2010: A Year to Look Forward To!

If you missed it, yesterday I posted my 2009 Year in Review...

Today, I would love to post a list of numerous races and events that I hope to participate in and accomplish in 2010, but I am thinking I need to try something different this year. After struggling with knee issues a couple times in 2009, I have a new perspective on running, racing, and everything else.

So, with that in mind here's a few ideas I have for 2010:

Personal Goals:

• Travel more. I have a good friend that lives in MT and need to make it a priority of mine to get out there and visit her this year. It was a goal of mine to do so in 2009, and that didn't happen. This year, will be the year. Asside from that, I would love to do some camping and hiking this coming summer, as well as a trip to a place I haven't been before, either in the states or abroad.
• Spend time with family and friends. I do this pretty well already, but want to note how important this is to me. I am very close with my immediate family as well as some extended family and look forward to the time spent together - everything from a short weekend to trips together.
• Do more painting. This is something I truly enjoy and find to be quite relaxing. I have a couple projects in mind and hope to share it with you in the next month or so!
• Read more! I absolutely LOVE to read, but have not done enough this year. It's rediculous! I probably have a dozen books on my bookshelf that haven't been read and am itching to do so.

Health Goals:

• Find a healthy balance between work, training, rest, and nutrition. This was a goal of mine last year, and I think I have come a long way with my nutrition, especially. However, I still have more to learn and additional changes need to be made. Balancing these things is probably the hardest thing for me and I need to realize that a missed workout here and there due to long days at work or not enough sleep is better than piling on the junk miles.
• Try new recipes. I want to get better about exploring better and healthier recipes. 'nuff said.
• Keep up with the vitamins/supplements. I have done pretty well with taking my daily vitamins and supplements and hope to be a bit more consistent with this in 2010! I am currently taking a women's multi-vitamin, glucosamine, fish oil, and have recently added Vitamin D.
  

Fitness:

• Enjoy running. This past year has been hard in regards to running, with the least amount of miles in 4 years. But, I have come to realize that it is important for me to be grateful for every painful-free mile ran, whether it was a 10 minute mile or 12 minute mile.
• Include more Core/Strength/Stretch. This includes getting back into doing my TriPower routine on a regular basis as well as participating in yoga, pilates, and bodypump classes often.
• Participate in races/events. This is pretty broad, I know. However, instead of listing off thousands races that I would like to do, I need to wait and see how the knee is going to hold up. I have a pretty good base built since my injury, so if I play things smart, I should be able to continue training and build some long runs. If that's the case, I have some longer distances in mind, in addition to different races/events from years past!
• Get out on the bike more. Unfortunately, this past spring/summer/fall I didn't get on my bike as much as I would have liked. Between the months of May and October, it was very wet and colder than usual.
• Join swim team, again. In June, I joined the Adult Gators swim team and met twice a week for 1 hour swim practice. It was the best thing I did and I look forward to doing it again.

BUT, if I were to list a handful of races, this is kind of what it would look like:

• Lifetime Fitness Indoor Triathlon - I have done one of these already, but my sister has started training for a triathlon and would like to do one of these this winter!
• Fargo Marathon - No, I am not talking about doing the full marathon, but the GoFar Challenge - which will consist of running the 5K Friday night and then the Half Marathon Saturday morning. It would not only be fun, but I would get a medal for each race, plus an additional medal for doing the challenge! If I struggle with getting my half marathon training done due to my knee, I will lay low and try to do the 10K since that has been recently added to the list of races that weekend! I am still part of the Youth run committee for this and it should be pretty fun!
• Detroit Lakes Younglife Olympic Triathlon - I did the Sprint distance of this race this past August and loved it. I am hoping I will be able to do the Olympic distance this time around!
• Ride the Wind 2010 - This is a two day ride for MS that I have wanted to participate in since I heard about it 2 years ago, but haven't been able to train for it. I think it's a 100 mile ride across two days, but it could be 150 miles. I haven't figured that much out yet. However, I will need to raise at least $200 to participate.

What does your 2010 look like? Do you have any specific goals/races in mind?