I have been silent long enough. I have not posted anything since the Paris marathon race report. This is evidence enough of what is happening with my triathlon season. I have been in a training funk for almost 8 weeks now. This follows an already shaky start of the year as far as training is concerned. It is time to take stock and to make the needed adjustments.

It is not all gloom and doom. My running has been the highlight of the early 2009. Although I did not train very well, I have collected the fruits of my past few years’ investments. So far, I have 2 top 10 finishes, 2 age group victories and 3 PRs on 4 Miles (22’38’’), 15K (53’50) and the Marathon (2h44’52).

My swimming has not been as good as my running but I feel optimistic. My training has been the worst in the last 5 years but similar to my running, I feel that the past year’s hard work is paying of. I don’t have record time to show yet but I have been experiencing new sensations in the water. I feel faster and I believe the time has come to test that speed.

My biking is a completely different story. I simply have not been biking at all. My training is inexistent and I have no sensations when on the bike. I tried to ride 3 hours a few weeks back and finished exhausted. I did the last hour slow to a point that I was being passed by mountain bikes. I am so behind on the bike that I don’t believe it can be fixed in 2009.

The conclusion therefore comes naturally. I will not be racing triathlons in 2009. I decided to still participate to the races I signed up for but I will not prepare them. I will show up on race day and will wing it. I am not saying that I will do the races for fun as I still don’t understand what this means but I will have no expectations whatsoever.

In the meantime I will focus my energy on both running and swimming. To be more specific, I will focus my energy on running and swimming fast. I will put aside distance and will work specifically on speed.

My objective for running is to be back on the track every week and to work paces I am not comfortable with. I will not race these distances but I will test myself on 400 meters, 1,000 meters and on the mile. I have been away from the track for so long that I don’t even know what time I should shoot for. This is really sad when I think about it. Let’s start with 1’05 for 400, 3’00 for 1,000 and 5’00 for the mile. I will adjust (hopefully down) these times if needed. I hope that working on these distances will help me lower my 4-5 mile race pace to the 5’30ish per mile. I also want to break my half marathon PR and eventually be ready for the season grand finale of the New York City marathon where I will shoot for sub 2h40.

My objective for swimming is simple. I want to swim 50 yards sub 30’’ and when this is done I want to swim 50 meters sub 30’’. I believe the first to be attainable but the second to be a huge challenge for me. If I manage this, there would be a natural next step but it seems so far-off that I don’t even dare write it. In any case this challenge would not be for 2009 but achieving this would be so cool; a life long dream.

Finally, I will keep biking casually but will limit the time and energy I spend there.

Voila, I am actually excited to work on speed for a change. I think it is the right time to do it and probably the best way for me to have fun again training and to be hungry again racing .

We shall see.