No Ironmans this year! Mostly, I just don't want to spend the time to get ready for them. The past four years, it seemed my weeks would revolve around, "When can I get in a long bike ride and when can I get in a long run. (Not to mention, "When can I cut the grass" during the summer.)" It was nice to finish all of the Ironmans and Half-Ironmans that I have ever done, but I enjoy the shorter races just as much (if not more). And I could never really "race" an Ironman. I was simply trying to finish. (Of course, it would help if I got myself into better shape, but where would I find to time to train more than I did this past year?) Maybe I'll be Lance Armstrong/Brett Favre and sometime in the future I'll "get the itch" to come back and try another Ironman. But for now, I'm only doing sprints and Oly's.
All of the following races are part of the SWCS. Doing well in my age group for this series is important, but mainly I'm just happy to support the races and the race directors in the SWCS. I'm not planning on going someplace exotic to do a race this year. (Well, some people might consider Roswell exotic.)
Feb 13th - President's Day Du (WSMR)
Apr 11th - Raptor Du (Holloman AFB)
May 16th - Buffman & Squeaky (Lubbock)
Jun 5th - Milkman (Dexter)
Jun 19th - Chick Fil-A (Amarillo)
Jun 27th - TriRaider (Lubbock)
Jul 10th - Bottomless (Roswell)
Jul 24th - df Ranch (Sweetwater)
Jul 25th - Tumbleweed (Odessa)
Aug 14th - F-1 (Roswell)
Sep 18th - Cotton Country (Levelland)
Sep 26th - Elephant Man (Elephant Butte)
Oct 10th - Raptor (Holloman AFB)
Dec 11th - Polar Bear (WSMR)
A real neat schedule for a school teacher. Some early stuff to keep me motivated, a bunch of racing during June/July when I'm "off", and some racing in the Fall to keep me going.
Should be another great year!
muffinman
Saturday, January 2, 2010
2009 Goals Revisited
I was thinking about my 2009 goals today.
"So, what about 2009? OK, I've got three goals. I will "age up" to the M55-59 age group this year. I'm not going to blow away the competition there even if I can go as fast this year as I have in the past. However, while the "best" guys are quite a bit faster than me, the older age group is just a little slower overall. My first goal is to place in the top ten of my age group at the BSLT 70.3. In order to do this, I will almost certainly need to be faster than last year, but given "normal" weather conditions I ought to be able to do this. My second goal is to finish the Silverman in less time than it took this year. This might seem like a "soft" goal, but just finishing the Silverman is pretty challenging. If the weather there is better, and assuming that I do finish, I should be able to go under 15:30. My last goal is to run a sub 21:00 5K. This is not going to help me much when it comes to running 13.1/26.2 miles at BSLT/Silverman, but it's something I want to do. I used to run 3 miles in 21 minutes when I was a cadet at the USAF Academy, and that seemed pretty easy at the time. As recently as 1996 I could run 1.5 miles in less than 9 minutes. OK, I'm older now, but there are plenty of guys in my age group who can run 5K's even faster than 21 minutes. I'll work on this during the next few months. If I can do it I'll do it before the end of May. One way or the other, I won't worry about trying to do this after the end of May. After that, I'll be racing BSLT and ramping up for Silverman."
I managed to finish 9th in my age group at Buffalo Springs, and I was very happy with that result. I finished Silverman in 13:30:42. which was two hours faster than my 2008 Silverman. (It sure helps to have nice weather.) I never managed a 21-minute 5K run. The best I did was 21:38, two weeks after Silverman.
However, I have real hopes to get below 21 minutes this year. I won't be training for any Ironmans, so I'll have time to spend on running 5K's. The past few years, I was spending so much time doing 3-5 hour bike rides and 1-2 hour runs, there wasn't much time left for anything else.
2010, the year of the 5K run!
muffinman
"So, what about 2009? OK, I've got three goals. I will "age up" to the M55-59 age group this year. I'm not going to blow away the competition there even if I can go as fast this year as I have in the past. However, while the "best" guys are quite a bit faster than me, the older age group is just a little slower overall. My first goal is to place in the top ten of my age group at the BSLT 70.3. In order to do this, I will almost certainly need to be faster than last year, but given "normal" weather conditions I ought to be able to do this. My second goal is to finish the Silverman in less time than it took this year. This might seem like a "soft" goal, but just finishing the Silverman is pretty challenging. If the weather there is better, and assuming that I do finish, I should be able to go under 15:30. My last goal is to run a sub 21:00 5K. This is not going to help me much when it comes to running 13.1/26.2 miles at BSLT/Silverman, but it's something I want to do. I used to run 3 miles in 21 minutes when I was a cadet at the USAF Academy, and that seemed pretty easy at the time. As recently as 1996 I could run 1.5 miles in less than 9 minutes. OK, I'm older now, but there are plenty of guys in my age group who can run 5K's even faster than 21 minutes. I'll work on this during the next few months. If I can do it I'll do it before the end of May. One way or the other, I won't worry about trying to do this after the end of May. After that, I'll be racing BSLT and ramping up for Silverman."
I managed to finish 9th in my age group at Buffalo Springs, and I was very happy with that result. I finished Silverman in 13:30:42. which was two hours faster than my 2008 Silverman. (It sure helps to have nice weather.) I never managed a 21-minute 5K run. The best I did was 21:38, two weeks after Silverman.
However, I have real hopes to get below 21 minutes this year. I won't be training for any Ironmans, so I'll have time to spend on running 5K's. The past few years, I was spending so much time doing 3-5 hour bike rides and 1-2 hour runs, there wasn't much time left for anything else.
2010, the year of the 5K run!
muffinman
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