Out With the Old, In With the New

My New Balance 890v2's have reached their limit. The funny thing is my new pair of shoes are the exact same shoes, just a difference color. I try to change out my running shoes every 400-500 miles. I track all my miles on all of my shoes and have done this ever since I started running. It's kind of a balancing act, really. Because, I try to also run my marathons in a pair of shoes with about 75-100 miles. I did a bulk of my training in the grey New Balance shoes. The new pair of shoes are solid red which match my outfit for the Lakefront Marathon perfectly.

Since the last post was primarily what's to come over the next year, I actually am still racing under my 2012 training plan. Which actually makes sense since it still is 2012. My big race of the year is the Lakefront Marathon on October 7th in Milwaukee. It will actually be my first marathon since the Boston Marathon in April of 2011. I qualified for the Boston Marathon with a time slightly over 3:03 and then ran the race with a time of 3:17. Now, I'm not going to turn this into a race report for a race that was about a year and a half ago, but I was definitely disappointed in that race. I understand completely the accomplishment of running the Boston Marathon, don't get me wrong. Honestly, it was probably my fault for setting such an aggressive goal for a race which required such long travel and difference terrain then Wisconsin. I had the goal of running a sub 3 hour marathon. I think the hills and the fact that majority of my training was done in the dead of winter in Wisconsin held me back from my goal. I have definitely gotten over the fact I didn't reach my goal and and just grateful for the chance to run in one of the most prestigious racing in the world. Anyway, the entire reason for that story is to explain the reason for the sub 3 goal. Also, the fact that this will be the first marathon since April of 2011. My training this summer has gone great! I have done 4, 20 mile runs among many other long runs. I also completed several other track workouts with specific time goals. Everything has gone as planned. Recently however, I have developed a pain in my left medial ankle, just above my malleolus (the "ankle bone"). So, that is starting to worry me. It has held me back on a few of me runs already. It seems if I can ice it regularly and stretch and wrap it up with a compression wrap I can get through my runs pain free. My last long run was this past Tuesday morning. Interestingly enough I ran it after a night of work, after a day of work. See, my job and the fact that I work third shift occasionally requires me to work third shift after a full day of training. We refer to this as doubling back. For instance I will be given off a Sunday night to train 8-4pm on Monday and then come back to work 10-6am on Monday night. So I then ran 21.2 miles in 2:38 after a total of 3 hours of sleep in a 40 hour period. The joys of the job are the fact that I had to go right right back to work from 2-6pm for CPR recertification. Oh yeah....

From here on out its time to taper and really cut back and hopefully recover from what ever is going on in my ankle. So until next time, thanks for reading and following!

The Beginning of the Journey

They say the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.  I officially took my first step yesterday and this blog will be along for that journey.  I was down in Madison on Sept 10th for a large chunk of the day to register for the 2013 Ironman Wisconsin.  For those of you who are not aware of what an Ironman is allow me to explain.  An Ironman triathlon is an ultra-distance triathlon consisting of a 2.4 mile swim, followed by a 112 mile bike, and finished with a 26.2 mile run.  It is one of the longest events of its type.  There are only 31 Ironman races throughout the world in a year and only 16 in the USA.  The elite male triathletes complete this distance in about 8:30 and females in about 9:30.  The course is open for a total of 16 hours which still leaves many people on the course trying to officially finish.  Many people remain on the course to finish the distance even though they do not "officially" finish.  In short an Ironman Triathlon is the Superbowl of triathlons.  Some have it on their bucket-list to just finish one, others race them for a Kona Slot (the Ironman World Championships are in Kona, HI in October), and the elites compete as career triathletes.

I am using this blog to document my journey.  I want to do this for a few reasons.  First, to share what it is I am exactly going through on a weekly basis as I train for this event.  Secondly, I think doing this will serve as a source to keep me motivated during the long dog days of summer.  Also, I really don't know when I will do another one, if ever, so I figure I will be able to look back at this to remind me of everything I went through just to push myself through 140.6 total miles to simply cross a finish line.

So, as I stated earlier, I was down in Madison yesterday to register for the 2013 race.  The way registration works for this and all events is, they open registration the day after the race on site at 9:00 am and allow all those in line to register first before opening registration up online.  If you choose to volunteer for any aspect of the race you are given priority for registration over general registrants.  To take advantage of this, I volunteered on Thursday the 6th.  I assisted with athlete registration.  So on Monday, I woke up early and packed the Jeep and got the girls up and ready and we were on the road by 6:15 am for Madison.  We got in line at 8:25 am and the line was about a half mile long.  I was a little nervous due to the fact that I had a 14 month old and a 2 year old with me.  Luckily they were AWESOME, perfect, actually.  We got into the registration room at about 11:15 am, nearly 3 hours later! After a minor scare of my credit card being denied, we got things figured out and eventually got registered.  Turns out the guy that registering athletes entered my cards expiration date incorrectly a couple times and my Capital One locked my card.  Luckily, I was able to use my debit card, whew.  

As of today, there are 361 days until race day....seems like forever away to be honest, but I know it will be here before I know it.  Until then, I have a few things going on in my life.  On October 7th, I'll be running the Lakefront Marathon in Milwaukee.  I have been training pretty hard for this race, as kind of a redemption race from the 2011 Boston Marathon.  I'm shooting for a sub 3:00 finish.  I'll be ecstatic even with a 2:59:59 finish.  After that race I plan on taking some time off to recover and recharge mentally for whats to come in 2013.  I have put together a training plan that will hopefully get me ready for the Ironman.  I officially begin "training" for it on December 11th.  Below is a graph of total weekly training minutes for my training plan.

For those of you who don't know me or my story, here is a short background on me and my life.  I am 28 years old and married to the best wife imaginable.  My wife is Sarah and we have been together since she asked me to the Homecoming dance our freshmen year of high school.  We have now been married for 5 years.  She has been the most supportive and accepting - for the most part :) - then again, she did let me register to do the Ironman next year... haha.  We have 2 of the cutest girls I know.  Maya is our oldest and is going to be 3 in October.  Delaney is just about 15 months and is a little devil.  She is never content sitting still and is always exploring.  We have a dog and 2 cats.  So as you can tell we have a full house.  I work for a local Sheriff's Office as a Patrol Deputy.  I have been working 3rd shift now for almost 2 years which definitely makes training all that much more interesting.  I have done 6 marathons, including the 2011 Boston Marathon and numerous other shorter road races.  I have completed 3 half Iron distance races and again, numerous shorter distance races.  I would consider myself to be a pretty competitive triathlete/runner.  I am always trying to place within my age group.    My plan is to update this blog with a new post at least once every week or two, so thanks for reading and I hope you continue to read and follow!