Following Kona I decided I need a proper break and after an initial surge of blogging I ground to a hault. The break from training extended to a break from blogging about Triathlon. I have spent over two months doing mainly swimming and virtually no biking. In looking back at my data for the year I noticed that I’ve now completed as many Ironman races post my foot surgery as I have pre. The thing is there’s only been two years of Ironman racing post compared to four and a quarter years pre. It hit home … I think I was pretty darn drained and that explained my almost complete lack of motivation to get out on the bike with only slightly more motivation to run.

As I write this I have a week before heading out to Lanzarote for 4 weeks solid training … I need to get at least some based fitness as the first week sees me training with friends so I won’t be able to just go at my own pace.

So what of the year ? It’s been one of the most life changing years of my life. My whole life view has been changed … no my view of life in the present as thats probably been re-inforced. My view of the future is at complete odds. It’s funny when you look at investments you get warned that past performance is no indication of future performance and yet we all just assume our world will continue for the next twenty years on the same trajectory as the last twenty years. I have spent an awful lot of time thinking, reading, searching… desperately hoping to find some convincing argument against the view that much of what we take for granted will collapse. I have planned more changes in my life for next year and I will continue to race. I will try and qualify for Kona in 2013 and will keep my fingers crossed it will still be realistic to travel to the other side of the world when the time comes.

I will continue to blog on this next  year.

So what of this year with regard to Triathlon ? It was the year of the 100 hour cap and I stuck to it throughout the year. Did it work ? It didn’t work for me but I can’t critique the advice. The cap was meant to allow me to change my training but I feel that without a coach telling me what to do I didn’t make the most of it. Also my mind just wasn’t on training for most of the year.

As for my racing it has been great fun. Challenge Wanaka kicked it off with a win which effectively made my year a success goals wise within the first two weeks. I truly hope I get back to race there again.  Ironman New Zealand was an experience, so close to the earthquake and such terrible conditions. The closest I’ve ever come to dropping out ever … even closer than on the Queen K.

Back to the UK and Wimbleball must rank as one of the most enjoyable runs I’ve ever had in a race. Getting faster each lap and (unsuccessfully) chasing down a friend put a permanent grin on my face. This was followed with a road trip to Austria with a buddy – fully recommend it. Klagenfurt was a nice place to hang out, shame the level of cheating during the race. Still enjoyed it and very pleased with my run time. It felt like a breakthrough. Ironman Wales was an awesome race which I will return to this year. With hindsight though it was clearly a Kona slot gone begging. I’ll miss Kona this year but given all my thoughts about the World I feel happier not going next year. This feeling made for a relaxed Kona experience – it was great fun hanging out and making new friends. The race itself was something else – awesome fun swim and then downhill to one hell of an experience returning on the Queen K … I wouldn’t change it for the year.

Some of the highlights of the year were Camps. The absolute highlight was our first EverydayTraining Camp I’m so looking forward to the second edition in a couple of months. My Final Epic camp was awesome – superb riding, I just need to figure out how to ride like I do on Epic Camp in a race !

The picture shows my training volume each year I’ve been keeping a diary. It’s the first year I’m under 1,000 hours.  There’s been fleeting moments of the pleasure of training I used to feel. It’s this I want to re-capture. For any hope of PBing next year (I have two chances – Roth and Busso) I need to re-find that enjoyment in training. I have goals – race a PB and qualify for Kona 2013 – but thats not what will get me out of bed to train the only thing thats consistently done that has been the pleasure of training and chasing stats !! To this end I will be posting an Eddington Number review shortly.

2012 is going to be an interesting year. My hope is to get a balance in my training and the rest of my life which will allow me to race strong.