"The man with the clear head...looks life in the face,
realizes everything is problematic and feels himself lost,
as this is the simple truth that to be alive is to feel oneself lost.
He who accepts it has already begun to find himself, to be on firm ground."

Ortega y Gasset

Every Tuesday and Thursday I swim in the morning with a master's swim group. We have been doing between 2800 and 3400 yards in the pool. That is comprised of a warm-up with is usually a variation of 200 freestyle, 200 kickboard, 200 pullbuoy, 200 freestyle. That is followed by drills that would be 10 times 50 yards, each under 1 minute with a 20 second rest, followed by a breathing pyramid, followed by 8 x 100 alternating backstroke and breast stroke, followed by a 200 warm down. The workouts are extremely demanding and satisfying. Over the course of four months I have dropped by time at various distances by a significant amount. I am by no means a competitive swimmer. My goal has been to make the swim portion of my triathlons stronger and a more comfortable part of the three events. I have accomplished that at the very least. I feel that I can comfortably exit the water at near the top of my age group now.

I have been training the past several months in preparation for an Ironman triathlon to be held on June 29, 2003, in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. It is a qualifying event for the championships in Kona. It will be my first Ironman length event. Although I have participated in several shorter triathlons over the past six years and am comfortable doing those, this event is, by its nature intimidating. During the course of my training I have become much stronger. I am now beginning to increase the intensity of the training. I have to be careful not to overtrain as well. This is an exciting process and one that I am enjoying very much. I will begin posting my thought on my training and preparation for the event. Periodically, when the mood strikes, I will post on some current event as well.

Regarding the space shuttle Columbia....I don't think I would start out on a cross country trip today in a 20 year old car. This tragedy should be a catalyst for rethinking where our space exploration money should be spent.