Andrew Louie

Sleepy Hollow Triathalon 2009

This tri was special for me for two reasons:

1) it’s in my home neighborhood

2) it’s for the lukemia and lymphoma society.

I related my own story about surviving Hodgkins lymphoma, to the organizers and they found it to be pretty compelling. They asked me if they could interview me for the local news channel 12, tell my story about going through lymphoma and then coming to run this race. I was happy to share my experience, and hopefully inspire others to train and take part in the sport. My interview broadcasts tomorrow starting at 5, watch local channel 12 in westchester if you can!

The race itself was a blast, except for the swim portion. The swim took place in a small cove on the hudson river at kingsland point park. There is a very small beach there, to get to the start line and finish line of the swim, you have to wade out into the water. The biggest problem with that is that it is a mine field of very sharp rocks and other things that would cut your feet. Alot of people got cut up really bad on the rocks. Besides the rocks, the water was cool and very choppy. It’s been raining pretty much everyday for the past month which generated a fairly strong current. the current wasn’t much of a problem inside the cove, but it did make the waters very rough, which made it very hard to swim. I swallowed several mouthfuls of hudson river water, which made me feel a little ill at the bike transition. My strategy was to go from buoy to buoy which actually helped me speed up the swim a lot because i noticed a lot of people were getting swept down stream away from the buoys, then having to swim extra distance to make it back to the shore.

THe bike portion was brutal, I was very surprised to see that in the first mile I had to face 3 monster hill climbs. Going up this one local road, Beekman, was like having to bike up a cliff. Many people had to walk it up, It was the only hill i had to get out of my seat to climb. The stretch out onto 117 was a pretty easy grade going out, all uphill. I felt bad for the poor newbie athletes with mountain bikes. those heavy bikes made the bike portion even harder for them. Coming back was a rice ride downhill mostly. I was able to cruise around 30 mph, topping out at around 36 mph somewhere. The return trip took us along route 9 where I remeber one of my first experiences biking on a road. I was biking with Lawrence at the time, and we were biking along the old croton aqueduct trail. I think we got lost at some point and to get back Lawrence took us through the cemetery and onto route 9 where we cruised down route 9 at 40 mph with buses and cars passing us at an even faster speed. It was my first harrowing experience on a bike. Ahh the good old days. On one of the final downhill portions through residential streets, there was a flattening out of the road for a cross-street, I hit that cross-street at 35 mph, it felt like my bike nearly bottomed out and I think i even caught some air when the downhill resumed. That was pretty awesome. The whole ride i was keeping pace with this guy is a green bike jersey. It was like a tortoise and the hare kind of thing, He would sprint really fast on the downhill portions but slow to a crawl on the uphill portions, so even though i lost sight of him when he took a large lead on the non-uphill portions, i was able to catch up on the hills. I could tell he wasn’t an experienced cycler because his cadence would drop a lot on the uphills and he would have to stomp on the pedals to keep moving.  The bike made me feel nervous about the upcoming half-iron man relay that I’m doing with my siblings. If it’s 56 miles like this, I would need to train twice has hard starting last month.

The last heroic sprint on the bike kind of wiped me out for the run, for the first mile i was laboring. THe news channel 12 guy was doing his piece right by the lighthouse and amazing caught me in the shot just as I passed. Worked out well I guess . I regained my air at around half way, after this huge hill I had to climb. and was able to run a little faster for the 2nd half of the run. I finished the run in 28 min, which is a little slower than usual but pretty good for a personal record.

Overall I finished 77 out of 223 finishers. if we take out the relay teams then i finished 67 out of 204, which puts me in the top 1/3!  my best finish ever after my 3rd place finish in the bear mountain tri!.

THe best part of the race was that Yuee came and supported me, well all of us. She made this awesome sign, and held it up!

Yuee made this motivational sign for us and held it up while we raced

The worst part of the race was that Jeff got really torn up in the swim portion. through the whole bike and run, he soaked his sneaker in blood and required stitches on his foot. Amazing that he actually finished, even if he was last. My sister also took a huge beating the water. We all came away with many cuts but Jeff got it the worst.

Overall the course was definitely very challenging, the hilly nature made it very interesting as well. This race got a lot of newbies to the triathlon sport which is great, more people interested in triathlons, the more triathlons will be organized. I fear the challenging nature of the course might scare some people away. I met two guys from brooklyn who were my rack neighbors in the transition area. It was their first time, and they were pretty cool. Everyone at the event was really friendly. One guy even ran with my brother at the run portion just to give support for him to finish. It was great.

Results posted here for posterity

Continue reading Sleepy Hollow Triathalon 2009…

Meet Link, newest member of our family

From Meet Link, newest member of our family

I decided this weekend that Yuee and I should raise a dog. It’s something that Yuee has always wanted, and something that I really want to do with Yuee. We got Link from breeder’s pick in Scarsdale. We had initially esearched a few breeds that we would like. I initally fell inlove with the shar-pei and french bull dog becuase i find the excessive skin curls and pushed in face to be really cute, but raising that kind of dog would be very challenging. We both were looking for good apartment dogs, Yuee liked the beagle, but the beagle likes to bark alot, she also liked the boston terrier a little becuase it is similar to the french bulldog, but it is not active enough for her. we had come across the shiba-inu in our research when we looked at the atkina. the shiba-inu is a very good apartment dog, very independent like a cat, which I like, I like cats, but am unfortunately allergic. he is also very intelligent, and active.

Our pup right now is quite a handful, I feel like we have to keep chasing after it with wee wee pads picking up pee and poop. It’s only natural at this stage. THe constantly changing environment is probably making the dog very anxious and thus leading to its uncontrollable bowel movements. Yuee and I are keeping track of its feeding and pooping schedule using bento.

Nesting hawks or eagles on the hudson river park

While I was running my 6 miles in today’s heat and humidity, at the turn around, near the marina on the hudson river park, there was a group of people just standing around a tree. Upon closer inspection, I find that there is a medium size raptor is guarding her nest and all these people are just gawking at it. some people have telescopes with camera’s attached. I think the bird was kind of nervous about all the people there. I wish I had a camera.

JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge 2009

From JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge 2009

I finished in 28min 14 seconds, about 2 min faster than last year!

Andrew Louie: MegaBall winner

The saturday may 1st drawing I matched 3 numbers, won 7 dollars! 40% return. woooo!