Ironman Boulder 2014

Today I took a big leap.

At Great White North the other weekend I joked with coach Angie that I was retiring from Ironman.  After two races in the 16 hour range I just felt like maybe I wasn’t very good at them?

Somehow in the space of a week I went from saying I was going to retire from Ironman to deciding to that I was ready to give it another try in 2014.  What changed?

Neil and I were out on Friday night and I received two emails announcing the registration date for the brand new IM Boulder next year. I made a comment to him that they must really want me to race it since they sent me the e-mail twice.  All of a sudden Boulder started to sound more and more interesting. Racing an Ironman is an incredible feeling and I long to have a better executed race out there.  However maybe part of not jumping on the IM bandwagon for awhile was because it was no longer going to be in Penticton. Sad but true, Ironman Canada in Whistler holds no interest for me, especially compared to Penticton.  In Penticton I could stay with my parents and it was a little more relaxed for me (not to mention budget friendly). And if I’m going to go for a full Ironman I’d rather have it count towards this magic number of twelve races to up my chances of a Kona spot one day so I’d rather do an MDot race.  I’ve never been to Boulder before and this sounds like a great opportunity to explore the area in addition to the race.

August 3rd, 2014 sounds like a great race date. It is close to IMC next year so I can train with anyone prepping for that race.  If my coach decides to hold a camp in Penticton next year the timing will probably work well for that too. Plus an early August race means I get to have fun and do non-triathlon things for part of the summer.  I maybe would have liked to get a bit more of my old speed back before going for another IM, but I’ve seen huge progress in the last year so here’s hoping that progress keeps happening.

I felt pretty anxious and barfy as I waited for the registration to open today.  Then a few minutes before it opened I clicked on the link and all of a sudden I was apparently in line!

A few minutes later and I was committed.

Not only that, but six of my teammates decided to sign up for Boulder too.  It will be fantastic to have so many friendly faces out there on race day!!

Boulder 2014.  Here we go!!

Are you in for Boulder??