Hello Friends and Family!
Sorry it has been a while! I’ve been settling into the
training center and trying to figure out the routine here. It’s beautiful and
sunny in Chula Vista and I honestly can say it has a huge effect on my mood,
and outlook on life. I’m not trying to boast or make anyone jealous, so I will make
a side note that the “0% chance of rain” SoCal quote is not true at all. It has
rained about 20% of the time that I’ve been here, and the nights can get
surprisingly cold. I mean to say that it feels cold when the day is in the high
60s and you notice the chill of the temperature plummeting to the low 50s
around 8pm. Don’t get me wrong, I will be forever grateful for this opportunity
to train here. Always.
The training center is an impressive establishment. We are
honestly 15 minutes from the USA-Mexico border. Apparently 5-10 years ago, you
could get off the 805 south and take Olympic Parkway for a quick trip to the
Olympic Training Center. Now the suburbs have sprawled eastward. People have
populated this desert region by forming communities like Otay Ranch and
Eastlake to connect the burgeoning multitudes of southern Californians to the
hub of San Diego. Olympic Parkway now has traffic light after traffic light and
takes roughly 10-12 minutes to get to the 805.
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| weight room |
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| athlete lounge |
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| Athlete lounge |
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| Key card |
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| Cafeteria Area |
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| Ramp down to the Cafeteria |
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| field hockey |
The security at the center feels a little intense at times.
We have a gated entrance guarded 24/7 and only having a pass on your vehicle or
your Residence ID will grant you access to the center. Coming up the main
drive, you will pass beach volleyball courts, our AT&T athlete lounge area
(with TVs, computers, printers, pool tables, ping pong table, foosball table,
video games and even Corn hole!) and weight room. You then will get to a four
way stop with our training room clinic on the left, the onsite housing on the
right and straight ahead is the Main office (with the Cafeteria hidden behind).
If you head out to the parking lot next to the housing for mainly track
athletes you will get an awesome view of one of the BMX courses that is literally
a quaffle’s throw away from the dorm. Thirty yards south of that is the Track,
and east of the track is a whole separate throwing area. It is quite
picturesque location with the Otay Lakes Reservoir just south of the OTC. This
body of water separates us from some beautiful hills that it is tucked up
against (Colinas? No se, supongo que they are kinda mountainous but not as
large).
Training: The workout day is kind of like a 9-4 day working
day on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and 9-1:30 Tuesday and Thursday with some
light recovery on Saturday. I suppose that as season starts to roll around,
Saturday will have discus and possibly pole vault practice. The multi event
coach here likes to target two events a week, if possible. I’m still limited in
practice so the running workouts I do are done on an “elliptigo” …. Which is
literally an Elliptical on wheels. It seems fun, but since I’m on that thing,
the sprint workouts tripled. Weights are broken up into two sessions to not
exhaust ourselves before skills training. A decathlete/heptathlete’s day will
consist of weights for 40 min in the morning at 9am Monday, Wednesday, Friday,
then a 20 min track warm up, followed by 30-40 min of skill work. Running
mechanics and hurdle drills will follow, then a sprint workout (except for no
sprints for Wednesday) then we will break to have a quick lunch (we are also
snacking during workouts after weights). Then we will do some rehab from 1-2pm,
and then meet in the weight room at 2:30pm for 30min, then a sand workout on
the beach volleyball courts, then head to the track to do this Acer machine
(It’s this crazy high tech machine that measures your explosiveness from a
squat, one leg thrust, and split leg squats and supposedly helps smaller
muscles in your legs develop and also promotes fast twitch muscle fibers). Then
you will find yourself in the training room around 4 working on more rehab.
Tuesdays and Thursdays start at the track at 9am with a warm up and hurdle
drills and event work. Those days are also complimented with a lot of core work
and hills. So ya its all fun, and it’s always a long day, but if the decathlon
were an easy event… everyone would do it haha.
Nutrition
is very important. I’m still gluten free and ultimately feel like I feel the
best and my body operates the best with this diet. So I’ve been meeting with
the nutritionist to learn when is best to fuel and what to fuel with. Spinach
for your salads, with colorful vegetables and fruits, a lot of grains
(rice/potatoes) after hard training, and protein!!! I’ve been educated that
20-25g of protein is an optimal intake for my body and with how much training I’m
doing, I have to try to get that in with my snacks (eating every 2 hours). So….
in the morning I will have fruit and a Chobani yogurt after weight lifting, and
a glass and a half of chocolate milk with some gluten free toast in the
afternoon before lifting. I typically don’t like dairy before working out, but
I feel much better when I make sure to eat more often, and hydrate hydrate
hydrate. Don’t think it’s just all about protein intake, you also need Vitamin
C to help your body process it!!
I hope
everyone is beginning to enjoy the holiday season. I’m just getting back from
the USAtf annual meeting. I attended this event in Indianapolis as an “emerging
elite athlete” to understand more about the rules, establishment of our
organization, how to market myself as an athlete and so on. Snowy Indianapolis is a beautiful downtown area
by the way. A store called “Rocket Fizz” has all kinds of different flavors of
candy, soda and awesome superhero decals. I left that place with a great
tasting rootbeer soda, a butterscotch Harry Potter Butter Beer soda drink and a
maple bacon flavored lollipop! I also recommend Bazbeaux’s pizza. Greeeeaaat
tasting pizza, and a great menu that makes every single pizza look like a gift from
the Gods. We climbed all 366 stairs of the the huge Indianpolis Soldiers and
Sailors Memorial (they had this in their down town circle and strung up
Christmas lights to the top so it looked like an enormous tree!).
I’ve also
challenged myself to watch a holiday movie every day in December and so I’ve
managed somehow! If anyone reads this and wants to share some favorites, I
would love to hear them!Also, I briefly mentioned I would share some of my
favorite all time movies since I watch a ton….(I’ve been told) and so here goes
some of the list. I’m sure these titles will change as I watch more 70s-80s and
80s-90s movies.
1. Good Will Hunting
2 2. Schindler’s List
3. The Green Mile
4. Silver Lining’s Playbook
5. Avatar
6. Harry Potter Franchise (surprising eh?)
7. LOTR Franchise
8. Star Wars Franchise
9. Django Unchained
10. The
Prestige
I hope the holidays treat you well, and that you find
yourself enjoying some wonderfully cheerful moments with friends and family!
Happy Christmahannukwanzaah!!
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