Gooooooooaaaaaaal(s)!!!!!

I've started this fancy blog in order to track my training for the generic Half Ironman triathlon I'm doing, (Note: It's not an official Ironman event, 'cuz you see "Ironman" is really just a brand name of triathlons, after putting the first long distance "Ironman" triathlon it is now its own organization with its own races and Timex watches and exercise equipment and stuff too. However, other organizations put on their own events that use the same distances as Ironman and Ironman 70.3 triathlons (or Half Ironman as it was once called--that's right, parentheses within parentheses, or as nerds call them: nested parentheses), they just don't use the name "Ironman." Got it?) but I've failed to do something very important: set goals. After all, Brother Stephen R. Covey has counseled us all to "sharpen our saws." Also, he said to "synergize."

The Goals

First, I will make a long-term weight loss goal; this will be the weight I want to reach by August 15--the day of the triathlon. Considering I have about 13 weeks left until the triathlon and I weigh about 226 right now and I should lose about two pounds a week, 200 pounds seems like a good goal.

However, since I don't ever want to suffer the indignity of racing as a "Clydesdale" again (and no, there is nothing braggable about winning the "Clydesdale" division--"so you waddled faster than all the other the fat people, congratulations fatty, here's your medal"), I think I should reach for 199 pounds instead. Although that's still fat, I need to be realistic and remember that weight loss is hard.

Shows like "The Biggest Loser" make it seem so easy to lose weight: leave your family, wear matching T-shirts, connive, conspire, cry, drink some water and voilá, drop 18 pounds a week. I've tried all of those before and found that drinking water offsets the weight loss benefits of crying and that conniving works up my appetite. So, I'll stick to a reasonable two pounds a week.

Before going into any race, one should always have a time in mind in which one would want to cross the finish line. If one doesn't have a goal time, one is prone to either drop out or walk one's fat self to the finish in last place. One might also be prone to skimp on one's training because "just finishing" the race might seem like an attractive idea when one doesn't want to roll one's fat self out of bed at 6:00 in the morning to go running.

Unfortunately, I've never done a triathlon this long before so I'm not sure exactly how slow I can plan on being that day. Relying on training times and past race times with some minutes tacked on to account for the difficulty of doing all three sports in succession I've to come to the following conclusions: I think I could finish the 1.2 mile swim in about 45 minutes, after which the 56 mile bike ride would take a little under three hours, followed by a 13.1 mile run of just over two hours resulting in a total time of about 5 hours 45 minutes. After looking at least year's results and seeing where the fat "Clydesdales" finished, this should be a reasonable, yet difficult-to-reach, goal.

The third type of goal I will set is the weekly weight loss goal. Friday will be the official weigh-in day for this goal, because for some reason (probably because it comes before the typical weekend of excess) I always weigh less on Friday. I'll put this goal at the end of the post.

Training Update

I didn't do as much of the training last week as I should have. I did do that one swim workout that I kept putting off at the beginning of the week. Unfortunately, it was the only swim workout of three that I ended up doing. I trained better last week than the week before and I have lost some weight--so, not a total loss.

Concerning p90x: I did two of the three lifting workouts. I skipped legs and back because I felt that sitting around was more important. I did chest and back this morning and I felt nauseated again, not as bad as last week, but nauseated nonetheless. I think it's the push-ups; having my head down and straining like that results in all of my food wanting to come out of my throat.

The scale says:

That it might be teasing me with inaccurate information; I only weighed 226.5 this morning and I was fully hydrated.

Weekly weight loss goal:

Last Friday I weighed 228.5 so my goal should be 226.5, but I already weighed 226.5 this morning. Better make it 225.5 for a little motivation.