Bye 2009, Hello 2010, and Hogpen

Well, last year proved to be a good year and I'm very thankful for being able to do and train for everything. Fantastic 5k, CMM Half Marathon, 3 States 3 Mountains, Tour de Caves, Monster Tri (won age group again), Old Hickory Tri, Clarksville Century (first bike crash), Age Group National Championships, Augusta Half Ironman (5:11), Bourbon Chase, Jack and Back, and the Clarksville Half Marathon. In addition, I logged just over 5,700 miles of training (total of swim, bike, and run) during 2009, got over my fear of open water, got a new road bike, a new tri bike, race wheels, and really increased my overall fitness to prepare myself for 2010. A LOT of good luck and very HARD work went into 2009. Soooo......

It’s finally here… well, the training that is. Two weeks into my 34 week Ironman training plan. This week is actually the beginning of the third week. The focus this first 12 weeks is to continue spending a lot of time in the gym working out with Jasper (my athletic trainer) to build a very strong strength base. In addition, I’m doing about 3 workouts a week in each activity (swim, bike, and run) to maintain last year’s end-of-season base/fitness level. I’m really focusing every ounce of swim effort into perfecting, to the degree possible, my stroke. This currently yields about 12 workouts per week for a total of about 15 hours. Not too bad so far.

I’ve joined a race team at my local bike shop (Trace Bikes) and have also been meeting with a dietitian to nail my nutritional needs. Hopefully the race team will keep me quick on the bike and hold me accountable for hard workouts.

First Race of 2010: A few of us went down to Helen, GA this past weekend for what has been called one of the toughest road races in America (running). The race was a 10.5 mile run the side of a mountain to Hog Pen Gap. It included over 2,500 of climbing with about 1,500 of that in the last 5k. I used this as a mental race for Ironman to NOT stop running. My buddy Jeff used it to kick everyone’s ass that showed up that day. I finished around 1:45: Jeff finished right at 1:26, 11th overall, and 1st in his age group. Another guy with us, Ben, finished just over the 2 hour mark. This was an incredible accomplishment for all of us.

I intend to keep this updated weekly this year. Hopefully it’ll be another source to keep me motivated in the long workouts that are not that far off.