Married life- and why I didnt blog for 2 months

I recently received this email:

[Hey Conrad Stoltz,
You are a big hero of mine and you have inspired me to cycle from central China to Denmark, my home country. I’ve been a fan of you since I heard about the BAMF nail incident. [He’s referring to this blog. C]
I know you are busy with your wifey, congratulations man, but I would be really pleased if you could update your blog. You don’t have to do some crazy long blog, just a little bit and it would be great.
All the best,
your fan Henrik Hagemann]

Hendrik prompted me to start blogging again.

1st off: “Hey Hendrik Hagemann, please write me your story and I’ll post it on the blog. China to Denmark is a loooong bike ride, and I wish to know if I inspired you in a good or bad way to ride that far…

Your fan Conrad Stoltz”

What happened since the last blog after World Champs:

Thanks to a match made in heaven, Liezel (nee Wium) and I blitzed romance, engagement and got married on 11.11.11 in South Africa. Good wedding pictures take time, I’ll blog about the wedding when the photographer is done editing…

Since then we have been having an amazing time, honey mooning and spending quality time together… We started on the tropical island of Mauritius,

Stayed a while… (Here sailing over shallow corral reefs)

Then Thesen Island in Knysna, South Africa,

Knysna Elephant Park was an amazing experience…

And after all that time in and around the ocean, we headed for the Karoo.

Then we had a quick 2 weeks in Stellenbosch (Liezel had to work!?) and then we joined my parents on the farm for the Festive season.

It rained  A LOT. Sometimes flooding the road and cutting us off from the outside word…

And sometimes you just have to hold your breath and take the plunge…

Liezel got to meet the rest of my family and we had a great Christmas.

I re-lived my dream from when I was a 3 year old. (Back then, there was no triathlon)

Training? Yes, we did some. My wife is a machine!

Here is a rough draft of my race schedule, kicking off this weekend:
Jan 14: Total Sports Challenge. Liezel and I will do the 2 man Terra Firma event under “Team Stoltz”
Jan 28: XTERRA Buffelspoort SA.

Feb 5 National road TT champs
Feb 12: National MTB Champs
Feb 28 XTERRA SA- Grabouw

March 3: Argus MTB race.

As you can see, we had an amazing 2 months together, growing even closer. We wanted to start our marriage off on the right foot, and keep joking “we’re on honeymoon for life”.  I didnt blog for these 2 months because the “bloody computer” is probably the biggest distraction from personal interaction and training, so I switched it (and the “bloody phone”) off and left it at home for 3 weeks. Was quite a liberating experience. Blogging is a hobby, not business as I have yet to make a cent from it, but I’ll gladly humour you guys, and thus keep recording memories.

Thanks for the kick in the backside Hendrik