Setting Up Your Best Season Ever

The new year is here and we are looking for your best season ever. That won’t happen by mistake. I’ll offer a few things I consider important to putting you in the right direction for a great year.

1. Set up your training, work and social life to match your goals. Are your goals in line with the rest of your life?
2. Surround yourself with people who support that structure and your goals so it’s sustainable and who offer support when things get hard.
3. Plan out your year on a calendar with races, social commitments, travel,family and friend commitments and be sure the timing and spacing is right. Does your race schedule match your training time ability at the right time of year? For example, if the spring is a super busy time with work and family, a June IM is probably a bad choice.
4. Look back on your last year and ask yourself questions and then looking forward and ask yourself how you are going to do these things better or differently to move forward.
   Clearly outline the following things:
   • What are you setting out to do?
   • What results are expected?
   • What are going to be your critical success indicators, these can be objective targets or subjective targets or both.
   • What were your actual results? Identify them including times, placings and percent of personal best performances.
5. Take the time to focus on and write out a list on what you learned. What are you hoping to learn in 2011? What are your strengths and weaknesses you’ve discovered both positive and negative and what are you going to do with that knowledge? What are you going to do to sustain strengths and develop your weaknesses. Indicate how you are going to move forward.
6. Exactly what are you going to do and when? Use SMART description ( Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time based)

Going through this process and planning before the year gets under way is going to assure you your best chance at hitting your goals in 2011.

Last but not least, remove all “garbage” in your life that is NOT in line with the map you’ve laid out for yourself to be successful. If it doesn’t line up in a positive manner for you to reach your goals then it’s likely there isn’t room for it in your life.