Back at it

The last few weeks have not been very good for training.  I hurt my right ankle and have struggled to get back in action. 

My swim times have drastically gone down.  When I decided to do an Ironman, I wrote down goals on what pace I wanted to do the Ironman events.  My plan was to be able to run a 2:00 pace/hundred yards.  This week, I did a swim where I was around 1:35 average.  I guess I need to rethink that plan.

My ankle was causing me trouble on the bike.  I haven't been able to get a long ride in a few weeks.  I did the 24 mile loop that we will ride in May with Dennis Muilenburg, CEO of Boeing Defense, Space and Security.  It was a great ride with Buford Shipley, but we only averaged about 18mph.  I need to get it up to 20 mph before the ride, but I think I will get there.  I did a few trainer rides, but not have not completed a full training session on the bike because my ankle was causing my form to sacrifice and I started having pain in my leg.

I took 2 weeks away from running.  On Thursday, I finally decided to go to a chiropractor and get him to check my ankle out and he did something that made a huge difference.  I ran 1 mile that evening and felt great.  Today, I was finally able to go for a run and did a 10K time trial.  I didn't know what to expect since I have been out with the ankle, but I completed it with no pain at a 9:00/mile pace.  I haven't run at that pace since I was in the military.  I set my Garmin to not tell me how fast I was going, just how far I have gone.  I didn't want the fact that I was going faster than planned convince me to slow down, so I just listened to my body and ran.  I was proud of my time, but still have work to do to get to a marathon.

I look forward to a good training week. 

Blog Start

This is the first time that I have ever had a blog, but I wanted to start something so that everyone who is interested in following my progress towards my ironman can have the opportunity to see what I have been doing.

This weekend marked the 4th straight weeknd with a ride greater than 40 miles.  The ride this week was from my house in Madison to the house in Hazel Green that I grew up in.  It had pretty good rolling hills and my legs were killing me after I was done, but that had a little to do with my run on Friday.  I did 6 miles up and down the hills of Eastview.  As a warm up and cool down for the run, I did swims of 2700 yards and 1500 yards.

The training is going great so far and I look forward to sharing my training with everyone who is interested.  Please go check out my website where I am talking about what I am doing at

http://www.daaa.org/DAAA_ironman.html. 

I will focus on keeping this up to date on a weekly basis.

Eric