I have launched into reading Daring Greatly and already I am having to reread, and then reread, and then go back and reread again. I'm totally digging the book so far and I feel like there are so many passages in the book that have a triathlon, or endurance sports angle. What really got me thinking this afternoon was a passage I read about her "vulnerability hangover." It really got my brain going because I have experienced this in racing and I've even talked to a few other ladies about this and felt a bit alone in my experiences. I went ahead and did my video blog on it today. Please excuse the beginning, it really took me a little while to get rolling into my blog today. Hahah. There is a fair amount of the "what am I trying to say here" talk. I'll also warn you that there is a more than normal amount of Sonja cleavage...Oy, the joys of being a rookie! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFz2ck2rdg8

I would be really interested to hear if you have experienced anything like this, or can relate.

This evening, I was really grateful to get an invite to a Coeur conference call where Stacy Simms was speaking on womens nutrition. Stacy developed Osmo, and she helped me personally with my fueling strategy for the last year. Her advice was such a gift to me, that I begged her to sponsor me this year. After the call today there are a few things I want to tweak and try after hearing some more of her advice (like some of her great recipes for Food in the Pockets). I literally could listen to her talk all day. I felt hopeful after this call that the future generations of women endurance athletes will have so much more access to information about how women need to fuel differently. This excites me.

I wanted to share a few things from the call here, just in case it's able to help someone in the future.

One thing I see out there on the race course all the time when I am coaching/spectating is people who are having nutritional disasters. I have had disasters, my athletes have had disasters, and I see disasters at every single race I am at. I asked Stacey what her advice was on what to do after nutritional disaster has struck. How do you rebound?

1) Poop - I have had issues with this. I have fixed that for the most part, and how I did is a whole different blog post, but what happens when you are doing the port-a-potty-hop? Going from loo to loo to loo? Stacey said that you need to hit up an aid station for potato chips or pretzels and plain water. No more sugar!!

2) Puke - I have never personally experienced this one, but I have seen it in action. Nausea, ill feeling, bleh? What to do? Stacey says Tumms are the way to go here. This will settle the stomach and get some calcium to your intestines, which is also a muscle.

3) What about Imodium? - I have heard that carrying Imodium is a good thing to have on hand. Stacey said absolutely not and I was really thinking this would be her response. She said it's not something you want to be taking in this particular compromised state. No no no.

I think it's important when you are developing your race strategy to have thought through some solutions for when things go wrong. I think that most triathletes spend FAR more time thinking about what "time" they will go when they should spend that time thinking about how to execute their races. When the taper sets in, the "time thoughts" can be an endless loop in the head. Get those thoughts off of time and get them on the executables, the plan, the how, why, what ifs. Think through what can go wrong and have answers to the difficult questions. I hope that the above answers can help you formulate your "what ifs" when you are putting together your execution plan.

(In case you wondered what nutritional failure looks like....)

Okay, some more Stacey insight. We talked about periods. Hallelujah, see, now you are getting poop, puke, and blood, all in ONE blog post! Aren't you lucky? Well, it was very interesting to hear the truth about what women's bodies do during the different phases of the hormone cycle. Enlightening because the truth is, nobody in sports wants to talk about women's periods. Nobody. It's a total "LaLaLa" fingers in the ear sort of situation. Not Stacey, she'll talk all day here. So, feel like crap for the 5-7 days before your period? Guess what...it's proven. You need more carbohydrate while training, you will have a tough time going anaerobic, and your heart rate will not behave. It's science, you're not weak, you're a woman, it's part of the deal. If you push through this time period where you feel like crap, you put yourself at risk for overtraining, or overreaching. This was a big eye opener for me and you can bet that my ladies are going to have to start logging their cycles into Training Peaks. I can't ignore these facts. Bottom line. In the Osmo women's line Stacey has put little things here and there to help with these natural rhythms. It's there when we need it.

It's been an eventful and informative evening! Please do share if you have any responses to my video blog, or have anything to say about nutrition or being vulnerable! Have a great day. Oh, and send good vibes to Michelle Thursday morning, she has ACL reconstruction.