Bookends

Foreword
2008 was my year of accidents. 2009 was my year of recovery. 2010 my year of letting nothing stop me! Last October I participated in an all woman sprint in San Diego. The race was my first race after my accident; my goal was to do a race within a year of getting hurt. This race seemed to be the perfect one, and it was. This race was my kick-start to the upcoming year. The year is not over, but as we head into fall and I look back at my year I have to say I am very happy. All of my goals were met and some new challenges & highlights were added along the way.

Chapters

• Hiking the Inca Trail and arriving at Machu Picchu on New Year’s Day
• Dessert Tri – Olympic
• CA 70.3 - Half-Ironman
• Wildflower Long Course – Half-Ironman, Paul & I raised over $8,000 for the LLS
• Became a Team Odwalla Athlete!
• Ironman Coeur d’Alene
• Christmas in July 5K, Leukemia & Lymphoma Society Fundraiser
• Vineman Aquabike – Half Iron swim & bike, NO run, best race format ever!
• US Women’s Triathlon – Sprint

See previous blog posts for the full chapters above.

Afterword
On the 17^th, a year later, Paul & I headed to San Diego to do the same Sprint Tri as the previous October! Once again I had the best fan ever in Paul. As much as I love racing with him, he is the best race day wingman ever. Calm, supportive, enthusiastic and willing to do all the driving! My friend Trisha raced too, just like last year. With all the racing I had done this year I had high hopes of coming to this race and kicking some butt! Unfortunately IM training burnout and 5 business trips kind of derailed this plan. So the new plan…don’t train AT ALL, have confidence that I can finish, smile and HAVE FUN! Mission accomplished. Maybe not the athletic highlight of my career, I was 30 seconds slower than last year, but I enjoyed every minute, encouraged other ladies along the way, pushed myself and was able to close the book on my year adventure.

From here on out there will be; no more mention of my accidents-old news these days, some non-sporty activities-cocktail Sundays by tiki-mixologist Paul!, new adventures-Cyclocross anyone?, and fun-the Solvang Prelude Wine Ride! My hope is to keep posting along the way. Many thanks to all of you for joining this journey.

Due to technical difficulties there are no photos in this post.