I was having a morning where I was feeling really critical of my training method. It wasn’t so much an objective evaluation of my progress, but I was fretting because I haven’t been following an official training plan, and haven’t been doing an organized ramp up of my training. I’ve increased the miles I’m running, but it’s been inconsistent, dependent more upon the events of the week than my training needs. My biking is all over the place – I’m not worried about the biking portion of this triathlon, so I bike when I can, and don’t worry about it when I can’t. This means that my biking miles vary between 7 miles/week (a serious low point) and 166 miles the week we did Cape in a Day. I’m averaging something like 18 miles/week which is too low for me to consider it training. It’s not even maintenance level. Swimming has also been inconsistent. I try to get in a swim each week, and I swam a ton when we were on vacation, but I haven’t been organized or focused.

So this morning I was thinking about this inconsistency and lack of structure, and I began to be hypercritical of myself. After all, I was supposed to take this seriously. I was supposed to experience what it feels like to push myself physically. If I had only created a plan and stuck to it, I’d be much further ahead in my training. I’d perform better on September 12, I’d be in better shape now, yadda yadda. We all know this emotional drill, don’t we?

I was telling Dusty all about these thoughts while we ran together this morning. While we did a 4.5 mile run that, a few weeks ago, we did as a run/walk, with far more walking than running. He tried every possible argument to get me to get over myself. He pointed out that I’m 44 and started getting in shape at 40, and therefore need to go slowly and expect it to take time to whip myself into racing shape. He reminded me that I don’t want to have a catastrophic accident or a heart attack, both of which are possibilities if I push myself too hard. He pointed out that I’m doing great and am in the best shape of my life. He argued that most women my age are not picking up triathlon training as a new hobby, and I should feel proud of myself. None of this was working particularly well. Then he reminded me that one year ago, he and I did a three day bike ride from Boston to New Paltz, NY. The longest day was a hair under a century, and it nearly killed me. I had a great time on the ride, but it was well out of my comfort zone, and I walked all the tough hills. Since then I’ve done the ALC (7 days/560 miles) and Cape in a Day (140 miles in a day, and a stupidly hot day at that), and I’m physically ready enough for my tri that I know I’m going to finish it. If we did the New Paltz ride again, we’d do it in two days instead of three, and I wouldn’t blink at the hills we had to climb. That discussion was what I needed. Comparing where I was one year ago, and where I am now is such a good benchmark. I didn’t do much training at all during the intervening winter, and I am still in substantially better shape now than I was then. This winter I have every intention of continuing to run, and will be looking for swimming opportunities. I will make a realistic plan so I don’t lose too much ground during hibernation, and I’ll come out next spring with goals in mind, and the knowledge that I can reach them. I don’t know if I’ll make the same huge leap forward in the next year that I made this one, but I know I’m still moving forward. Hell, I’m still moving my goal post. I haven’t found my end goal yet (if there is such a thing).

Also, I may not be very organized, but I have definitely made running progress. When I got back from the ALC and started training, my “regular” run (which I did not do regularly) was slightly under 3 miles, and I found it hard. My summer regular run is not quite 4 miles, and much hillier than the old one. I think it’s time to make this morning’s run my new “regular” run, and turn the old one into my easy day. Six months ago, I ran sometimes because it’s a good way to stay in shape, but I didn’t like it and wasn’t very good at it. If you had told me then that I would be going into the fall intending to run 18 miles/week every week, I wouldn’t have believed I could get there.