Happy 2013!

For the past month and a half I have been hearing on an almost daily basis about Miguel’s goals for 2013. He has been picking a set of fitness, work, and life goals to work on throughout the year ahead. He thinks and rethinks them, writes and rewrites and goes back and forth with what should be included in the goals. He started right about Thanksgiving week and had been tweaking them all the way to the very last second of New Year’s eve, pretty much like Congress with the so called “fiscal cliff”. I, myself, have never been too much a New Year’s goal or resolution setter. Quite frankly I’ve never cared too much for New Year’s celebrations in general, but, after hearing so much about Miguel’s goals --which you can read about here--, I finally gave in and set up a few things I would like to accomplish.

So, anyway, here they are, my fitness goals for 2013.

1) Complete Ironman Texas in under 13 hours - In 2013 I age up and join probably one of the most competitive age groups: the Females 30-34. To celebrate my 30th birthday with a bang I registered for my second ironman race, which will be held on the day of my birthday. Last time I managed to finish in under 15 hours; this time around I’m more experienced and disciplined, and, I’m hoping, somewhat of a better triathlete. Now, I know I have little to zero chance of placing or earning a Kona slot, but after setting a half an hour PR on the 70.3 distance at the Kerrville Triathlon, I’ll try to set up a PR worthy of a 30th birthday celebration by attempting to cut two hours from my previous time. There will be a lot of work to be done here.

2) Reduce my body fat percentage by 5% - I’ve been running since I was twelve and, although I don’t consider myself to be fat, I’ve never been slim either. What can I say? I can train for dozens of hours every week, but I think everyone who knows me knows that I do that in order to be able to eat chocolate cake and french fries without ballooning my five feet petite frame to over 200 pounds. However, I’m curious to see what I could accomplish by cleaning up my eating act. I’m a sugar junkie, I admit it, so this will not be an easy goal to achieve.

3) Train for and complete my first stand-alone marathon in four hours - Despite running for over a decade and a half, I’ve never run a stand-alone marathon. To end the year with another bang, I’m hoping to train and complete the big 26.2 in under four hours. This one should be fun!

Happy New Year y’all! May we accomplish all our goals for 2013!