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Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Month-Long Iron Man DONE!

I finished last night with a 6.2 mile bike ride and a .58 mile (or 20 lap) swim.  Woo hoo!  Grand total 26.2 miles running, 112 miles biking, and 2.4 miles swimming in 29 days.  Now I am anxiously awaiting my commemorative t-shirt.  Pics to follow as soon as I get it.

Things I learned from this challenge:


  1. It was much harder than I expected.  Not so much the physical effort, but the time commitment.  I have been running 3 days a week for quite a while, but this required me to get out there almost every day in July to either run, bike, or swim.  Some days I had to do 2 activities.
  2. I am fearfully and wonderfully made.  I accomplished all this, while at the same time still running even after finishing the 26.2 miles so I can train for my first Half, and while running my first obstacle course early in the month (didn't count those miles towards my 26.2 either).
  3. Planning ahead was key.  If I had not taken the time early on to figure out how to break down the activities & miles into reasonable chunks, there's no way I could've crammed it all in at the end & finished.
  4. The cross-training of biking and swimming really seems to have improved my running also.  I am going to continue to cross-train one day per week.
  5. Yoga every day.  Every day.  Stretching, twisting, relaxing - it's key when you are training this much to also maintain that flexibility and balance.  Plus it just plain feels good after a hard workout. 
  6. Something I still need to do is evaluate how many calories I am burning, and plan ahead for meals & snacks.  I didn't do a good job of that this month and many days just inhaled whatever I could find in the cabinets in the evenings, and often still went to bed hungry.  Especially as I continue making longer runs in the Pew to Half training, I really need to make sure I'm fueling up well but not overdoing it.
  7. I had fun!  Even on the days that at first it felt like a chore, once I got out there I always found by at least halfway through that I was enjoying myself.  That's always good to remember, on days when motivation seems to be lacking.

2 comments:

  1. I am in total awe. Not that I didn't think you could do it, just that it takes such commitment. Very smart that you calculated early on!

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