Before we get to far into 2011, I think it important to review the year that was 2010. The year started off with a solid showing at the Winterfest Frozen Goose 5K, where I finished 3rd overall. It was the first race where my parents and sister came out to cheer me on. What an amazing feeling that is! Then came my first and only loss of the year. The Shamrock Shuffle. This race has become my achilles heal. Dispite leading early and for the majority of the race, I ended up losing to BiggTree for a second year in a row. An early tactical decision backfired resulting in too much energy being expended early on. I simply faded at the end. Overall it was a good race and I beat my previous years time by several minutes.
Things quickly changed a month later. I whooped BiggTree at the Eau Claire 1/2 marathon (my first 1/2 ever). I was really proud of this race. It simply felt great. I finished with a time of 1:42:44.
Following the EC half my attention turned to triathlon. Specifically Trinona. I knew BiggTree would be lookin to extract some revenge. Unfortunately I think the bike portion of this race really sealed BiggTrees fate. He was close to me out of the water. And I think the bike I own just gave me the advantage. I'm not sure but after the bike he might have phoned in a part of the run. I really wasn't happy with my overall time but I think my expectations might have been a little high. It didn't stop me from doing it all over again a week later at Rochesterfest Triathlon. This time around I did much better. Far exceeding what I thought I could do at the swim. Somewhere on the run I even caught up and passed my team lead. Always nice to whoop yer boss!
Attention then shifted back marathoning. The target race: Whistlestop in Ashland, WI. Two things ended up changing those plans however. First, even though Trinona and Rochesterfest weren't "A" races I allowed them to take on that mentality. Quite simply, Sprint distance triathlon is just more fun then running the countless miles dictated by most marathon training schedules. As a result I fell behind. One long run resulted in me inducing a case of heat stress/stroke. Then I ended up injuring myself trying to make it up on a long run I wasn't prepared for. The end result was I ran the Whistlestop 1/2 marathon instead. I wasn't as fast at Whistlestop as I was for Eau Claire. I finished with a time of 1:49:17. It was however, the third race in a row where I trounced BiggTree.
So that was my year. Looking back at it I'm happiernow than the day any of those events occurred. But that is just my personality. I'm never satisfied with performances on race day. The biggest thing I think I learned last year, is you need consistency in training. You can't be on one week and falter the next. You have to string weeks of good training together to accomplish some of these goals. Another thing I learned is you need to properly warm-up before a race. I didn't do that at Trinona and my swim times paid for it in a most horrific way. So this year, consistency and preparation will be focused on!
