Where is my head at...

Physically I feel pretty much ready or will be ready for this thing called Ironman. My support system of training partners and family are all behind me 100%. No one has missed me on my long lunches at work.

Mentally I think I am hurting myself.

I think most people can think of huge goal they had coming up and got a bit nervous over it. Like when you have to give a public presentation or upcoming event you have never done before. Heck it took me ten minutes to sign my wedding certificate, after the pastor, the witnesses and my soon-to-be had signed it and handed me the pen...and stared at me for ten long minutes.

My nerves right now have more to do with not letting myself done. Not beating myself up out there on the course but building myself up. I jokingly wrote on my arms a few weeks ago; one arm a reminder that ego equals bonk and the other that the plan equals ironman. It was more an admonishment to stay positive in adversity than anything else.

Who hasn't mentally flogged themselves in the middle of run? I have. "To slow. You were faster last year. Stop running, you can walk, its no big deal. I'm thirsty, gulp your water down. You can't finish this. Stop." And on, and on, and on. I am not alone here right?

My mind has the ability to create good thoughts too. Positive energy that with each strong affirmation is a benefit to putting one step forward, moving one mile per hour faster on the bike, there are no sharks in the lake.

Mistress see's the cracks in my mental game. She bought me a mental toughness CD specifically for triathlon. I haven't tried it yet. Maybe I will fall asleep to it tonight.

I do not want to imagine the tricks my negative self will play on my pysche, made even that much more fragile by having swum and biked so far. I do not think the demons will abate until the run. Most assuredly they will wash over me in the swim as I am being lapped by stronger triathletes on the two loop swim course.

My physical training plan has been in full affect for months now. The reward, my ironman tattoo and finishers medal, firmly envisioned. Mentally I still have dragons to slay and affirmations to memorize when I am out there alone in my head for 140.6 miles.

I have a track record of being stubborn. Of not quitting. I often ask myself deep into my training, "Do I have enough heart?" Is that the right question? After almost twenty years of overcoming obstacles, do I still need to ask myself that. Apparently I do.

The race course will be won or lost in my mind and that is where I will spend between 14 and 17 hours on November 4th. The epic battle that will take me from the sea, to bike and finally my own two feet will rage and howl though my face may be blank. Already the wearied look of training long volumes masks my inner turmoil and the lack of energy subdues my pacing back and forth across the carpet, but make no mistake every minute of every day I think of Ironman. It consumes me and not always in a positive, harmonious way.

After 433 days of countdown, and peaking for one ironman already this year, I feel somewhat like Frodo from Lord of the Rings, trudging each day a little closer to Mt. Doom. Gollum representing the negative part of my mind and Sam the believer in the cause. I don't really consider Ironman Florida a ghastly place like Mt. Doom, but like Frodo I have the doubts and the fears of measuring up when I look into that water on November 4th and visualize how the day will end.