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Michelle Grainger has been a Coach and Personal
Trainer for over 17 years. Michelle has achieved her
Elite Level Coaching License with USA Cycling, the highest
achievable level of coaching. Michelle also holds several Certifications
in Strength and Conditioning, Nutrition and Pre and Post Natal Fitness.
Michelle graduated from the University of Florida and has continued with her education to maximize her knowledge in the fitness industry.
Thursday September 1st, 2011
Fire Ban for Boulder County as 1 Year Anniversary Approaches.A big thank you goes out to all officials that had a hand in the fire ban for the Boulder County areas west of highway 36.
It will the one year anniversary of what became the worst and most expensive distaster in Colorado history.
This fire affected so many of us and continues to do so with flash floods, economic hardships, mental anguish, and much much more.
A big thank you also goes out to the United Way, Boulder County, and many more angencies that continue to support us and help us.
And... thank you to the citizens of Colorado for also reaching out to so many of us and helping us.
***************
Sheriff enacts fire ban for western Boulder County starting at noon today, Sept. 1st, 2011.
Camera staff
Posted: 09/01/2011 10:32:41 AM MDT
(Boulder County)
Sheriff Joe Pelle has instituted a fire ban beginning at noon today for western Boulder County.
Open burning, all fireworks and model rockets will be prohibited west of Broadway in Boulder, west of Colo. 93 south of Boulder and west of U.S. 36 north of Boulder.
The fire ban allows for the use of liquid- or gas-fueled stoves, campfires in improved U.S. Forest Service campgrounds and charcoal grill fires on private property.
A dry and hot August has driven local fire danger into the high category as measured by the National Fire Danger Rating System, according to the sheriff's office.
Tuesday August 16th, 2011
Supposed to be leaving for PBP tomorrow but... Feeling sad and left out today. Tomorrow was the day Steve and I were going to France to ride in Paris Brest Paris/PBP. Instead, I'm not packing, not riding, and not going. Sucks to be injured gain. So many of our friends are going and we will have to cheer them on in our thoughts.We've waited so many years to go and then after the car accident and all of the surgeries it is so bittersweet to know I would have made it. To know what I/we went through to get me back riding and to get through all of the qualifiers. To get so close-yet to be soooo far away from being there. Four more years. This can be a life time. Especially knowing how short life can be.
Now my days are spent meditating (to get through the agony of another surgery), rehabbing, getting work back on track, and morning the loss of not going to something that meant so much to us and took so long to get to.
The worst feeling is that I cannot show that I was pulling off a great come back. To show myself that I was able to coach myself back onto the bike and back into the qualifiers and then through PBP. That I would not let Steve down. Even I wasn't sure if I was going to pull it all off. So close. Weeks away.
So this week will be had to get through and will be even harder at the time of the start. But, as one lovely dear neighbor wrote to me. "You've been here before, and you can do it again. And you will". She sees in me something that I hope I never lose. Determination. Something great coming from a spunky lady who is 86 years old. Lived in Alaska, built a house in the Boulder mountains (when there was only a dirt road to her house). I bet she's overcome a lot in her life time. She's a terrific friend to have.
On a good note. Saw the hip surgeon today. I can now place weight on my leg and occasionally walk solo across the kitchen and soon across the gym floor. Yahoo. Life is looking up. Only a few weeks left and then rebuild all of the muscle. Oh can also get on the trainer. That will happen tonight after work!
Looking at the positive is very important. Keep looking forward. One foot in front of the other.
Four more years.
Sunday August 7th, 2011
Change. Time for change and more contemplative thought.
No clue why this photo. It's kind of meditative in it's own beauty.
Been spending loads of time just thinking . Thinking a lot. Thinking about who I am, who I want to be and where I want to go.
My right wrist hurts enough, all of the time, that I wonder what I will be able to do with it in the future. Not complaining because I know I will make what ever I want to do, work. I have a good brain. I can use it. Use it to find new ways to do things. But is a big change in the futire?
I love working with people. My clients. I have moved my life froward to work with people and teach them how to be more healthy. To be fit. I strongly believe fitness is how we can overcome adversity. Challenges. They are going to happen. Sometimes all in a clump-like what has happened to me the last 25 months. If I wasn't fit and had not used sports/fitness to challenge me throughout my life-well, I do not think I'd be able to be so positive with so much that has happened. Both mentally and physically. Challenges. Gets us to motivate.
Don't get me wrong. It hasn't been all positive and easy. I have days where I think I just don't want to move forward. Too much has happened. So many injuries so many hard times. These thoughts don't last long because I feel that if they do last long they get you stuck in a bad place. A place where I don't want to stay. It's not a productive place and can lead to really negative feelings. I do feel these sad and depressed feeling thoughts need to be felt-if not they'll get you some time down the road. So I learn from them. Use them to do a lot of thinking. A lot of meditating. A lot of searching.
I heard about a yoga instructor at a local gym. He's in a wheelchair. I have to look this guy up. Talk about positive energy. Very cool.
Positive thought. Listen to the negative, think about it and let it go. I think letting go of negative thought is like letting go of negative energy. Also, letting go of the people that may be holding us back.
Yup, that's change and change is progress. Even if it's scary.
Monday July 25th, 2011
Dedication and determination = survival. We can survive amazing things. This is what sports/fitness can do for us. It teaches us amazing things.We train and recover in order for our bodies to adapt. We teach our bodies how to do amazingly hard races and events. We survive because we train ourselves to survive.
It takes dedication of mind and body. Dedication and determination. All things we learn while training for our athletic goals we use throughout all of our daily lives.
It"s easy to want to quit when the going gets tough but we don't. We continue on. We continue on because we train ourselves to do just this. To NOT quit.
In 25 months I survived:
-A truck - bicycle accident
-5 related surgeries (more will eventually come)
-PTSD so severe I was only sleeping an hour a night and lost life’s most precious thing; my perception of who I am, who I had always been, and who I had built my life around being
-Cancer, cancer surgery and the cancer treatment
-A neighborhood mountain fire so disastrous it is called the most expensive disaster in Colorado history.
-An amazing physical and mental comeback in less than a year
- A broken hip while training on my bicycle commuting to work
- and
a flash-flood, through my community, with the velocity and depth not seen since the late 1800s.
I survived! I survived because of what I learned in a lifetime of sport and dedication to athletics and fitness.
Monday June 13th, 2011
S-Works Specialized road shoes for sale. Size 41.5. New.
Size 41.5.
Only worm a couple of times.
They don't fit with my orthotics so I cannot wear them.
Email me if you are interested. Email address is on this website.
Monday June 13th, 2011
PBP and Brevet rides. SoooooooI almost changed my objective training macro plan(s), made in early Spring about what Brevets and rides to do to get ready for PBP. Could it be the satisfaction of registering for PBP , last Friday night, took over the carefully laid plans to be conservative with my training and rehab?
Or.. was I getting worried listening to all of the stories of fellow Randonneurs doing multiple 600kms Brevets and 1,000km rides and I felt left out? I want my 1,000km. I do! I want to get the Randonneur 5000 award. I WILL!
It's been a hard road coming back but I am starting to feel stronger on the bike, in the gym, on the floor -doing my exercises. A little bit of progress at a time. Far more slowly than I would like to see or would have expected. The hip is doing better then I had expected but the wrist is not going very well. My back is slowly getting better and the neck seems to be holding up. Knees... not bad. Still, I CAN ride the bike and I am grateful for this. I AM! I just get whiny about it at times. Ahhh, live today, not in the past. Live for who you can be right now-not who you used to be.
We were able to place our entry into Paris Brest Paris (PBP) on Friday night. I crack jokes that I needed a cue sheet and map just to get through registration. I was impatient, as the site had some glitches and it was not actually my own lack of ciber weaving data entry but the site just needed me to be patient.
If you need a recap of what and how... here you go...
This step has been the long awaited part of the PBP preparation. Registration was a challenge, as you have to have a lot of information included while you register. First you go to one web site to pull your homologation (I think that's the word they use) numbers from the qualifying events. This is actually the second step as we did this back in April for the pre qualifying registration. Remember, we pre-qualifyed by doing several pre qualifying events last year. I crammed those in after the cancer surgery and before the hip surgery. Steve was able to get in one longer Brevet event than I was (more on this later below) but my 600km Brevet event allowed me enough "points" to sigh up early this year. Signing up early allowed for us to give 30 euros and have a place "held" until this week. The intent is that you are going to register for PBP, do the 2011 qualifiers and then fully register.
There is an award called the Randonneur 5000 award. There have only been 26 American women to get this award. I would like to be one of those. You have to start by being (completing) a series of Brevets and this means you have completed what's called a SR series-or Super Randonneur. The Super Randonneur award recognizes those riders who finish an ACP-sanctioned (Audax Club Parisien -ACP-is the organization from France) brevet series of 200 km, 300 km, 400 km, and 600 km in a calendar year. This is something we have been completing each year since 09. The Randonneur 5000 award is for those riders completing at least 5000 kilometers of brevets (including a Paris-Brest-Paris, a full ACP series of 200 km, 300 km, 400 km, 600 km, and 1000 km brevets, and a Flèche team event) within a four-year period.
All I would have left for this award is the 1000km brevet, once I have completed PBP. I would have liked to have completed it already but because we don't know what my hip or wrist will do with such a great distance, we (Steve and I) have decided to wait until we finish PBP and then set my sights on the 1000km brevet. Maybe even do it in another country. It gets quite tedious doing this much riding all of the time and with so many official events- to get to PBP-which only happens every 4 years and I want this goal/accomplishment and it has really helped be the carrot for my recovery.
Tedious? Well, I miss my mountain bike and have only been able to ride it a handful of times since the accident. Hope this changes in the next year or so as my hand gets stronger. I love riding and the road bike is providing an outlet to this thing I love. You know, the wind, the smells, the sights.....
Each of these events is to be completed self supported. We load up our bikes to carry almost everything we need. In PBP we will be allowed two drop bags. We'll place extra gear in these and plan on changing out clothes at least 2x during the 1200km of PBP. Oh, we have signed up for the 90 hour category. This means that we will be official finishers of PBP, when we complete it in or under 90 hours. There are two other categories; 84 hours and 80 hours. The risk for choosing these times can be that something goes wrong along the route and you do not make it in under your allotted time-then you are DNF-did not finish. Or DQed-disqualified.
We will start PBP at 6:30 PM(or when ever our wave of riders crosses the start line) on Sunday night, August 21st. We will be done by 90 hours later. Steve and I hope to be able to do this under 80 hours but we have the 90 hours to do it in. There are 5-6000 possible riders from all over the world. 719 from the US.
So I will stick to my original plan. Do the 600km this coming weekend. DOn't try to cram in the 1,000km. Stick to the plan. Stick to the plan........
Thursday May 26th, 2011
PBP Dates to Note. As posted on the SIR and RMCC websites, these are important dates to take notice of:THURSDAY, MAY 26, 2011
Important PBP Dates from Mark Thomas (of SIR)
Mark Thomas reminds us of the following important dates for PBP aspirants. See lots more info like this on the PBP Wiki.
May 29
Preregistration for riders who rode a 200km ACP brevet (or longer) in 2010
Starts midnight Paris time, so 3PM on 5/29 for west coast, 6PM on 5/28 for east coast
June 11
Registration begins (presumably midnight Paris time, so afternoon of 6/10 in US)
Preregistered riders start final registration
Non-preregistered riders may also register if there are quota spaces available (likely)
June 19
Pre-registered riders lose their priority space if not yet registered
This may free up national quota to allow more non-preregistered riders to register on June 20
July 17
Registration deadline
Riders who registered without all of their 2011 brevet homologation numbers must provide them by July 17
More registration info at the ACP PBP Registration page.
Thursday May 12th, 2011
Riding forward to recover from PTSD and other injuries.
As I begin to realize that my dream of going to PBP is likely going to happen (Steve and I have now qualified), it seems it comes with more emotional and physical work than I thought it would take. Not that I thought it would be easy. No. As a coach I know that the work required to come back after so many injuries and mental stress is not easy. But, I thought once I qualified I would feel more confidence about getting to Paris and riding 1200km in 90 hours or under. Two steps forward, one step back. Guess it's better then two steps forward and two steps back. I just have to get this weight off of my shoulders. The weight of the monkey that seems to be sitting heavy, waiting for me to fail. To not get stronger. To not feel accomplishment. To not feel like I'm moving forward. And yet, I AM moving forward. I just am not the same. Hhhmmm, not the same. Why do I feel compelled to be the same?
I guess the easiest way to heal and move forward is to give up the past. If I really want to start over, I need to stop the continuous thoughts of "I'm not the same as I was" and " I'm not as fast or as strong as I was". Of course I'm not. I was hit by a truck, I got cancer and I had multiple surgeries to repair the accident damage. So why do I continue to think I will be what, who, and where I was? Because I am human. I want hope. Hope and determination of that hope is the driver of this cyclist, this athlete, this human. I want what I remember to be me. I felt like I was superhuman. Well, that's what I thought. I never gave any physical endeavor much thought. I just went and did it. And most of the time succeeded quite well. Not like I didn't have to try. Or that is wasn't hard. I pushed myself all of the time. I could always do and be better. The very thing that is driving me to Paris now, is the monkey that sits on my shoulders. To give it up now would be to give up my dreams. If I give up my dreams, I let the accident win. The system wins-not me. Not on my terms. So I continue to pedal. To look forward. To have hope that one day, although not the same as before, that I will be comfortable on my bike. Comfortable with less strength, comfortable being different than I was. Comfortable with the wind in my face and the views from the seat of my bike. I miss that feeling. I miss the parallel to life that riding brought me. The bike moves forward. Life moves forward.
It's hard to leave behind what you know.
Monday May 9th, 2011
A little humbulness goes a long way to get you to PBP. The last qualifier for Paris Brest Paris--------DONE! Now let the work begin!
The Black Forest 300KM is one of the most beautiful Brevets. It takes us on rolling roads through horse farms and past huge houses nestled against the foots hills west of Denver, and south down to towns with names you only hear about when there are major snowstorms; Larkspur, Palmer Lake, Black Forest and Elbert. This 300 KM is mainly above 7,000 feet and has just under 10,000 feet of elevation gain. You hope for no rain throughout the day, as it will turn to snow (as we found out last year) but this usually means good stiff headwinds for most of your scenic riding.
A not so pretty photo of me at the finish. It IS the finish and with all of my whining about how hard it was and what things hurt more than I would have liked...I can still smile. I am now qualified!
Woke up in a not so good mood. Yesterday just didn't go as I would have liked. I didn't feel much joy. Hmmmmm. Then I started to think about everything. Everything about the last 23 months.
I am so very fortunate that I can still ride. I can still go after my dreams. That I can actually see how very hard this is for so many people. That I still have a gift. I still have two legs, two arms, hands, a brain. For goodness sake! It may all be much harder than I ever expected but doesn't that show me how very lucky I was for so long? I was so able to do so much? That I could do so many things? And now, to still be able to go after my goals/dreams, to be able to look at this all and realize how lucky I was and how lucky I still am. Yup, learning a little humility today. To be able to look back at what so many people said after the accident, the cancer and the fires. "How lucky you are to be alive!". I couldn't quite get "it". I only saw what I'd lost, not what I still have. Hmmmm, I think I'm beginning to see what I still have. I have a lot. I have love, a life, friends and family. Yup, I DO have a lot. I also have a lot to learn-humility/humbleness.
Thursday May 5th, 2011
Qualifying for PBP. It's the time of year, that comes every four years in a Randonneurs/Randonneuses life. If you want to make it to PBP http://www.paris-brest-paris.org/pbp2011/index2.php?lang=en&cat=presentation&page=statistiques you must do your qualifying Brevets.If you listened to your RBA, you did some of the pre-qualifying Brevets last year and were able to get on a "holding" list. This list allows you to get through your qualifying Brevets, this year, with some calmness and not have to keep your eye and finger on the computer screen's red registration button as the sign up day gets closer and closer. You and 5999 of your best Brevet riding buddies. I was one of the lucky riders. I was able to get in my 600km Brevet just before taking a 9-10 month break form riding to work out the kinks of several accident related injuries. Doing the 600KM Brevet (ACP, of course) allowed me to pre-register on April 17th. At least I have a little time to finish up my SR series and get my mind and body ready for PBP-a goal of mine for more years than I can remember. The very goal that seems to be helping propel me forward as it is harder and harder to keep rehabbing and riding and working and mentally preparing for PBP. Like the little engine that could! I can, I will. Well, because to stop now, would seem like quitting. And I am not a quitter. Life, like riding is something we do to get us to the next goal-the next thing. Like a long Brevet or ride, things always change. My hope is that the riding gets easier, more relaxing. Less painful, and becomes what it once was for me, a great way to see life and the world. I think I can, I think I can, I can, I will, because quitting is not my option.
So, making the come back after so many injuries is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I knew physically it would hard but I didn't think it would be such slow progress. I know, I tell my clients and athletes to keep moving forward. To be patient. I can, I will!
So I needed a diversion. A diversion from riding on the roads I know so well. The rides I would time myself on (once a racer-always a racer). So I asked Steve if he'd like to go on a mini vacation to ride somewhere different and do a Brevet qualifier, too. We began looking for something that would be at a lower elevation than our home town or where we sleep at night. Not hard to do as we live at about 7,000 feet. We also needed some Brevets that had a little less climbing than home. This would give me the best possible riding and success. Wenatchee, here we come.
Our biggest decision was not who to give the pets to for a week or what to pack for different weather conditions, but was whether we should go buy fenders for our bikes. We know some of the RMCC Brevet riders have fenders on their bikes but Steve and I have declined to add them to our bikes (at least for now). We are very aware that is can be very impolite to ride with people in rain and not have fenders... but decided to trust that we would be treated as inexperienced guests and I can say, we were not disappointed. We were treated like the dry inland riders we are. Lucky for us (or really our new riding friends) we only encountered a handful of rain drops. I now own a brand new pair of quick release Race Blade fenders. I'll be ready for that rain now!
The Brevets during the NW Crank Week Apples, cherries, and pears. We saw fields of winter wheat brown and done and the new sprouts of the coming summer wheat. We rode along the Columbia River and saw incredible mountain lakes, like Lake Chelan.
Our new friends at SIR (and, of course the promoters of NW Crank) did not disappoint. We had a wonderful vacation and even more satisfying rides. We made great new life long friends and people we hope to see in Paris or Brest, or along the way.
Steve and I would highly recommend going next year and getting in some early season miles, Brevets, or just great scenic rides. P.S. bring fenders-maybe.
Bonne Route!
Michelle and Steve
