2012 Season

First post in along time.  No quite sure why... I guess I had nothing to write about.

The only way to describe season 2012 is - disappointing.  Having ended year 2011 with a time trial PB of 55:52 for 25 miles I had high hopes for 2012 and racing Ironman again.  The preparation started off well and I was in the best shape in January for the time of the year.  We had a week in Lanzarote and I was swimming, riding and running well.

A change of job meant that I was spending a lot of time in Germany during the week, but Helen and I adjusted my training and the preparation was still on track.  The turning point for the worse was a training ride back in he UK in March at a weekend when I got hit by a car.  I hit the deck pretty hard and was out for a while and spent the rest of the day at the A&E.  Fortunately nothing broken except of the bike, which was a write-off.

I returned to training pretty quickly but it should have been obvious that something was very wrong. I was at 50% of my pre-accident levels and wasn't really able to follow the plan anymore.  To make things worse work was busy as I was splitting my time between Germany and the UK.

I run an early season 10M and recorded a new personal worst result and decided not to run the London Marathon and concentrate on getting back to full fitness.  But the fitness was in no hurry to return.  Even a week in Mallorca did not help and was well off the pace at the 70.3 race at the end of the week, coming in 23rd in my age group.

On the first weekend of July I raced Ironman Regensburg, which was a a key race of the season.  I gave it my best shot and had a decent swim and a reasonable bike, but faltered on the run in stiffing heat.  I ended up with a slow time of 10:12 and 24th place in my age group

My last chance of qualification for Ironman Hawaii was Ironman UK in Bolton and usually I go quite well in second Ironman of the year but this time I was struggling on the bike and ended up pulling he plug on the run.

That was also the end of my stint with Helen and PBscience.  I enjoyed the training over the previous 18 months and it' a shame that it ended up with a couple of poor result.

After Bolton I took some time off did a sprint triathlon in Seaford winning my age group and taking second overall again, a sprint at Dorney Lake with a second in my age group and the London Triathlon coming 8th in my age group with a fairly slow 2:17.  The season ended up with a fun run 10k in Nuremberg, close to where I worked all year with another personal worst time.

Hopefully next year will be better.