Introducing the DSQ

Ride Day
time- 3:28
distance- 47.75mi

This, my friends, is the unofficial start of Honu 70.3 training. It will be the official start when I pick a training plan and write down my 20 or so weeks of pain and suffering to come. Which should happen in the next week. I know you're excited to hear all about that so stay tuned.


Today's ride was my first time back in the saddle in what feels like a while. I did that trainer session with Sean a week or so ago and not much since then due to flats and vacation. To answer your question you didn't know you were asking, yes, the ride today did hurt and my legs were burning disappointingly early. But I expected that so it didn't mess with my head too much. Let's just say the first mile of Pupukea suuuuuuuucked like it hasn't since the first time I hit it (happens at minute 41 on the Garmin link, in case that isn't immediately obvious by the elevation spike and speed crash). But I fought through that, thought happy thoughts, and got to the top. The Top is more satisfying sometimes when you have serious moments of, "Yeah, I'm not so sure this is happening today," early in the ascent. Sure is nice to get to the top and feel like, "Woo, that felt good, lemme do that again so I can feel the way I talked about in that blog that I wrote back in January." (Oxygen debt and severe muscle pain to strange things to the brain.) Pineapple Hill was the same but less so. It hurt and it was slow, but very little matches that opening mile of Pupukea.
All of this bring me to the Main Point of this post: The DSQ. This stands for Dirtbag Suffering Quotient. Put your hand down, of course I will explain. To get properly strong, both physically and mentally, suffering must be involved. As Tom Hanks said as that lovable drunk Jimmy Dugan, "It's supposed to be hard. The hard is what makes it great."And if riding the Honu course with Sean taught me anything, it's that it's gonna hurt. And the only way to prepare for something hurting it to hurt more in training. So that's what I aim to do. I need to learn to suffer, absorb it, and suffer more. Through learned suffering I will have a good 70.3. Obviously, that isn't the only thing I will be working on and looking at during my training cycle, but I think it will be an important component. There is no question that what I'm signed up to do it going to hurt. It hurts for everybody, from the pros all the way down to the little age groupers like me. There is no getting around the hurt. There is only getting ready for it. Hence the DSQ, a completely random and arbitrary quotient I will occasionally assign workouts when I remember or feel like it. Anything that makes me suffer, that strengthens me both mentally and physically, which should be damn near everything I do, falls under DSQ. Today's ride who get a high DSQ because I'm slightly out of shape for a ride like that and there was quite a bit of fighting going on. Soon today's ride ridden as it was will have a low DSQ, which will mean intensity, distance, or both need to be increased.
So that was that. I was going to meet up with Dirtbag Diesel on his way back from his ride this morning but he flatted out and needed to call for a ride. To review- last time he and I rode together I flatted twice, while he pointed, laughed, took pictures, and took a video. While I was on vacation he rode with Dirtbag the Grey. The Grey flatted and I got a text with a picture of the Grey fixing his tire and telling Sean that he is number one. But when he flats no one is around. Not. Fair. Therefor, I close this post with an artists approximation of Sean's ride today.