Thursday, December 01, 2005

southern california

originally written for the USC Triathlon Newsletter 12-01-05

This is the time of year when those of us at USC can sit back in our t-shirts, boardshorts, flip-flops, and sunglasses, and call our favorite friends and relatives on the East Coast, Midwest, or Pacific Northwest, and with the biggest stupid self-serving vacuous grins say "Duuuuuuude, what is up with all the sun? It's like so not snowboarding weather." Oh yeah. Soooooooooo Cal. You gotta love it. Let the rest of the country drool. Let the rest of them whimper. Let them gnash their teeth in jealousy and rage, let them utter their lamentations of envy and despair. Let them worship the land of surf and sun, and all the blessed who inhabit this realm. Let them suffer.

Truth be told, this is really our competitive edge. Against all the competition we're likely to see from the rest of the country next season at races like Nationals, those of us in SoCal have the opportunity to take advantage of the climate and train all year round. Swim. Bike. Run. It's all possible. Just for you, you perky little obsessive-compulsive exercise rat you.

And you can do it all with the knowledge that all the other schmoes in New York, Massachusetts (tell my brother MIT sucks), Minnesota, or various other random snow-flooded locales of your choice (South Korea, Dave?) are stuck indoors sucking eggnog and getting fat. And all those holiday parties people here are slinging around? Consider it carbo-loading for that extra-long training day. All the cookies and pies and cakes? Energy bar substitutes, my friend, energy bar substitutes. Hot chocolate and cider? Recovery drinks! Fuel to the fire that is the furnace of your raw, flame-throwing, high-octane, high-tuned, high-performance aerodynamic cheetah-sleek supersonic warp-speed perpetual-motion mega-dynamic bio-nuclear body!!! All of it, just mere excuses to suck up sun and surf and 70 degree days under crystal-clear blue skies calling your name.