Plans for 2011

Well, now is the time to make the decision what big triathlon to do in 2011 as most registrations open in the coming weeks. Most fill up within hours; Frankfurt, I believe, is already full! I definitely want to do another long distance race and this time round it has to be one of the Ironman series. The 2 favourites are Ironman Europe in Frankfurt and Ironman Austria in Klagenfurt. However, I have decided to postpone until 2012 for a number of reasons:

• Training for Challenge Roth was very exhausting, especially the last few weeks. You're supposed to up your training by no more than 10% per year - I more than doubled my distances on the bike and in the water in the last 6 months!
• I started training with a hamstring problem. I am still training and racing with the same hamstring problem. This has to go wrong at some stage, so I need to sort this out first before another big venture.
• There are tons of really good races near my new home and I have done a single one so far. I am going to spent time to race shorter distances which should also improve my speed.
• I want to run a decent marathon, but cannot do this while training for an Ironman.

So, the plan is to run a marathon in spring time - hamstring permitting - and focus on a number of Olympic and middle-distance races. Top of the list are Challenge Kraichgau,Austria 70.3 and Elbaman.

Disclaimer: if I am going to pull out of Roth in 2 1/2 weeks time then my plans might change. But this is not going to happen... ;-)