First off, apologies for not being a better blogger! When all the training started to take so much time, and the weather warmed up, I found lots of excuses to be outside instead of blogging. :)
But what a great season it was! Thanks to all of your help, I met my fundraising goals and had a wonderful time training for Steelhead 2011. It was very hard but I always felt that the mission behind all the miles were worth it! I was on an amazing team with so many great people. Many were first time triathletes and it was great to see them accomplish their goals and overcome their fears!
It was very exciting to arrive in Michigan and check into the race:
Here is the Steelhead TNT team after our practice swim the day before the race:
Only glitch? Those nice gentle waves and beautiful calm water were soon overtaken by this (5 minutes after we finished our swim):
Which turned into this:
So, no swim for Steelhead 2011. :( They changed it to a duathlon (bike then run) and we waited about 90 minutes to start the waves 2 people at a time. Pretty weird! It was nice to chat with all the fun people I was racked with but a huge bummer as I usually get a big boost from the swim. The rest of the race went awesome and I was very happy with my bike and run! Here's a pic of my buddy Ron and I (we ran most of the 13.1 together):
After the swim was cancelled, I sure was glad I had done the full 70.3 earlier in the year at Muncie IM and at Steelhead in 2009.
But there is always next year! I'm already signed up for the Elkhart Lake TNT 2012 team and Muncie 70.3 Ironman 2012 a month later. It was too disappointing to train for Steelhead and have the swim cancelled, especially as it has been cancelled 2/4 years, so I'm not going back next year.
Hopefully next season I'll be a better blogger! But until then, here's the 2011 recap:
1) Two 70.3 Ironmans (Muncie and Steelhead)
2) One Olympic triathlon (Elkhart Lake)
3) Six sprint triathlons (Carmel, Eagle Creek 1/2/3, Morse, Go Girl)
4) MY FIRST MARATHON! (Fox Valley)
5) Four 1/2 marathons (Mini, Geist, Monumental, Miami Beach [coming up in December])
6) Plus other road races (Back on My Feet marathon relay, Run Like Hell 5K, Living History Farms Trail Race...)
For a grand total of....~355 miles raced in 2011! By far my biggest year ever!
Oh, plus adopting a new dog, going to the dog agility nationals, tons of travel for work and lots of career milestones.... But I'm not planning on slowing down in 2012, especially when it comes to continue fundraising to support the mission of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society!
Here's to Elkhart Lake TNT Team 2012! GO TEAM!!!
THANK YOU for all your support and kind words. I could never do this without my friends and family (especially my awesome husband, Allen!).
Hugs,
Sam
