of ideas”. My legs were dead, and I just was not ready to hurt the way a race demands. So I shuffled in, and tried to make sure I got to enjoy the extra minutes out on the course by people watching, and soaking up the race atmosphere.
It was kind of cool having the finish line inside a stadium. A bit different than most races.

Austin is a pretty cool city. I have been here a bunch of times, but still seem to find something new, that I haven’t seen before. The other day we went window shopping a bit, and went into a cowboy boots store. Now, for someone as indecisive as me this would be a total nightmare. So many choices, and only two feet. Wow.

And another good hobby here is searching out celebrities. There are a few big names that live here, Lance Armstrong of course, Sandra Bullock, and Matthew Mcconaughey are just a few. We did a bike ride that passed by Lance’s ranch property - Called Seven Wins. Whether you are a Lance fan or not, still was fun to do a non Hollywood version of map of stars homes.

I am back in Toronto now, and it is one of the nicest times of year to run here, fall. There are two marathons in town, one in September and one in October.

My younger brother, Jakub, has been suckered into the triathlon world. He now seems to think that it is normal to wake up early on a Sunday morning, line up with a few thousand other people in shorts, while the temperatures are barely 5 degrees Celcius, and go for a run. Earlier in the week he called me and said he was going to run the marathon, so I might wish to come and watch. However, the realization that he has barely run in the past 2 months finally sinked in and last minute he signed up for the half marathon instead. Now, he is a talented little bugger, much more so then he realizes, so even with no training he gets away with things that mere mortals would not. My first half marathon I trained more then he did, ran it just a few seconds faster then his first half marathon in 1:35, and ended up with a stress fracture. His first marathon he barely trained, ran a 3:16, and a week later did a sprint triathlon. Crazy!

Well, anyway, last Sunday I braved the Hawaii jet lag that still haunts me, and went to watch the Goodlife Fitness Toronto Marathon. It was fun, I saw quite a few athletes I knew, and had a chance to practice my spectating skills, while madly trying to see Jakub a few times, along the point-to-point course- not so easy.
His run was not exactly what he hoped for, but he does not know how to get stressed out, so was still smiling even after some cramps, and a porta potty stop slowed down his run. He did manage to look flashy in a bright green shirt so we could see him, and some SL3 compression socks. Of course he did not pull them up quite properly, and by 4 km they had fallen down mid calf. I always make fun of his skinny, skinny, chicken legs, so he knew he would not live this one down. Time to bulk up those calves!

Well, I have had a few days to let the past weekend sink in, and it still seems a little surreal. So here is a story of how it unfolded. A bit of a warning though, this blog is a bit long, and does not have enough photos. Blame that on Chris who was too nervous watching the race to take pictures.

The week prior to the race just flew by, and before I knew it it was Saturday morning, still dark, and I was weaving my way through the crowd getting body marked, my bike ready, and into my very snazzy blue Blue Seventy speed suit. I fully expected that I would be so nervous I would feel like puking, but somehow I was really calm, weird.

The swim start is in deep water, and we had to be out at the start line more than 10 minutes before the gun went off, so there was lots of shuffling for position, trying to figure out who was around, and staying out of the way of the paddle boarders keeping us back. This would be a bit of a rough start, with more than 150 pro’s, many of them very similar swim speeds, and most of them men with much more sprint speed then me. Suddenly the race started, and within seconds I was in the middle of a big mess, arms pounding me, someone grabbed my butt, pushed it down, and I was fighting just to stay up, instead of swim forward. No time to panic, just time to try and not drown! I had to cut across to the edge of the crowd, close to the buys, find some clear water and finally get into a decent swim rhythm and go. I was finally moving forward, passing people, and feeling better and better. In the second half I caught up to a small group, and ended up coming out of the water with a few other women, like Leanda Cave who usually is a super swimmer. It was a bit of a relief, since it meant my swim was not as disasterous as it felt. Awesome.
Out onto the bike, somehow I lost the water bottle that was between my aerobars immediately out of transition, and got the string that I tie my crank with twisted up in my rear wheel, near the brake. So a very speedy pit stop, while a few people whizzed past, and soon I was on my way, with Scarto my Cervelo P4 no longer tied up. I passed a couple of other girls right away, and realized just one other was ahead. My super fish of a teammate, Lucie Z, crushed us all in the swim, and was more than 2 minutes up the road. Not long into the bike Chrissie Wellington came by me. I stayed behind her for only a couple of kilometers, on a downhill the gap stretched out, and soon I had a decision to make. Step on it, and really go, in order to keep her in sight and try to pace off her or play my own game. It was not a two person battle, there were more then 60 other women behind me, and I could not pin my race on imitating someone else’s race plan. So I just settled into my rhythm, and didn’t panic. Soon I passed Lucie, and by 60 km I found myself feeling strong, and catching some of the scattered pro men ahead of me. It was hot, and windy on the course, but no crazy wind gusts that are famous in Hawi, instead it was more constant cross winds, which was fine.

The second half of the bike course was quite lonely, a few men, far, far ahead, so I could barely see them, and nobody else around. The wind was picking up and at 140 km I was really having to focus on staying positive. Every once in a while a media vehicle or motor bike would come by, snap a few pictures, and whiz off again. For a little while the media helicopter hovered above, and it reminded me that this was the big show, and I was in second place. How cool. The last 15 km of the bike I started to feel super again, and came into T2 feeling like I put in a strong ride.

In and out of T2 pretty quick, while putting on compression socks, lucky Avia shoes, and stuffing some gels and salt pills in my pockets of course. That is when I realized just how hot it had gotten. Roasting. I got moving well enough, and was amazed at the crowds and wonderful support out on the run course. Everything from guys dressed up in full body banana suits, to one guy yelling at me how much the prize money for second place is if I could hang on. Well, money was last on my mind, survival was first and foremost. Each aid station I took as many things as I could grab, and mixed it all together, Coke, Gatorade, water, ice, it didn’t matter. If I couldn’t drink it I just dumped in on my head. I also would dump as much ice as I could down the front of my suit, where it would slowly melt, and in between aid stations I would just reach in, pull out an ice cube, and have something to keep me going to the next aid station.
Oh yes, there were definitely some rough times on that run, when Virginia passed me, and then Mirinda, I tried not to falter, and just kept moving forward. Mirinda blew by like it was a 10 km, and all I could do was wonder if perhaps she would pay the price later on and fade, or if she would keep flying. In the Energy Lab, a very famous part of the run course where it is supposed to be the hotest, and toughest part of the run, I caught up with James. I could see him up ahead for a long time prior to this, and finally inched up my way and caught him. Very rough day for him, since he is usually a blur of speed on the run, but it was nice for me to see a friendly face. He offered me some Red Bull, I offered him some ice cubes. He declined when he saw me pulling them out of my suit. Wonder why. By this point I had been walking the aid stations in order to have enough time to grab as much as I could, and running the parts in between. Survival.
Throughout the run I didn’t really know who was right behind me, or how far, I just focused on moving forward as best as I could. And it wasn’t until the last few kilometers that I let myself think about what place I could finish. As I came to the finish line I realized I was going to finish fourth, meet my goal of top ten, and finish strong. It was super coming down Alii drive, so many people, and finally the finish line. Too good to be true.

Yes, 4th place is the chocolate medal as Abi would say, but hey, in my world there is nothing wrong with chocolate, actually chocolate makes everything better. Just think, have you ever had anything that once covered in chocolate was not even better? Chocolate covered pretzels, chocolate covered jujubes, chocolate covered licorice, you get the idea. Well, if I keep working my butt off perhaps next year I will have a third, or second or first place trophy from Hawaii that I can cover in chocolate, until then I will be happy with my current 4th place chocolate medal.

I will post a race blog shortly, but just wanted to take a moment to say that I am elated about my Ironman Hawaii race this past weekend. I went into it calm, and pleased to have a chance to race on the island, feeling strong, fit and confident.
It has been a very incredible year, and I am thankful to my family, for their patience and support, Alex and Brett for giving this housewife a chance to go after a goal, and for the amazing team mates who inspired me on a daily basis. I know many of them had a very tough day in Kona, but they still managed to offer a smile and words of support to each other and to me out there. A truly remarkable group of athletes, and friends. Team TBB has been an incredible experience and without the sponsors, coaching, and support staff many of us would still be struggling on our own, our goals a bit farther out of reach then they are now.
I recieved many wonderful emails prior to my race and afterwards as well. One of the funniest ones was from my friend Andrea who emailed me “put on your big girl panties and run like you stole something”. It definitely made me laugh, and reminded me that no matter how stressful or serious we may think a race is, there is always a way to look at it with humour.
So thank you to all, and I will put my race day to paper shortly. As soon as it sinks in.