2012 Goals Pt 1: Getting here
Jan 30, 02:52 PM
Every year at work there’s a big staff meeting where the leadership gets everyone together and lays out the goals and objectives for the coming year. They go through the financial situation, forecasts, what we want to achieve, vision for upcoming programs and other very exciting stuff. So I decided that I’d go ahead and write up my goals for the coming year as well. I’ve heard it said often that one of the best ways to make sure you really go for a goal is to write it down and tell people. So that’s what this is. It’s an opportunity for me to share my goals for the coming year, how I hope to get there, longer term dreams, the current situations and challenges and other stuff that will hopefully give a better picture of where I’m going and how I hope to get there.
How got to where I am now:
For the past year, approximately, I’ve been working out pretty consistently. This is probably the most exercising I’ve done in my life on a consistent basis. I started 2011 running, or at least trying to run, outside in the cold. I wasn’t a fan of the cold but was very inspired to get outside thanks to my new GPS watch that I had just gotten. Starting out, my runs were short and fairly slow. I was pretty solidly in the 10min/mi pace to start with (with some 11min pace in there too) and it took until the middle of May before I was consistently running in the 9min/mi pace range. Over the summer I logged many miles and was pretty consistent in my distances: almost all in the 2-4mi range, and time: generally in the middle of the 9min/mi pace. The races I competed in, OU AIA Triathlon (May), Giant Eagle Triathlon (July) and The Great Buckeye Challenge (August), all were Sprint distance so the running would only entail a 5km run.
Similarly, my cycling consisted primarily of 10-30mi rides over fairly flat terrain with an average speed in the 16-17.5mph range. My rides were enjoyable, but not especially challenging. I was riding pretty frequently and enjoying the time outside. Toward the end of the season, though, I started getting bored riding the same routes all the time. Over the course of the season my avg speed increased incrementally starting out in the 16mph range and ending in the 17mph range. I had some faster times with races, but overall, things were pretty consistent.
Swimming was the biggest improvement for me. Starting out swimming 500yd intervals and pushing myself to do 1000yd workouts, I started taking the swim class and my weekly yards increased massively. It soon was common to be pushing 1800-2100yds per workout. This showed in my racing as well, though my times were never exceptionally fast.
The biggest change happened after my last race of the season. I took about a month off from working out completely. I didn’t swim, run or bike at all. It was a nice change of pace after spending so much time over the summer exercising. The first workout I did was an easy 2mi jog near work. I turned off the pace notifications on my watch that normally help me stay within a specific speed and just went out to see how I felt. I tried to take it easy and not worry about speed or anything. When I got home I was shocked to see that I had just run the fastest pace I had ever run! It was my first sub 9min/mi pace! That awakened part of me to the possibility that I could run faster than I had been. I started running with a determination that I hadn’t had before and started pushing myself to be faster and better. I also started pushing my distance out to the point where I completed a 10.5mi run with a 9:14 pace!
By the middle of November, I was excited about the upcoming year and ready to face whatever challenges were coming. I knew I could go farther, faster and better than I did the year before. Then I found out that I had shin splints. It was like a brick hitting me on the head. My progress stopped immediately. I took 2 weeks off running to try to get rid of the pain but it was still there. I got new shoes, but it didn’t help. Finally, just after the new year, I went to a Dr and got an MRI done on it. The muscles were fine, it was mainly just muscle soreness. I also found that when I started riding my bike on the bike trainer, the pain went away.
So at the end of 2011, I was cautiously trying to figure out what the upcoming year would look like and wondering what would happen with my leg. I was hoping the pain would subside but it was still a wait-and-see game at that point.
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