Long time coming

Clearly I suck at blogging every day... so much time has passed since my last post so I'll try to update you from the start.

Jan. 2nd 2013:
I signed up for Ironman Muncie 70.3. I was already training well and progressing pretty good.

I also set a goal to run a 13.1 distance every month this year! Pretty ambitious but attainable.

February 18th:
I was diagnosed with Diverticulitis and had a visit to the Emergency room where I was directed to a colon dr. He placed me on meds and scheduled me for a colonoscopy to check out the situation. I was off from working out a few days and this ultimately didn't impact my training too much.

I spent the month of Feb and March traveling for work. I was managing to get my 13.1 runs in even when traveling. One of them I actually ran in Helsinki Finland, that was pretty cool!

May was filled with some more travel of which one trip was to California to my HP office headquarters. When I arrived on Sunday May 12 I wasn't feeling very good and I figured my diverticulitis was acting up again...

Sadly I was right, Monday I trudged through work at the office doing my best to manage the pain, I'd called my family doctor to get some antibiotics ... But by that afternoon I was in serious pain. My colleague was kind enough to drive me to the ER where they did a CT scan that showed indeed I had another outbreak... Only problem was that this time was a lot worse and included a small hole in my intestine. I wasn't prepared for their next update which was that I was going to have to have emergency surgery to resolve the problem.

The doctors where really cautious and I got admitted to the PCU (Progressive Care Unit, one less than ICU). After a while they decided that they were going to treat me through the night and see how I was in the AM. I was taking antibiotics via IV, and morphine for pain. The next day my wife had flown out to be with me. It was so nice to have someone I loved finally by my side. Every time a dr. would visit we'd ask about surgery and they became less and less focused on that.

Now, flashing back to the point where they said surgery, I was crushed... my goals of completing my first Half Ironman gone... All the training and commitment I'd put into the race wasted... And now even now after the idea of surgery passed many were saying I'd never be able to do it..

My Wed it was clear that I wasn't going to have surgery and that now they just wanted to watch me and make sure I was getting better and no fever. Thursday afternoon I was finally able to leave the hospital.


The following Monday I saw my colon Dr. and he gave me 3 options. 1) do nothing, hope it doesn't happen again soon. This was unlikely considering I'd had two issues within 2 months, and the second episode was a lot worse than the first. ... 2) Meds for a long time to see if that helped avoid future problems. Trouble was that the meds had a low success rate and weren't tested on people in my age group... 3) Surgery to remove the bad section of colon. The good news here was that research shows that less than 3% of the time are there any issues after this type of fix.

Of course I asked the Dr. the important question about my race and training. To my delight the Dr. agreed that training and racing had little impact on this and that we'd schedule the surgery for after the race.

I was back to training after having missed about 2 weeks of it. I was running out of time and becoming more nervous about the upcoming race every day... Was I ready?

Fast forward ...

July 13th Arrives ... It's go time! Race Day! The day I'd been training for!

Swim 1.2 Miles: 43:19
T1: 4:29
Bike 56 Miles: 2:55:45
T2: 4:40
Run 13.1 Miles: 2:37:24
Total: 6:25:37 

I killed my goal time of <7:00:00 ...="" 6:30:00="" a="" and="" blast="" br="" even="" goal="" had="" i="" my="" nbsp="" of="" stretch="" too.="" wow="">

Now, it time to prep for the surgery. ... and now you're caught up. I'm going to try to post more frequently maybe it will help me be less grumpy about the surgery and recover (no workout) time... 


-me-

Commitment

Prior to 2005 I'd never considered distance or endurance events. It was by chance in Fall 2005 when I needed to be in Panama City Florida for work. My flight to Florida got delayed and canceled which led to getting stuck overnight in Atlanta with Ironman Florida competitors.

The IM event happened to be the day I was heading home, however I was able to go to the start and witness the emotional power of the event. Inspired by those competing, I signed up for my first half marathon (500 Festival Mini-Marathon) from the hotel's computer and actually ran on the hotel treadmill that very day.

I made it back in the afternoon and managed to see both of the competitors I'd traveled with at around the 15 mile mark of the marathon. I was so in awe of the event that I ended up staying too long and actually missed my flight home.

Signing up for this 70.3 had been 6 years in the making, I completed my first and only marathon in March 2008. I've managed 5 half-marathons, and in 2012 I completed 3 Sprint distance triathlons and my training has been consistant with the ulitmate goal being the completion of a full IronMan at some point in the future.

Training for such an event is a huge commitment, one that I couldn't do without the support of my wife. As the parents of 5 kids, I could never have considered such a commitment without her support. Today, is the day that I commit to my ulitmate goal of IronMan, and this 70.3 is the halfway point to many exciting days to come!

Today, I signed up for the Muncie 70.3 Half Ironman. The event is on July 13th 2013.

• 1.2 Mile Swim
• 56 Mile Bike
• 13.1 Mile Run 

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