Wearing Underwear (and other things I've been doing wrong)

I haven't been believing in myself or giving myself credit for working toward completing a sprint triathlon. (HELL YEAH I'M TRAINING FOR A SPRINT TRIATHLON BITCHES!) But you all know this and I'm trying to be better. Now I need to try and be better at a whole bunch more things.

1. I thought that because I was a big girl and I was hoping to lose some weight before the race, I didn't deserve nice training clothing. I have plenty of t-shirts and load of shorts so I had been biking and waddling in regular gym shorts and plain old cotton t-shirts. I went to REI and finally broke down and bought an insanely (at least to me) expensive pair of tri shorts. Holy damn are they the most comfortable things I own now. I also bought an equally expensive moisture wicking top and its like working out with cool clouds floating around me.

2. On top of not wearing the right clothing I was not lubing up properly. There's this anti-chafe stuff called Body Glide. To anyone who's thighs spend more time together than apart (in fact there's a whole nother lube for that sort of thing), it's called chub rub. Of course now that I am wearing my wondrous new shorts they don't even budge and they don't ride up. They keep everything where it's supposed to be which reduces the risk of chafe considerably, but I did get some just in case. It was only a couple bucks and I've heard that if your jogging in the heat in a t-shirt, the sleeves can rub uncomfortably on your inner arm. We will see.

3. I did a bit of searching because I find myself really uncomfortable on my 10 mile + bike rides. Part of this was my incorrect active wear, the other was a wrongly positioned saddle. Not to gross anyone out but the angle of my bike seat was crooked and I guess I ended up riding more on my lady business then on my posterior. WRONG. Also terribly uncomfortable. When biking, use your ass - trust me. For any male readers I may have, God love ya because I couldn't imagine navigating a bike seat with balls. (Haha)

4. Finally, wearing underwear is something you shouldn't be doing. (Unless we are talking bras, but you know how I feel about supporting my girls) Almost all running shorts have underwear built in. Tri shorts and bike shorts are built specifically with padding and non chafey moisture wicking properties that make underwear just one more annoying chafe causing piece of fabric. So, not to be unsavory but I've been ditching the underwear now that I have great activewear.

I'm sorry this post has been mostly about clothes and ways to avoid chafe but as a bigger aspiring triathlete these are almost as important as having a working bike! I had no idea but I guess it's better to learn late rather then never. My workouts are more comfortable now and therefore more enjoyable and more fun. See I'm making progress already! Bike the Drive is Sunday and even though it's supposed to be insanely hot I'm excited. I'll try to stop and take some pictures!