T–251 WEEKS
No I don’t really need five years.
There. That was a short post.
But seriously, five years is obviously a ridiculously long time to train for one race. And that’s exactly the point.
I don’t want to spend five years training for an Ironman.
I want to spend five years getting really fit and maintaining that lifestyle.
Most of my fitness goals in the past have followed a pretty familiar pattern. Pick an event. Find a training plan. Build the mileage. Do the event. Feel great about it.
And then…now what?
This time I want to try something different.
Instead of starting with the requirements of a race and working backward, I want to start with where I am today and just keep building.
Slowly.
I don’t need to be able to ride 100 miles anytime soon. I don’t need to run a marathon next year. I certainly don’t need to spend my weekends doing six-hour training days because somewhere in the distance there’s an Ironman.
What I need right now is to get a little fitter.
Then a little fitter than that.
And hopefully enjoy doing it.
Five years gives me room for that.
It also gives me room for other things.
First, I want to build enough hiking fitness to backpack from Yosemite to Tahoe with my son. After that, a half Ironman sounds interesting. Then I’d love to be fit enough for a long bike tour through Europe with my daughter.
None of those are detours from the Ironman plan.
They are the plan.
Each gives me something interesting to do. Each asks something different of my body. And each should leave me a little more prepared for whatever comes next.
There is another reason I like five years.
It takes away the hurry.
If I’m tired, I can go easy. If something hurts, I can back off. If life gets busy, training can fit around it. Missing a workout doesn’t threaten some perfectly constructed 16-week progression.
I’ve got 251 weeks.
I can probably afford a bad Tuesday.
And maybe that’s where this gets interesting for By Feel.
Traditional training plans have to prescribe something: run this far, ride at this power, hold this pace.
I’m trying to see how much of that prescription I actually need.
Can I gradually become much fitter simply by being consistent, paying attention, sometimes pushing myself, sometimes backing off—and letting the next challenge tell me when it’s time to do more?
Eventually the Ironman will get close enough that I’ll need to train specifically for it.
But that’s years away.
For now, I have somewhere I want to go without needing to be in a hurry to get there.
And I kind of like that.
Have you ever gotten better at something by giving yourself more time instead of pushing harder?
Feel good.