2009: A year in review

What a year 2009 turned out to be. I want to take this post into a few different directions. The overall purpose of this post is a review of my life in 2009. The items I wish to examine are as follows:
1. Lessons Learned
2. Exciting Moments
3. Looking Forward goals for 2010

To focus on the first, when looking back on 2009, I learned a few things. First starting with work, we made a few mistakes, but none catastrophic. This is very positive, since we can only improve from our current state. My boss and I were able to contribute a good deal of money to our company’s bottom line. I am happy to be associated with this. However, a few items that jump out at me that we have already improved upon and or learned from a mistake are as follows:
1. Ensure accurate communication of Engineers comments on submittals to vendors.
2. When approaching a large project worry more about clarifications in the notes from vendors as opposed to counts and quantities.
3. Allow yourself a good DEDICATED week to scope out a project the size of Deloitte.
4. Clarify startup activities and quantity of days before PO is issued.

In life I learned a few lessons too. Most of them relate around triathlon but some are general.
1. Completing an Ironman isn’t as hard as I thought if you train well for it and pace yourself.
2. Learning your RPE and being able to correlate that with your heart rate and pace is critical to racing an Ironman
3. Mental preparation once again was one of the largest factors in my Ironman training.
4. Taking time off after an Ironman, take more than you think.
5. This one I already knew but I lied to myself and am paying the price now. At the first sign of any pain or twinge that reoccurs for more than a week go to the doctor.
6. Choose your races early and stick to that plan, don’t add stuff at a later date that may jeopardize your future goals.
7. After an Ironman, I personally need to write down a workout plan that significantly cuts volume but still provides with regular physical activity, or sign up a for a new workout class or pursue something other than Triathlon related stuff. This could also be self improvement type things, night classes, etc.
8. Still working on this one, learning to tolerate your job and be happy about the positives and to not be stressed about the negatives. I personally compare my job to other jobs on a regular basis and I am reminded about the all the really positive things about my job.
9. I learned this one late in 2009, but I need to try to make a better attempt at speaking with my family on a regular basis.
10. Nutrition is really important in racing an Ironman
11. Do better with changing my nutrition habits when my training load changes. This year I am still eating too much when I am not training. I will try to have better habits of eating while training so I don’t have issues when I cut my training load.
12. Being very friendly to people will really help you get what you want.
13. Becoming friends with someone even if you don’t like them or have anything in common, will only help you get what you need from them.

Exciting moments or things I will remember for quite some time to come. There were many exciting times in 2009 so I will simply list them as they come to me in no particular order.
1. Finishing my first Ironman
2. Breaking 5 hours in an Half Ironman
3. The birth of my 3rd nephew
4. My little sister getting pregnant
5. Getting my new bike, race wheels, and just recently my powertap
6. Visiting San Francisco
7. Meeting someone special at a concert
8. The divorce of my best friend from growing up and being able to spend time with both of my best friends in Dallas, shortly thereafter.
9. All the new people I met in 2009 and growing my social and work network.
10. Going to Australia
11. Becoming a coach with TTT
12. Making a commitment to do 2 Ironman races and 2 Half Ironman races in 2010.
13. Doing a Triathlon camp with Gordo Byrn and all the others especially Chris McDonald and visiting Utah.
14.

Looking forward: These are the things that I am excited about in 2010, I am very thankful for having all of these things ahead of me.
1. Ringing in 2010 on a Beach in Australia
2. Coaching myself for all my races
3. Becoming a certified Triathlon coach
4. Racing 2 Ironman distance triathlons
5. To all the new friends and acquaintances I meet in 2010
6. The marriage of one of my best friends in July
7. TTT triathlon training camp in Arkansas

If you could sum up the past year in writing here it is. Enjoy. I am very optimistic about 2010 and foresee another very positive year. I think it may turn out to be a year in which I learn more about myself than I have in the past 2 years in Dallas. So Cheers! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.