I am now an Ironman

On August 29, 2009 in 14:03:04 I became an Ironman. You can see the journey here

http://davidsjourneytoironman.blogspot.com/


It was a great day, and a long way in the making. I would not have been able to do this without a tremendous amount of help. While this blog is not about the Ironman (please see David's Journey to Ironman) it is about my brain injury and the challenges that I face.



The journey had its own unique challenges. Planning the three parts of a triathlon is a challenge to anyone without a brain injury. During my training I moved, faced challenges at school, employment, and got married. Lots of events that are huge life changes happened during training during this time I was lucky enough to have a great trainer from Training Bible Coaching. Carla Hastert was amazing. I owe her so much. She not only took on the challenge of training someone with a brain injury. She did this at no cost. She is the hero. I just did what she told me to do.



I was able to download and upload her workouts to my Garmin’s and then go about my workouts. The runs and bikes worked out pretty good. The only challenge was the swim.



How does someone who doesn’t remember what lap they are on, get in any kind of a quality workout. When we are talking about the 3.8kl distance needed for the Ironman. How does the athlete remember the laps? The drills.



With the Garmin I can put specific workouts in, I can do heart rate, speed drills, cadence drills, time drills, etc. When I am in the water however it is just me.



After many different ideas we found some water proof paper. I right down my specific drills. I.e. free style, kick's with the board, and other drills. I could mark down when I finished a lap, and keep track, so I would not over or under train.



This was a miracle for me. It made the swim for me.



Training for the Ironman is a challenge for anyone. Training with a brain injury brings it own unique challenges. I want others with TBI to know that anything is possible. We can do anything with the right technology, although it is still up to us to put in the work.



The next challenge is the Goofy Challenge. That is a Half Marathon on a Saturday and a Full marathon on the Sunday. I will keep you updated.