2011 in Review

Another great year of training and racing has come and gone, and 2011 was pretty special.  First, let's take a quick check on December:

Swim: 5 swims, 12,100 yards
Bike: 3 rides, 43 miles
Run: 13 runs, 90.76 miles
Strength: 4 workouts
Yoga: 1 class

Can you tell I'm not loving the bike over the winter?  Marathon training is still in full effect with over 90 miles running, and the Charleston Marathon is in 12 days.  My only race in December was a single 5k that gave me a nice PR.  The swimming was pretty consistent, but I really wanted to see two swims a week over the winter.  The biggest gain has to be a return to regular strength training and yoga.  After completely abandoning the practice during Ironman training it feels so good to start getting strong again.  I know next years speed gains aren't going to come from form improvements, as my form in all three sports is pretty solid.  So it's time to start working on some strength gains.

Overall numbers for 2011:

Swim: 62 swims, 143,585 yards, 81.58 miles
Bike: 130 rides, 3135.5 miles
Run: 173 runs, 1100.01 miles, average 6.4 miles
Strength: 29 workouts
Yoga: 23 workouts

There's a concept put on by a local triathlon store called the Cast Iron Club that looks really cool.  If I was going to do another Ironman in 2012 I would probably sign up for it.  The theory is that you train and race (and log your miles) for the equivalent of 30 Ironmans in a single calendar year.  This turns out to be 72 miles of swimming, 3360 miles of biking, and 786 miles of running.  I didn't sign up for 2011 because that sounded like way to much work.  But turns out I only missed it by about 200 miles of cycling that easily could have been accomplished in December.  This is pretty nuts.  Swimming 81 miles? Biking over 3000?  Those are unheard of numbers. 

Recently I've seen a picture floating around facebook that says "140.6.... Don't ever question my commitment".  Seeing numbers like that and knowing that I did finish my first Ironman makes me truly appreciate the type of commitment I made to my health this year.  That's insane.

Friday I ran 9.56 miles over lunch to wrap the annual total to 1100.01, just to mess with anyone who has OCD and thinks I should have capped it at an even 1100.  This includes my wife and father-in-law.  The nerd in me now thinks I should have thrown the extra few feet in there to stretch it to 4 decimal places and look at the binary conversion. 

As it stands, 00110001 in binary = 49, and I had 173 runs which is 10101101.  If you add those binaries together you get 10011100, which is 156 numeric.  So 49 + 173 = 156.  4 + 9 + 1 + 7 + 3 = 24 and 2 + 4 = 6.  If you add the numeric 49 + 173, you get 222, and 2 + 2 + 2 also = 6.  Which has to lead you to the ultimate conclusion that I am really a gigantic nerd.  But I'm sure you already knew that.

At the beginning of the year I outlined my 2011 goals.  How did I do?

1.  Ironman on November 5th at IMFL = Success!  I did indeed turn Iron at IMFL, finishing in 13:06.  It was a glorious trip.

2. Single digit body fat % and maintaining a healthy weight throughout the year.  = partial success.  I did get the BF% down to about 16%, which is very good.  So the problem was in the goal there.  I never should have shot for single digit.  The real goal was 11% anyway.  I did, however, complete my weight loss target by the time Ironman training started and hit my ideal racing weight for the big day, getting down to 165 lbs just before the race. 

3. Age group placement in something - Fail.  I never did any better than 4th in anything.  So close!  Next year.  I even finished 13th overall at one race, a 5k in April and was still 5th in my age group (I think).

4. Time goals:

• 5k under 22 minutes:  Success!
• 10k uner 50 minutes: Success!
• 5 mile under 40:  Success! no races, but plenty of training runs in 36:xx.
• 13.1 under 1:55: Success! I actually ran 7 halfs under 1:55 in 2011.
• 26.2 under 4:00: Fail, but the only marathon I ran was in the Ironman at 4:25, which was still a PR
• Century Ride under 6 hours: fail, the one century ride was just over 6 hours and unofficially timed.

5. Have a garden:  Partial success here.  I had a garden, it was small, and nothing actually grew there.

6. Live in a way that makes others proud:  Success!  I completed a heavy workload for Ironman training without abandoning family or friends, became much closer with some local friends.  I changed jobs, started working from home again, and was truly able to put my family first. 

Here's some highlights in pictures from the year. 

The year I turned Iron has turned out to be pretty incredible.  I can't wait to see what 2012 has in store!