The Road to the Ironman – Rested, focused, so let the fun begin!

A story came out of my trip to Cancun, that continues to reminds me how unique my journey is and how puzzling people sometimes find it.

My vacation wasn’t all about napping and eating, believe it or not I did exercise finding the pool a wonderful morning workout. No lane lines, unsure of the distance of the pool (somewhere between 25 yards and 25 meters) and plenty of wide open spaces just to do lap after lap. I swam three mornings with each time being about an hour. The last swim was a bit later than the other two so by the time I was finished a pretty decent crowd was forming on the pool chairs for a day in the Cancun sunshine. As I exited the pool a person mentioned that I was a pretty good swimmer. I kind of laughed, said thanks, but I mentioned I wasn’t a very good swimmer compared to an actual swimmer. As usual I confused a person with one of my less than witty responses. I explained that I was a triathlete and most triathletes are usually average swimmers because we generally come from a running or biking background.

The person mentioned that she was unaware what a triathlete was, so I proceeded to tell about the sport but again she looked at me like I was growing a 3rd eye ball. I mentioned I was training for an Ironman and her response was she thought I was in the Ironman movies (not your brightest bulb or maybe it was she was from the UK and didn’t understand my American?) So again I tried to describe the Ironman to her, telling her that the fastest woman on the planet actually comes from Great Britain but that didn’t help. Well I tried my best, I thanked her once more for the nice compliments on my swimming and went on my way.

I went into this vacation a little burned out, I hoped to regain some of my focus, to relax and really think about why I have this desire to be an Ironman. Coming out of this vacation that swimming experience helped in many ways. I am a Triathlete because I can be a Triathlete. Listen I am not saying I am a very good Triathlete, but there is very little more in life that I enjoy knowing I found something that gives me such joy.  Being an Ironman means so much to me. I choose in life to push myself past the barriers, to see how far I can take this and right now that is me completing an Ironman. Now I am approaching the biggest challenge I know I have ever faced in the training that stands before me in the coming four months.

My journey has been unexpected but that is the best part of the whole experience. I never knew when I started out wanting to lose weight that decision placed me on a totally different path. This lifestyle is awesome and it works for me.

In Cancun I ate like a pig and took plenty of naps, just the break I needed. Now it is time to get down to business.

September 12, 2010 just 115 days away.

Running totals:

Running miles treadmill: 206.10

Running hours treadmill: 31:15

Running miles outside: 148.40

Running hours outside: 23:42

Biking miles: 728.40

Biking hours: 38:10

Spinning hours: 7:00

Swimming laps (25 yard pool) : 2,902 lengths or 1,451 laps

Swimming distance: 75,550 yards or 42.9 miles

Swimming hours: 15:30

Weight lifting hours: 20:00

Stair Master miles: 85.77

Stair Master hours: 10:30

Stairs in Cancun 1:05

1 pathetic game of volleyball: 1 hour

TOTAL HOURS – 153 hours and 00 minutes