Sunday, January 31, 2016

Accountability



So this year my big goal is to do well at XTerra World Championships.  For those that don’t know the course—it is basically a series of hill repeats on both the bike and the run.  They pack in 3000+ ft climbing in 18 miles on the bike and 1500 ft in 6 miles of the run.  So the key to this race is power/weight ratio.  I like to think that I do fairly well on the power side of the equation—which does me well on flatter courses.  I am also not that tall so I am pretty compact for the windy courses.  My forte is definitely flat, windy courses (I also get blown around less than the smaller women in the wind, another advantage).  So, what business do I have targeting the exact opposite of what I am naturally good at?  What we love and what we are naturally good at don’t always line up.  So here I go.

The first easy thing to do on the weight side of the equation is to throw money at it.  I’ve been riding a dual suspension, fairly long travel mountain bike for the past few years.  For Christmas Santa Clause (Don) brought me a nice new 29er hardtail that is going to save me a good 5 lbs once we finish swapping out a few components and put race wheels on it.

Now the hard part and what this post is really about—actually getting to race weight.  I always seem to be able to get within about 5 lbs of what I consider my optimal race weight.  That 5 lbs is probably the difference between standing on the podium and not.  How to make it happen?  Enter the coach, Chris Bagg.  On one of our recent calls:  “Hey, your weight is staying the same, how about we do food logging for the next couple of weeks so the I can see where we might need to make some adjustments”  So, to make it as painless as possible, I got the app for my phone (My Fitness Pal) and started logging my food.  The sneaky thing is—you can hook it to your Training Peaks account—so not only do I get to see what I am eating every day—my coach also gets to see it.  After 2 weeks of logging, he has not suggested any changes in my diet.  The very fact that I am logging it and he can see it is causing me to make smarter choices and the scales are going in the right direction.

I actually know exactly what I need to eat to get to where I want to be.  So why don’t I do it?  Why can’t we be accountable enough to ourselves to not need the added step of a coach looking over our shoulder?  I don’t actually know the answer to that question or I would have been successful in the past.  Since I don’t know the answer I am going to go with it and pause every time I go to eat something and think:  What will Chris think when he reads this in my log?  I still have a way’s to go—I’ve actually now gotten rid of the off-season weight and will be moving towards those last 5 lbs.  I hope I can be successful with this extra measure of accountability we have added.  #cbcg #WeAreEvolution #EndureandEnjoy

Tuesday, January 12, 2016

Balance



Something that I am and have been struggling with for a while now.  2015 was a busy year—but not all by choice.  From a professional perspective, my team was executing what for most, is a once in a career project (moving a major data center).  This was in the middle of an already incredibly busy year—we broke all kinds of sales and profit records.  Delivered 2x the amount of projects we have every done in our history. 
I have prided myself over the years for having been able to maintain a good work/life balance.  Knowing when to say no, making sure that I have put the proper systems/staff in place so that the work side of the equation did not overwhelm the life side of the equation.  Well, the onslaught of 2015 tipped that balance too far over to the work side.  I don’t feel like I have recovered from it—and some of the early 2016 indications are that this is on the way to becoming the new ‘normal’  Which means I am going to have to figure some new things out to regain that balance-I don’t particularly like where I am at now.
I am in the process of changing some things at work that hopefully will help the equation a little bit—but I fear that I will not see the balance I had before—part of what can keep me going is that at the most I have a little more than 2 years before it all goes away and I can pursue my passions.  Part of what makes me successful in business –is the life part —so I cannot lose that and still succeed.
I’ve had to make some tough choices:  how much/how do I continue to pursue my passion (triathlon/cycling), how much can I give back to the community I love to foster, how large of a circle of friends can I realistically support? 
Obviously this past year I have blogged almost not at all, I have been very sparse on social media - -this is one decision I had to make-which is hard with friends scattered all over the continent.  I have started working with a coach again (Chris Bagg)—that has taken a huge planning burden off me and I hope this will be part of the solution to bring the balance back (and help me go faster). I will not be taking on Ironman this year, instead will be focusing on XTerra—which is a ton of fun and does not take the time commitment of IM.  I have one sponsor, Evolution Healthcare and Fitness, that is giving me great support to keep my body healthy and I find it super easy spread the word when all that they do is top notch.
Of course through all this, Don is always there and always super supportive of whatever is driving me.  He is the one constant that I can always count on.