Our only security is our ability to change. ~John Lilly

I feel comforted by this quote because I am about to embark on new changes in the upcoming year. With any change there are new emotions, some positive, some not. Fear is something that can hold us back from change, but it is also something that can motivate us to grow. I have been through a lot of hardships these past few months. Getting through the holidays were a struggle for me for my mom had always made Christmas so enjoyable for our family. She was the angel on top of the Christmas tree so to speak. It has been extremely difficult to wrap my head and heart around the feeling of missing someone so much who you will never "see" again. Therefore, instead I try to imagine she is next to me, guiding me to make the right choices.

The past few months in Austin have been productive and there are exciting changes for 2010 with our new Team Specialized taking on a new front of red, white and STRONG! Looking at the athlete roster you can see that screaming loud and clear! To make sure I am keeping up with my teammates as well as being the best athlete I can be, I have decided to make some personal changes. I have joined up with Team Sirius and Siri Lindley will be my new coach this year! I have watched and admired Siri from afar for many years. She has the ability to bring out the best in her athletes and I have absolute confidence that she will do the same thing for me. She has been through the ins and outs of racing, and overall I can tell she "gets me'. She has an intuition that I think is hard to find in a coach, which is why I have been insistent on being self coached for so long. I am also looking forward to have a team to push me through workouts and to lean on for support when things get rough. Tomorrow I leave for Santa Monica where I will be training with the team for three weeks. I have been looking at pictures of the Santa Monica mountains and can't wait to ride up through those gorgeous hills and to smell the eucalyptus...and hopefully not the smog!?

I will send updates from camp, my homestay family has informed me well in advance that I need to sharpen up my Rock Band skills...air guitar on the plane the whole way there:)

xoDesiree

I was looking forward to this weekend for a long time before the race as I knew it signified the reunion of the “Traveling Circus”. I have two dear friends who I have been traveling to races with for years and years now, David and Scotty. It seems we are always lost, laughing, running into a crazy adventure of all of the above when we are together. Hence my excitement to be reunited with these two. My Dad and Amy would also be joining for the fun and I was looking forward to seeing them as well.

I traveled with my friend Kelly from Austin and that all went smoothly. David and Scott showed up to grab me at the Augusta airport, only after visiting two other airports in Augusta. Who would have thought such a little place would have so many airports? The vocal GPS had been set to an English accent for it was the only one David could stand…so we appropriately named her Ruperta, a female Rupert Evert of course. David would later practically tear poor Ruperta out of her haunches and throw her straight back to her motherland…for she were to say “Recowwlculating” on this trip one too many times. We had a laid back dinner that night with Kelly at “Nacho Mama”..the food was fresh and delicious. Even though it was not yo mama’s it was still pretty darn good.

The day before the race we were hearing tall tales of a large current that was to push us directly into transition and onto our bikes. I was envisioning a totally laid back NYC style swim, effortless and beautiful. I have to say it wasn’t nearly as swift or as wonderful as I had been imagining. David and I did have a fun time on our warm up swim laying flat on our backs and watching how fast the dock was going by. We then went out onto our bikes to preview the course only to be passed over and over by a racer who had a few things to prove, either to us or to his girlfriend he had left in the dust about a mile back. Yikes! In the afternoon I had a exploratory run from our hotel, I even got directions through a secret entrance to a pristine high school track by a kid who went to school there. He went on to tell me all about his baseball team and he kept calling me “mam”. Such a nice young kid but for some reason I still feel too young to be called “mam”? Maybe not! I did some strides on this springy bouncy track and was singing “I’m so Excited!” in my head. Yes, I did a dance to that in 6th grade in the talent show wearing a red sequin shirt with my friend Amy Sims. Great song, scary dance!

Race day began with three very sleepy circus travelers entering the darkness and making our way to the transition area. I ran into my friends from CDifferent, they had a whole slew of athletes racing, several had recently lost their site in the war and were doing their first tri ever. Amazing. I ran into one team athlete and I told him about our traveling circus theme song “do do dodo..do do dodo”. I told him we adopted it as our theme song because we were lost all the time. He said “Hey I am lost all the time too maybe I should get onto that” ! He went on to have a great race…and did not look like he needed our theme song one bit.

The swim was point to point so we had quite the job of stuffing ourselves into the shuttle buses to take down to the start. David and I spent the time before the race cracking jokes and laughing (sometimes at my dad and his shorts..aka Mr Fuzzy Dudz). We had a dive in start and Kelly and I made our way down to the pontoon and within a few minutes the gun went off. I said a little prayer that my goggles would stay on my head. Pheww, they did but I did not keep up with the lead pack or anyone else very well after that. I came out of the water and heard my dad yell three and a half minutes down! Uh oh, I had some making up to do. The bike course was beautiful, careening, pine tree lined, hilly at times and flat and fast at others. We had a headwind for much of the race and I was looking forward to getting off and running some people down as I think now I was in 7th or 8th place. Back into transition, the Asics socks and flats went on and I took off like a bat out of hell (weird expression), passing several girls immediately. I was running in 5th now and could see Magda up the road. The run course was two loops of excitement and almost pancake flat with some tough turns. There was a huge straightaway through town filled with loud noise and team cheering. I got a thrill every time I went down this street. In the last loop I managed to catch Magda and Pip, sending me into third place. I could see Kelly and Laura duking it out at the turn around but by then I was beginning to run out of gas and of real estate. They still seemed to be about a minute or more ahead. The last few miles of any race are always a challenge. I thought about Ma a lot in these miles and how she used to strategically place herself somewhere in these miles, then pop out and say “Go Des!”. My dad was there too and gave some loud cheers. I ran home into the finish, got hugs from Kelly and Laura and then went straight into a massage.

David had started waaay behind me and I still had to get some run miles in so I went back out to find him. I found Scotty out on the course and then David immediately after…we ran the last 8 miles in together and then it was time to hug my CDifferent friends, take some pictures, and then….burger time!!

I really enjoyed this race and thought Bill Burke and his staff did a fantastic job, especially for a first time event. The crowds were large and the feelings were happy. Thank you as always to my stellar sponsors, Asics, Specialized, SRAM, Zipp, MyAthlete, Oakley, Blue Seventy, TYR, Jack and Adams, Rae and Badger Ford. You guys rock! Thank you also to Ma Ficker for inspiring me the entire way and in training every single day.

On Monday, Labor Day I participated in the Austin Triathlon. It was put on the greatest bike shop on the planet...Jack and Adam's bike shop in conjunction with High Five Events, led by race director and good friend Dan Carrol. On Sunday I participated on a pro Q and A panel with about 6 or 7 other local Austin pros. It was very cool to see everyone lined up there together, the talent at the table was strong enough to move it from the floor! As I was sitting there though I was not feeling so good. I began to feel like I wanted to be somewhere else, I wanted to get up and run away. Everyone seemed to be laughing and smiling and I just felt sad and gloomy. I was trying to buck and up and cheer up but my insides were hurting. The past few months have been very difficult and it felt strange to be back at "work" again. I felt like I was in the twighlight zone.

I went home and I started doubting whether racing was a good idea. I did not think my head was in the right place and was worried I would get out there and start sobbing like a bafoon on the bike. However after much thought, I decided to just keep moving forward. I checked

my bike in and got my things ready at home for the next morning. I was thinking about what Ma would say (WWMD?) and I knew she would have encouraged me to get out there and just enjoy myself. So that is what I decided to do...

We started off in Town Lake with a deep water start and looking around as I was bobbing in the water I could tell we were in for a rough start. There were a lot of people in the wave and the first few minutes were much rougher than usual. I finally settled into a pack after what seemed like the entire wave went by, and happened to be upon the roughest feet I have ever felt. I touched them several times and could only imagine a catcher's mit! I was also imagining what the owner of this set of catcher's mits might look like. I was convinced he was an elderly, impressive ex UT swimmer (I'm thinking 80's here people). We made our way through the swim and it turns out those mits belonged to my friend, my age Lon! We had a discussion about the condition of his feet after the race...he did not seem to be aware of their condition in the least. Ignorance is bliss:)

Onto my speedy and pretty Specialized Transition I ventured onto the exciting bike course circulating through downtown Austin. I was in fact, enjoying myself. I was in third and had better biking legs than I expected to have. I was thinking about Ma and how hard she fought in her last few months. I thought of how painful emotionally the last few months have been. With these thoughts I was able to push harder and harder until the end of the bike I arrived into transition on the heels of first place woman and my good friend, Kelly Handel. Kelly had

about a ten second lead coming out of T2. They had us run directly onto a tough trail section and I was having trouble balancing myself through those rocks. I gradually moved up until finally I was on Kelly's heels by mile 1 or so. I was breathing like a horse and it was embarrassing! The sun was full on now and the temperature seemed to be rising each mile. My mile 2 Kelly and I were running side by side and it felt strange. She is my good friend and here we were duking it out! The announcer, Logan was booming about saying what a hot race was on etc etc...I felt a sudden burst of energy about half way through and decided to surge a bit. Kelly stayed on my heels pretty much the entire second half and forced me to run hard. I was glad to see the finish line. As soon as I crossed the line I thought about Ma and hoped she was watching, she would have been proud I went out there and got the job done.

Thanks to Jack and Adams and High Five Events for putting on such an outstanding race. You guys pulled it off seamlessly and any race with post race ice cream cones at the end is a do-over for sure!

Thank you also to my sponsors TYR, Asics, Specialized, Oakley, Jack and Adams, SRAM, Zipp, MyAthlete and Blueseventy who continue to stand by me throughout such a turbulent year. I am sad to be missing Kona but am planning to save up all my energy for that race next year! Next up...Augusta 70.3 and that should be a ton of fun.

I was hoping to make you think of Chucky there for a second. I know you are all thinking that I have dropped off the face of the earth. I would just like to say I am back! Hello! For a while I was relying on Facebook to keep my friends updated on my wheres and whats, that got a little too time consuming and hectic. There was also too much of a cross between people who I wanted to see my most personal details and those that I did not. So! I have decided to start updating my website again and twittering…I like twitter as it is much more simple than Facebook and I have more control over what is posted there.

Things over the past few months have been a roller coaster of ups and downs. After a strong early winter and spring of training the last few months have been ridden with injury and stomach illness. Before the New Orleans 70.3 I was feeling confident and strong, thinking I could at least have a decent race. In the days before the race however I was too careless with my diet and must have had something that my stomach translated as evil. I woke up race morning with a (to spare the details) “bad” stomach and started the race on a half empty tank. No good, no fun and not productive. Coming back home after one of these episodes is never fun as the “symptoms” can last for several days and leave me weak and depleted. I literally was having trouble finishing a four mile run. Taking a nap always seemed like a much better idea. I have often the thought if I could just change one thing physically about myself it would be my celiac disease or gluten intolerance and overly sensitive stomach. It has caused me much strife.

I then began experiencing a nerve injury that was displaying as a sharp heel pain for most of April and May. It was the strangest pain as it would get better for a few days, I would manage to get some running in, and then it would return immediately. Frustrating! I realized it was my biking that was in fact aggravating the nerve so I decided to take a week off of that too. I accompanied my mom on a road trip down south to visit our relatives. During that time…poof! the pain vanished. I also had a great bike fit on my new Specialized Transition from Dave Wenger at Source Endurance. These new changes along with the time off have allowed me to train pain free for three weeks now YES! I was sorry to miss out on St Croix and the Rev 3 tri….sometimes things do not go according to plan.

I am happy to say that tomorrow I will be racing Eagleman 70.3. I have been home this past week to see my mom (who is still fighting off her cancer with prize fighters strength). Eagleman was my first ever half ironman way back in 1999 when I was a young tike of 22 years old. I have raced it 5 more times since then, making this year my 7th time there. I love this race as it is flat fast, hot and takes me back to my roots. Vigoman the RD and his staff always puts on a first class race.

Thank you to my sponsors Specialized for my beautiful new Transition and Ruby, Asics for my awesome Hyperspeed race flats and all other accoutrements, SRAM for sending what I need asap and that super smooth Red component groupo, TYR for my super comfy race duds, swimmie trunks and goggle, Blueseventy for my Point Zero and Heliz fasties suits, MyAthlete for allowing my friends and family to see my whereabouts on the course, Oakley for my beutious sunnies and to Jack and Adams for being not only the best bike shop on the planet but great friends too.

After this race I will posting much more regularly… Promise.

Cheers and thank you for your support, Desiree

My first impression of the Specialized offices was through the rain soaked wind shield of my rental PT cruiser. I was amazed by the grandiosity of the place. I walked in and was greeted by the site of the most creative and innovative Specialized bikes, interspersed with a few very "famous" bikes belonging to riders such as Cippolini and Ned Overend. I was given a tour of the building and was happy to see that dogs were allowed to hang out with their respective owners as they worked! I witnessed all sorts of future projects, projects of the past and felt a great energy buzz as I walked the halls. My bike was waiting for me in the fit room and I was given the royal fitting treatment. My parts were measured, bike parts were adjusted accordingly and all along I was treated like a princess. By the end of the day I was perfectly fitted onto my new gorgeous Ruby road bike and Transition TT bike...I even got a blue aero helmet to match. Wohoo! I then had a delicious Italian dinner with Nic, Bobby(who was recovering from his long flight from South Africa) and Jay the photographer who had been documenting the whole scene. The day was a blast and I am now training on my newSpecialized machines....they ride the roads as if they were made with butta. Yes!