Setting and Meeting Goals

"What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals."  -Zig Ziglar

I set a goal back in June to run the half marathon at the Rock ‘N Roll San Antonio event on November 11, 2012 in two hours. My best half marathon time up to that point was 2:09 from 2008 when I was training for my first half ironman triathlon. Since then, I let up on consistent training and had times ranging from 2:15 to 2:45 over the next 4 years. It didn't feel good to see my times get slower but I couldn't complain if I wasn't setting goals and holding myself accountable to my training.

So I set this goal 5 months ago and yesterday, I DID IT! I set a new personal record of 1 hour and 59 minutes, just skidding in below two hours. I didn't care how ugly it was out there, I stuck to my guns and when my body wanted to quit due to the heat, humidity and wind…I just ran harder(at least I felt like I was going harder).  I knew every single person participating was enduring the same conditions I was and I wasn't going to let it get me down.

I’d like to say I had a blast yesterday, but let’s be honest, it was HOT! I stayed calm though and remembered how great I did at sticking to some important guidelines when I set this goal.  What guidelines am I talking about?

There are multiple guidelines that should be followed when setting goals in sports or any part of your life and talking through them in my Sports Psychology class really helped me hone in on them.  Here are a few tips or reminders to help with goal setting:

1.       Set specific goals in measurable terms (I wanted to do my half marathon in 2 hrs and to do that I needed to average a 9:10 pace so began tracking all of my runs while doing intervals and tempo runs to see my progress)

2.       Set moderately difficult but realistic goals, don’t exceed your ability (I didn't get crazy and say I wanted to run the half marathon in 1 hour and 45 minutes when I only had 5 months to do it. I knew I had done this distance in the past close this time, but I needed to start all over again)

3.       Set short and long range goals (I've cut over 4 minutes from my 5k time, but it didn't happen quickly. I measured it frequently to see how I was progressing and signed up for a practice half marathon three weeks before my race to test out the endurance)

4.       Set goals for practice and competition (I’m sure you see a pattern in what I was doing above for me not to detail it out)

5.       Provide support for goals (Important people in your life should know, understand and support your goals. Plus it’s easier to not give up when everyone knows what you want to achieve and can help keep you accountable)

6.       Identify target dates for attaining goals (Write it down and post it somewhere for you to see often!)

So what’s my next goal? Ironman Tahoe in September 2013! Big jump from a half marathon to a full ironman triathlon but don’t worry… I have lots of short term goals up until then. J For now, I think I deserve to celebrate my half marathon victory and have a little fun with cross training! Stay tuned for some reviews of upcoming group class workouts!

**Shout out to my amazing husband, Anthony who ran the half marathon yesterday and set a new personal record of 1 hour and 31 minutes! I joke that I'm getting faster now that I have his last name.