Buh Bye 2011 you were a good one...

Mine started big and ended even bigger. Not a goal in sight going into the year and what unfolded was more unbelievable than I could have imagined.

January started off with The Goofy Challenge. Immediately after the marathon, I folded myself into my car to drive 8 hours home to avoid an ice storm. Our only snow of the year.





Later in the month, I dipped my toes back in the triathlon waters, indoor style.



February was the half marathon at Run the Reagan. My sister and friend were there running a 10k in prep for the Disney princess later in the month. It would seem that I was practicing the "run a race and not stop to take a bunch of photos" policy that month.

(Insert cute picture of my sister and her friend sampling their first GU as that is my main memory from that race.)

In March, I completed my 5th marathon! (I had to look up what number it was on Athlinks. Does anyone use that site? I LOVE it. It gives you results for just about every race you have ever done. So handy.)



Later that day, my friend Wendy and I signed up for Augusta 70.3!

In April, we hit the road on our bikes. We clipped, unclipped and did slow motion fallovers like most new riders but we got it done.



I joined a masters group at Lifetime Fitness. I also started coaching swimming for my tri group. Not an actual photo of masters practice or my coaching... :)



In May, after cracking my head open exiting the swim on my first outdoor triathlon of the year, I managed to get 2nd place in my age group. Have I showed you the video? Check it out. It turned out my head was bleeding but didn't know that until the end when CR insisted the paramedics check me out. I also had a minor concussion but didn't know that until days later. I think I just wanted to keep racing to avoid people asking me if I was OK. Seriously. The sound you hear is my pumpkin sized head hitting the pavement.





June was a whole lot of training and apparently no pictures to show for it. I was knee deep in long rides, runs and early morning swims.

July brought the Peachtree Road Race and the Chattanooga Olympic Triathlon - my first oly! Oddly enough, now that I look back I was reading the book American Wife back then and am still trying to finish it up. I guess I just lost interest towards the end...





In August I experienced my first earthquake while in DC for work, rode the Augusta 70.3 course a couple of times, did the Acworth Women's Sprint Tri and signed up for the full iron at Beach 2 Battleship taking place 2 months later. In all honesty, that swim at Acworth was worse than the mass start of Beach 2 Battleship. True story.



Oh September! My first century and my first 70.3 distance. I did better than I had hoped and had a great experience racing with friends.











October was all about Beach 2 Battleship. Long weekend training sessions followed by tapering that arrived just when you thought you couldn't log one more mile. In the end, it was worth every minute. CR rung that cowbell for 13 hours straight!





I laid low in November. Sort of. An awesome 10k with friends followed by a new PR in the half marathon.







Which leads us to December... Jingle Jog!



Thanks for coming along for the ride! I hope everyone has a great New Year. Good luck to everyone racing this weekend or heading down to Disney for next weekend's races. Happy 2012!