ironman training..

well,I've decided to officially start my training for the Ironman. Officially I will be competing in a Full Rev 3 event at Cedar Point next September (2013). I know there I'd some debate if I can call myself an Ironman after hopefully it and I don't really care. If the distance is the same then I'm okay with calling myself an ironman..

I have a long road ahead of me though.. And for some reason, I haven't really started training yet, which scares me a bit. But I can't find the motivation yet. I'm not sure if it is just the fact that it is next year or what my issue is. When I trained for the half ironman 2 years ago, I started running mid December and had the half ironman the following August. But I was worse off with my running back then. I actually thought I had horrible shin splints for the last 10 years, so I went to the doctor who suggested physical therapy. And after spending many hours and many dollars on physical therapy (and shoe inserts), I realized that it wasn't helping. I almost gave up that dream. But some of my runner friends suggested that go to an actual running shoe store to have my shoes properly fit. So as a last resort, I tried that. I went to New Balance and they suggested some specific shoes and they fit! So the race was back on! And really, that was my first year really biking long distances. 20 miles seemed like a lot back then! And I was horrible at swimming. Again, endurance swimming was very new to me and it had been forever since I actually went swimming. That first year, I hired a swimming coach just to help me get the basics. Before the coach, I was just going too quickly. I wasn't gliding... I was going too hard and my heart was racing while just doing 1 lap.

So from that first half ironman, I really started off badly at all three elements. So maybe that is why I'm not going crazy yet. I have never biked 100 miles, but I did manage 60 a couple of months ago, without much training. I don't think I could've run a full marathon after that, but I could probably have struggled through 5 miles.. well.. at least 3. So I'm already in better shape starting off. I swam a 1/3^rd a couple of months ago as well. But I know that there is a huge difference between the 1/2 ironman and a full one (well I'm assuming). It took me 7.5 hours to complete the half and I'd assume that I'm looking at 16 or 16.5 hours for the full ironman. (cutoff is 17!)

I have been running once in the last 2 months before I started back up yesterday. So my 2 mile run was quite painful. I had to stop for just a bit as well. So I went again today and did another 2 miles. It is amazing how tired my legs were after only the short 2 mile run. I was planning on running another 2 or 2.5 miles today but work was crazy. So I need to run at least 2.5 miles tomorrow (Friday) since I have a 5k planned for Sunday. It's the Hot Chocolate 5k in Columbus. Now that's the motivation that i need! Ha..

One of my problems is that I have too many hobbies and interests. I'm still trying to do a lot of photography, to get better at it. I'd like to enter some competitions this coming year, just to get critiqued. And I'd also like to take some glass classes, but I might have to put this off some more. I can only do so much!

Well, I'll try to keep this more updated with Ironman training. It should be an interesting year!