Pic Spocket

After a few weeks of toying with the idea, I finally took my decision and registered yesterday for the Sprint Triathlon event (Sunday race) in Leamington this coming June 21. The name of the event is kind of funny: TOMATOMAN. That’s because the area is well known for the production of tomatoes.  Here is the link to the event:

>> http://www.tomatoman.org

I never thought I would do something like that: I have never participated in a sport competition event of any kind before. The Sprint Triathlon has half the distances of an Olympic triathlon: 750 m swim / 20 km Bike / 5 km run.

While I am in decent shape after general cardio and weight training since January, my expectations are pretty modest:

- I only started swimming in March (and I am slow!);
- I only started biking 1 month ago, and my bike is an Hybrid;
- I only started running 3 days ago;
- The event is in 3.5 weeks only.

Therefore, I just hope to finish the event and hopefully not in last position. That would still be a good achievement considering I was 60 lbs overweight just a few months ago.

Who is game to join me?

Here is the 3rd installment of my trip to France last March.

I ended that travelling weekend with a stop to the famous Mont St-Michel, (St Michaels Mount) which is the second most visited tourist attraction in France after the Paris area. It is a tidal island in the North of France.

The tides vary greatly around this rock island, by about 14 meters at times, and sometimes the Mount is an island, sometimes it is surrounded my a huge marsh. The speed at which the water retires (and come back) is notoriously astounding.

I left early in the morning hoping to get good light for my arrival, and maybe some light fog to have a mysterious look to my pictures. Be careful what you wish for. There was so much fog when I got there, that I could not even make out the outline of the Mount while I was standing barely 100 m from it. So no pictures of the overall St Michels Mount that morning. Here are a few of the fog pictures. The first one is taken on my drive there, the other ones are taken on the site.

Most of the rock is covered by the Abbey, which offers a really medieval feeling.

Later that day, the fog lifted and I could take more compelling pictures of the exterior of the area. Around the abbey, there is a small village with hotels, restaurants, gift shops, etc.

The marshes are surrounding the rock formation during my visit.

Finally, on my way out, I finally had the chance to take pictures from further away showing the area.

See more of my pictures of Mont St-Michel.

All the pictures from this trip are available in the album below.

France, March 2009

Saturday morning was the perfect day to ride my bike. I left bright and early at 7h15 am, the sun was out and there was no wind. I started with my now usual route to Amherstburg, but then decided to go further. I went for Harrow, using a small detour to get more distance in my ride. I was aiming for 100 km, not a small goal considering it’s only my 3rd ride! The scenery was simply awesome, in warm morning light, with waterscapes completely mirror-like.

Map of the route followed

(click on the map for INTERACTIVE version)

Stats of the ride.

Because of the lack of wind, I was able to keep a good and constant pace throughout.  

 Speed Graphic :

(click on the graph for larger version)

I am pretty proud of my achievement (I did 104 km in only 3h30 moving time), but I have to say I was not a pretty sight when I made it home. I was completely dead, and my legs could not hold my weight anymore. I felt violated ;). I think I pushed a little too hard for such a long distance, given my experience. I have to learn to pace myself I guess. I couldn’t walk until my wonderful wife gave me a leg massage to get the lactic acid out of that area.

I think it’s going to be a few days (more like a week) before I touch that bike again… I still managed to find enough energy to go for a 10 km rollerblade ride the evening of the same day (see Fitness Log).

This is the continuation of my France Business trip last March. That previous article also included a map of the cities visited.

Once my work finished in the Vendée area, I had the weekend to head back to Paris. I decided to not take the shortest path, but to visit a little bit along the way.

I headed first to the West Coast, where I have never been before. I stopped in Sables-d’Olonne, a well known vacation area. However, I was not lucky that Saturday morning because the fog was so dense that we could not see much of anything.

I followed the small roads following the coast for a while, but my progression was slow, and the view did not improve much.  I then rejoined the highway to go further north and west. I stopped in Vannes, a small interesting town with a lot of character. Once again, the architecture of a church interested me.

Here are other pictures taken in Vannes, giving a hint of the architecture.

Then I headed to Carnac, a small village of 5000 people, known for its alignment of monoliths (standing stones). These stones were erected thousands of years B.C. without much understanding of their meanings even today. More informations found HERE.

I also processed a few HDR pictures of the alignments:

Few sheeps were occupying the area.

See more pictures from the Western Coast of France drive.

After this stop, I headed to Rennes for a good night of sleep. My plan was to go to see the famous Mont St-Michel in the North of France on Sunday before heading back to Paris for my last week of work there. To be continued in part 3.

Back in March, I was in France for work, but not in the south this time. I passed 2 weeks in Paris and 1 week in the Vendée area, near the western coast. I have yet to sort and process the Paris pictures (I took like 1200 photos) but I did process the ones from the other areas visited during this trip. These areas are highlighted in the map below:

Some of these areas will be covered in part 2 and 3. The week outside Paris was in Vendée. My hotel was in Les Herbiers and the customer located in Saint-Prouant. This area is mostly rural. I wish I had some time to search for nice landscapes, but work occupied a lot of my time.

Here are a few pictures snapped on my way to work in Saint-Prouant in the morning. The first one is a HDR of a small road going in the woods, with early sunlight rays piercing through morning mist. The second one is a reflection on a lake.

In Les Herbiers, where my hotel was located, there was a small castle that I would also pass every morning on my way to work. This picture was obtained by combining several exposures since it did not fit in my viewfinder even with a wide angle lens.

A few hundred meters from my hotel, there was the ‘Mont Alouette’, having windmills on display and a small chapel on the other side of the road. These pictures were taken at sunset at the top of this hill.

On Friday afternoon after work, I went for a car ride in the area and ended up in the village of Saint-Laurent-sur-Sèvres. The chuch there mostly captured my attention, but also the façade of a building.

See more picture of the Vendée area.

To be continued…

I was due for an update on my weight loss program for a while, but simply lacked the time to do so. I am glad to report that since the end of April, I have reached my goal and lost 55 lbs (25 Kg). Yay for me

Here’s the updated graph.

Click on chart for larger version

Granted I could not weight myself as often as I usually did before in similar programs, this must be the smoothest gradual loss I have ever done. I am especially happy with this considering the amount of travelling in Europe at the beginning of the year. I have been very good at watching my diet and staying active.

I am an engineer.. I like numbers Here’s a few statistics:

The new challenge is now to keep the weight off. I can now relax the diet a bit and allow myself for a nice restaurant meal and cheating a bit, maybe once a week.

As for activities, it will be easier with the summer beginning. I have started swimming at the gym. I really like it. Most cardio exercises are focusing on the legs. With swimming, I can shift it to the arms. Also, I have just started biking again and intend to do several medium/long distance rides this summer. Finally, I still love rollerblading. The diversity of exercise should help me to stick to my plan for the coming months.

The weather was incredibly nice Sunday morning when I woke up. It was the perfect opportunity to do my first longer bike ride. My friend Craig recommended a ride consisting of a loop between Windsor and Amherstburg, going through back country roads. I am sure he would have been very happy to ride too, but they had family visiting that weekend.

It went better than expected. I pushed myself so that I would be back home early, since Corinne was still sleeping when I left. As a result, I was quite exhausted when I returned, but I covered 61 km in 2h06 minutes, at an average speed of 29 km/h, which I think is respectable considering the fact that I just started biking again.

Here is a jpeg image of the path I followed:

Click this link to see an interactive version of this map in a new window.

Click this link to see the speed graph (lightbox).

I thought I would be quite sore today (the ride was yesterday), but I am happy to report that it is not the case: I do not feel it at all. I think I would be able to go for a longer ride, in the 100 km range, especially if I slow down a bit.

More information is available in the Fitness Log page.

P.S. Many thanks Craig for the good recommendation!