Australia: Update for a visit

Just a brief update on my proposed plans to visit Australia in the near future which i haven't commented on lately. My plans are still intact to visit "Down Under" come the 1st weekend in October in order to race in the Western Australia Duathlon Championships. I am awaiting the opening of registration for the race so that I can actually have it checked off of my list.

My next goal is establishing a time line as to the length of my visit. Throwing a wrench in this mix is the fact that I will almost certainly be making a stop in NZ and am thinking about having a couple day layover in order to compete in a running race there. Luckily for me, one of my best friends is actually moving to NZ in August so I will have somewhere to stay for a couple days.

I am so thankful to have so many people that support me in so many ways. Some have helped financially and other have helped by providing me with kind and supportive words. My hope is that by mid July I will have my plane ticket purchased and only have some minor trip details to lock up.

We all have dreams. In order to make dreams come into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline and effort.

Their are certainly times when I think, why don't I just act like a normal person? Finish a good days work with dinner with some friends while chatting over a few drinks and heading home to relax on the couch. That sounds just blissful at this point, I think its something that I often battle with and have battled with over the years. Trying to lead a busy social life while kind of half assing my training for whatever event is in the forefront.

Now that I have signed on with Studio 7 and Lance Leo as my fulltime coach, I have fully committed myself towards attaining some proposed goals in 2011. 2010 is basically a wash for me as I am using it as my building year for triathlons, to gain strength and experience. Putting in a full years worth of dedication and hard work should reap some major benefits come 2011 race season which will be specifically planned out permitting I stay injury free.

Sometimes I wonder what separates the "men from the boys" and it basically seems to boil down to hard work in endurance athletics. I kind of like what Bill Bowerman once said with pushing yourself to limits.

"the real purpose of running isn't to win a race; it's to test the limits of the human heart. A teacher is never too smart to learn from his pupils. But while runners differ, basic principles never change. So it's a matter of fitting your current practices to fit the event and the individual. See, what's good for you might not be worth a darn for the next guy."

"Testing" my personal limits is certainly a goal of mine and in order to do so appropriately I have realized that I must cut certainly luxuries out of life to attain this. Luckily I can keep my head on straight while staying focused on ultimate goals in life, with the main one being "Happy" and "Content" with life. Along with achieving my individual goals, I hope through my coaching service as well as volunteer work I can impact other people's lives in a positive way....this is what really matters.

New events that pop out of no where

Last night I posted that I accepted a position at "Greenapple Sports & Wellness" as a Chiropractic Aid which to many is a shock because of some other prior stated plans. The initial goal of moving to Australia has been scraped at this point in time, because after adding up the benefits of this job opportunity locally, I felt that it was in my best interest to stick around.
Greenapple Sports & Wellness has a very good name in the community and the possibilities of expanding my coaching business can actually be increased through this avenue as well while interacting with clients. Now down to my goal of heading to Australia! Mike Kahn shocked me by announcing that he would start a fundraiser while he is preparing for the NYC marathon to assist me in my journey "Down under".
I want to state that I am still traveling to Australia, but for a much more brief stint. The goal with heading Down Under will be to knock out 2 races, one being a duathlon in western Australia and the other being a BIG olympic distance triathlon on the gold coast. In the Duathlon I will be able to race one of my best friends in Cody Angell and its motivational to say the least. Every time that we have raced each other we pretty much "Lay it on the line" trying to break each other from the get go with crazy surges and maybe even some classic "Lance Armstrong" stare backs during the ride.

Thank you to everyone who has donated $ for my trip, I will not be moving there BUT I will still be heading over to race some amazing competition and what it boils down to is that it will cost exactly the same to get there. I will continue updating my blog with updates while leading up to my trip as well as triathlon recaps. next up: Over the Mountain

Triathlon #2: Jetton Practice makes perfect

To the request from a couple of my blog followers, I am actually going to write some race recaps through the season. Most of them will be multi-event in format but there will be a few running events mixed in.

exactly one week post tryCharleston Half Ironman, I spoke with Sheila Wakeman about her event, the "Jetton Triathlon" and said I was interested. After signing up, I knew I would be in for something eventful especially since my 6 weeks to 70.3 training really hurt me. My hamstring was killing me, my hip flexor was out of whack and my legs were basically "dead" as runners would say, no pop.

I thought it would be a great idea to use this race as a practice round for upcoming triathlons in the season, since it has been 4 years since I had really tried to make any attempt at triathlons. Last year's 2009 World Championship race was horrible and looking back, it should have been with my, excuse the language but half ass training plan. I needed some more time in the water and understanding how my body would feel after transitioning from event to event again. Upon signing up for the race, I noticed that my neighbor Lat Purser had signed up as well as Jim Rhodes. Lat is an elite triathlete in the area, who lays down some sicks times, especially in cycling. Jim just ripped off a 4:27 half ironman, followed by a 2nd overall finish in the sprint at white lake.

Competition was tough and I knew that on my best day considering the circumstances, I would only hope to be close to these guys. I was more confident going into the water, BUT it didn't pan out, i caught myself just kind of floating around so to speak. I remember thinking, "if i stay near Lat in the water that would be alright". So once he passed me around 250m in, I just stayed near him without any effort to increase the pace or even pull all the way through my stroke. 1st lesson in racing, my mind basically made a decision prior to the race and it worked just as I thought it may. I need to focus on KILLING the swim!

after leaving the water in just under 14 minutes before we hit the time mat, I grabbed my helmet and sunglasses, then it was off to the bike course. It was funny because 4 of us left transition together and everyone of us had a horrible mount on the bike. I had to laugh at the situation and just think about this being the total reason i was here, to practice. Once on the bike and moving, Lat flew past me and yelled something my way. I tried upping the pace but my hamstring just wasn't prepared to move that quickly. All in all I had a pretty damn good bike portion as I passed a ton of people and this was the 1st race that I had NEVER been passed on the bike.

After duking it out with some guys I caught up and passed about 1/2 way in I made my way to T2. This was not the smoothest dismount to transition but it was alright. I grabbed my shoes and visor then hit the path. I felt no speed in my legs at all, I was just running one steady motion. My breathing QUICKLY began to give me some serious problems. I was struggling to breath and my top just felt too conforming as usual so I stripped it off at the mile marker. My times were slow I knew and I wasn't moving very well because my legs were zapped totally from the 70.3 7 days prior, but i managed to pass several people. I didn't feel DECENT until the last mile when I seemed to pick it up a bit because my breathing was more regulated.



I learned a significant amount from this race and was eager to move forward. Gregory Billington won the race overall and I spoke with him after about his next races. Spain was the destination for the collegiate world championships in 2 weeks, no wonder he laid the wood on everyone. To give an idea of how difficult the 5k course was, he ran 17:40+ and I ran 19:02. Just a couple months back he ran 31:17 for a 10k at the end of a triathlon and well minus the tri part, I just ran 15:54 in the Boston 5k 3 weeks ago!

Looking back I feel like I am over racing but I am racing with purpose, to learn and to get in some great workouts. I believe I ended up 5th overall(1st in my Age division) which is great. I felt a little uneven with my performance afterwards but looking back I am very pleased. Over the past few weeks I have had a lot on my hands in the part of racing indeed!

Boston 5k - 04/19
Boston Marathon - 04/20
TryCharleston - 05/01
Jetton Tri - 05/08

That's a lot especially if anyone was to look back over the past 2 months of my training logs. More race recaps to come! Keep hope Alive

Recommendations for preparing to move to another country

Right now I am currently trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together that will make my trip to Australia as smooth as possible. I have been using search engines to assist my preparation with documents and all other sorts of things. I wanted to see if anyone out there had any tips relating to leaving the country for more than a couple weeks at a time?

Back in college I was fortunate to travel to Scotland for a couple weeks and it was very eventful, slash, a bit out of my comfort zone, BUT cool. This upcoming trip is one that will really make me venture away from my little bubble to open my wings so to speak and see the world and what it has to offer. After some deliberation about how to raise $ so that I can travel and also not leave behind loads of loans that I have, I am going to essentially do everything that I can to alleviate the stress of bills back home.

The biggest thing that I am going to take a step with is selling my vehicle, which i have been working hard to pay off so I could actually "own it". This makes sense as it would just sit in place for months and I would be paying upwards of $2500 in payments and insurance while away. Crossing my fingers that after I have the car completely buffed that it will sell for my pay off. Next in line will be my furniture upon the expiration of my lease in July. Even though I love my king size bedroom set, LCD TV, sectional and etc, it will have to go. The funny thing is that with the sale of all of this I will still have trouble paying for the cost of moving away.



It appears that the tenants at my investment condo are going to resign a new lease in July which would relieve a burden off of my shoulders, knowing that I can still make my mortgage payments even though I have been biting the bullet a bit. This is a lot of info that some people may find interesting in getting to understand me while others would say I speak too much about my personal life. I want people to know the real Christopher Lamperski, nothing to hide, just trying to live life, make people smile and make my small difference in the world where I can.

My question to close things up is: " Any tips for moving out of the country?"