2013 Race Plans

I believe I started writing this post on January 1st. I mean, what better day to start planning my 2013 than on New Year's Day!?!?

We'll start with the very little of that blog post that I started......

Guess what I did yesterday??? I made a training calendar to get myself back on the wagon! The other night I started looking at races to put on my calendar for this year. What I'm listing now is what I've made so far, but I hope to add a few more. Problem is, racing is not cheap. And, distance racing is even more expensive! It'd be one thing if I wanted to do a bunch of 5k's, but no, I like to do 10k's and above.

So, here is the list of races I have on my wish list thus far:

Twinsburg Indoor Triathlon - February 17th
Towpath Half Marathon - April 7th
Cleveland 10 miler - April 27th
Cleveland Half Marathon - May 19th
The West Branch Battle Sprint Tri - June 9th
Towpath 10-10 - June 16th
Vermillion Oly Tri - August 17th or 18th (need to confirm date)
Towpath Marathon (Full, Half or 10k) - October 7th

And now, here we are on January 23rd and things have totally changed. No need to rehash old news, but if you don't know what's happening and want to - you can read about it here and here.

So things have changed. I actually have no idea what I'm going to be able to do this year and I HATE that. If you know me personally you know that I'm a planner. I'm guessing that even if you only "know" me through this blog, you've probably come to realize I'm a planner. It's not something I hide and actually I take pride in my ability to plan things.

However, what I don't take pride in is the way I react when I can't plan (i.e. control) things.  It gets ugly people. And here we are....

Crohn's Disease sucks and it fought me almost all of 2012. Most people weren't aware and I guess you can say I was winning. I mean, even through a flare that was seemingly lasting the entire year, I was able to power through and complete almost all my fitness goals. In some ways, finishing my first 26.2 in 2012 means more to me now than it even did on October 21st. I didn't realize quite how sick I was from this disease until about December 29th...and even then I didn't have a clue. But, I digress (as usual).

So happy...

But, for now, Crohn's Disease has taken over. I will not say it has won, because it hasn't. But, for now it has taken the lead. I can't do things I was once doing (like, say, walk up the stairs without getting winded) and I can blame it completely on Crohn's Disease. Clearly I've been struggling with this. I'm trying my best to deal with the fact that after being in the hospital for 1 week and home for 2, I'm still only slightly better. Today is a good day and I'm focusing on that.

A happy, tired Oly Tri finisher....I will be this again soon...

2013 race plans..... I can't make them right now and that sucks. But, I hope that several of those races listed above become reality anyway. 2013 is likely not going to be a year of great PR's for me or a year with many races. However, 2013 is still going to be a year that has races in some capacity. It will be a year of renewal. A year of healing. Hopefully a year with no surgery and with this damn disease going back into remission.

I guess one can say this year is going to be a race of different sorts for me. A race to better health. Perhaps 2013 is going to be the year for my weight loss. Whatever it is, I am bound and determined to make 2013 a good year.