Made the Ironman Press for qualifying at Wisconsin. They have started publishing articles about the qualifiers from the races for this year's IM World Championships.

You have to read down the page a bit to see the 35-39 males, but it is cool to be recognized!

Click Here to read the article.

Spring break has come to a close. This year the family stayed home because Dad had to work and we had Mimi come and visit. I know Shani and the kids had a blast with Mimi and sometimes just having family around is a great vacation.

We also were blessed to have the our close friends the Schloegel's visit from KC. Matt is my old training partner and close friend from California. I don't know what it is about him, but we seem to pick up where we left off. Matt and I were able to get in an evening ride and an early morning run. Just having them stay the night was a lot of fun and we caught up during a wonderful dinner. Matt has 4 girls and my heart goes out to him once they all become teenagers.

I finished off the week with a long ride of 4 hours and a 30 minute tempo run. It is always nice to be out on the bike, so although my workout was not that great with tired legs, I loved being out there.
No spring break in Texas is complete without pictures of the kids in the bluebonnets. Our neighborhood is covered in the Texas State flower so we had to head out about 2 blocks to snap some great pictures.

I am off to Seattle tomorrow to interview some candidates for our opening there. I hope we find someone good.

On Wednesday, we had some cold weather move into Houston. It was quite a culture shock from the 85 degree days we have had over the past few weeks. Thus, I find myself inside today relaxing and watching it rain outside and writing on my blog.

Before I get into my training update, I have to share with everyone how proud I am of my son Parker and his T-Ball game on Wednesday night. I have ever seen him play so hard and do so well. He played in the infield for 3 out of the 5 innings and hit some shots to the outfield while at bat. You could see his confidence lift as the game went on. What a great sport for young boys.

With all I have going on with work, training and family, having an afternoon of relaxation has been a really nice treat. Mimi is here from Orlando and is joining us for all of next week. The kids are so excited she is here. I enjoy her visits as well because it always frees up some time for training!

Thanks to MiMi being here, I watched Cycling Tv on the internet this morning and got to see Alberto Contador Bonk on the final climb. I thought that guy was invincible, but it goes to show everyone can have a bad day. He was left all alone out there to defend his jersey and they got the best of him. Unless a miracle happens tomorrow, his Paris-Nice is over.

Yesterday was a long run of 15 miles, and the cold drizzly weather was welcomed by me as I always enjoy running in colder weather. Legs felt great and running in the dark, thanks to daylight savings, can make for an interesting adventure during an early morning run.

I did manage to get a nice swim in today up at the new natatorium. The Nat was set up as long course and should be for the rest of the spring and summer. Long course swimming is such a different experience than short course. It always reminds me of the long summers of training as a kid. Although my arms were tired today I still managed to put in a solid 4,000 meters. My swimming is really starting to come along and my times are starting to show some improvement.

Tomorrow should be a long ride. I hope the weather lets me get outside. If not, I will be on the trainer in Dana's garage. If you have not checked it out yet, take a look at Dana's new website www.coachlyons.com.

I found this youtube post of the final kilometers of the Paris Nice today. The quality is not that great and there is no voice over, but if you missed the stage, good chance to see what happened:

Yesterday I received the most awesome e-mail. I was contacted by someone from Ironman.com that is doing interviews of the athletes that qualified at IM Wisconsin. I don't know if anything will be published, but to just get contacted was a pretty cool experience.

I finally made it back from Pittsburgh late last week and was so glad to be home. I was only able to get on a treadmill Thursday of last week in Pittsburgh after a forced 2 days off. My coach, Dana, had scheduled last week to be a rest week so not too much was lost.

Saturday was a very busy day for us. We had Girls Run for Hannah starting at 7:30, then off to the ball park for the opening day of T-Ball. The whole family was exhausted by the time we got home, but we had a blast!

Since I am the photographer at Girlsrun, it was great to get some pictures of all the girls for the start of the spring season. We have a record number of girls for the program this year, so I am sure we will raise a lot of money for Livestrong.

Training got back to normal by Sunday with a decent ride in some very warm weather.

This week promises to be a good training week with some hard runs, hard rides and my longest ride of the season on Sunday.

The pictures in this blog post include one of the T-Ball parade, one of Parker hitting home on opening day and Hannah at her first Saturday practice at Girls Run.

So what is 14 degrees? You are probably thinking it is some high tech weapon for my aero-bar angle on the bike. Better yet, the precise angle of the lugs on the bottom of my Newton Shoes. Nope, 14 degrees is the current temperature outside here in Pittsburgh!

I arrived here on Monday night and they have been in a deep freeze since I landed. I really don't know when I will get a workout in, and might end up going a few days without one.

Anyone that trains for Ironman and lives in the Midwest is a dedicated athlete. I brought my cold weather running gear, but I don't think it will do the trick in this temperature so I will have to find another way to get the work out in later today if at all.

Work is crazy right now so that is my focus. This economy is causing everyone to keep their eye on the ball like never before. I have a great sales team, so I know they can find a way to deliver numbers no matter what the economy is doing. Being in Pittsburgh is giving me a great opportunity to complete some work projects that have stalled and find some new ways for us to generate revenue. Strong companies like ours always emerge from times like these in a better position then before. I see us puting even more distance on our competitors. It is kind of like racing in a headwind. You can whine, you can cry, or you can HTFU, stay down on the bars, grind it out and ride so far ahead of your competitors they will never catch up.