LUNA Summit 2011

Yet another year of Luna Summit has passed. I always head into the weekend knowing it will somehow go faster than the previous year. We headed out on Thursday afternoon and arrived to the hotel expecting to be in separate rooms. But we arrived to find out the 3 Chicago Triathlon LUNAs were all in one room! Unfortunately, it was an extremely small room – just one bed and a cot. I had no idea how we were going to fit all 3 of us and the bikes we had rented in this room. Good thing we wouldn’t be spending much time in this room!

For dinner on Thursday night, we ventured out to find the same little restaurant we ate at last year – only to find out it wasn’t really the same restaurant! We walked a while to another place we thought might suit our needs – we walked about 15 minutes and the place was perfect. The atmosphere, the food, all just what we were looking for! After a quick dinner, it was back to the room for some much needed sleep.

Friday morning, we woke early to fit in a run before I needed to be in Leader Training all day. Uh oh. It’s dark. It’s 5:30am. We’re in a strange place where we don’t know where we’re going. When exactly is sunrise? 6:32am? Considering I needed to be in the shower by 7am, we couldn’t wait that long. So we took off a little after 6am, and yes, it was still dark, but we stuck to the trail and road we knew and it was a perfect little run. Not as far as I would have liked, but better than nothing.

Leader Training was interesting. Clif headquarters had moved since the last time I was here and I was excited to see the new place. We were tucked away in just a
couple of the rooms for most of the day where we discussed the new teams, best practices, Luna products, minimum requirements for the Chix teams, the Breast Cancer Fund, and one of our sponsors, Ahnu. Then my teammates showed up and we took a tour of the new facility. As expected, it was incredible.

We finished the night with dinner at Clif headquarters, an overview of the Breast Cancer Fund and a quick introduction to the pro team and it was back to the hotel for us. The next day was a big one for us, so we went to sleep pretty quickly.
Saturday was individual sport training. So all the tri teams were off to swim in the bay and do a quick run along the ocean. This year was much warmer than last,
but still really pretty cold. Many of the LUNA Chix were freezing by the time they got out of the water. We did a very short run and were hustled off back to the hotel where we scarfed down a quick box lunch and took showers to clean off and warm up for our afternoon seminars.

The first 2 seminars were on nutrition. Then there was a road bike handling skills session with a coupl3 of the Luna pros. Quick break and then on to the Breast Cancer Fund talk and another presentation on LunaFest. Not much time before dinner and then we had the option of heading out to do some shopping of the Luna Sport line.
Now the weekend was almost over and on Sunday morning was the “epic” road ride. We were told it was a challenging ride, but I’m still not sure I got what I expected. It was tough. California has hills that we in the Midwest are not used to. A couple sections of 45 minutes of climbing. I haven’t been outside on a bike in 6 months! Though I looked completely overdressed, I have to say I was glad I brought every stitch of clothing I did because the steep descents were VERY CHILLY! I was impressed with the riding of the other Lunas and this was now by far my favorite part of the weekend. It was tough, but some of the scenery was absolutely breathtaking. And we’re still about a month away from decent outdoor riding in Chicago.

The rest of the day was basically grabbing another quick box lunch, which my roommates were kind enough to grab for me before there were none left (THANK YOU!!). A shower, a few minutes just sitting around and off to the airport to head back home. It always goes so fast.

I’m excited to have met some of the new awesome teams with the LUNA program this year. It’s refreshing to talk with new LUNAS and try to help prevent them from making the same mistakes we did as a first-year LUNA Chix team. I’ve given a lot of time and effort to this program, but I also think I’ve received more in return. As the saying goes, “you get out what you put in”. Our team has gone through LOTS of new members. Some teammates have been outstanding, others not so much. But I do think that this program gives back so much more if you really are in it for the right reasons and you do your part as a team member. I’m excited to see what spectacular things this team achieves in 2011. We have lots of returning team members, but we also have first-year members – the perfect combination for a successful year!