Complete a half Ironman

I don’t feel this necessarily deserves a place as its own “thing” since it’s related to this thing, but it could be its own for sure! I will be scheduling this into my calendar as appointments – so far it’s really working out well for my other workouts. Pilates and Yoga, here I come!

The best thing my coach said before the holidays began was “Your goals for the “holiday week” should simply be to try to emerge on the other side feeling good about yourself.” And that’s what I did! I made sure to get my X-training, swim and bike workouts done before Xmas Day, and then I did my run on Sunday. I definitely feel like I came out on the other side doing just fine!!!

I had decided last year at this time that 2008 was going to be the Year of the Triathlon for me, except I was going to kick off the year with a 1/2 Ironman, which would have been my first tri. I signed up with Team in Training a year ago to train for the May 2008 Gulf Coast 1/2 Ironman in Panama City, FL, but I was never on schedule from the start. I had a long 2007 marathon training season from May to November, and was only off for a month before starting another 5 month training season. Mentally I wasn’t ready to jump back in. I also had emotional challenges. It was the first holiday season since my mom died; my dad was alone, depressed and hospitalized; my siblings and I were struggling to juggle own lives and grief and take care of Dad, and then in early 2008 I had some scary medical issues, and lost my job. Then my dad died early spring. I dropped out of Gulf Coast – it was too much.

I began training again in May 2008, and signed up for shorter distance races: sprint and olympic tris and a 1/2 marathon. Although I ended up deferring the NYC marathon to next year 2009, by October 2008 I had completed a sprint and 2 olympic tris, and a 1/2 marathon. So in 2008, I did complete my first tri! Just not a 1/2 Ironman. I am a 3-time marathoner and now triatlete but come May 2nd 2009, I will be a 1/2 Ironman finisher as well! Wildflower, here I come! I’m well on my way, I think, training-wise. I’ve been 80% on schedule for the first month of training, big improvement from this time last year.