My Goals for the 2012 Track Season

Hi guys! I hope all of your weeks are going wonderfully :)

This week has definitely been a crazy one - after a winter of creating my own workout schedule, I am back to going to practice every afternoon. I am so excited for this track season so I thought I'd share with you what my goals are (not all are time-related!).

• PR (beat my personal record) in at least 2 of 3 events. I run the 800m, 1600m, and 3200m, and I'd love to beat my best times in two of these events, doesn't matter which two! My coach had us write our goals down on a goal sheet for all of our events - these are some pretty big goals I set for myself, but I'm excited to see if I really can do it. 

These are my end-of-season goals - I'm not very close to these times right now! You can check out my current PRs here. The reason for the ? by the 400 is that I've only run the event once or twice and am not even sure what my PR is! 

• Stretch and do core work after every practice. Last season I was not good about this because it takes time. It's a silly excuse considering it takes all of ten minutes to complete both, but in my busy world ten minutes is pretty valuable. I realized that treating my body well is more important than having 10 extra minutes at home! 

• Write weekly recaps of how I'm doing. So I don't set myself up for "failing" this goal, I'm okay with doing bi-weekly recaps. I just want to keep you guys updated with how it's going (which I didn't do too great of a job of during cross country season) and be able to look back on my progress! 

I took a trip to the Nike outlet just before the season started and was in heaven! Look at all those tempo shorts :)

i also got this outfit while i was there! 

• Do one weights workout a week, on my own time. One thing that bothers me about my track team is that there is next to NO focus on strength training. For my body, I know that running 3-4 days a week and lifting 3 days is ideal. However, I can't just miss practice every other day to lift weights, so I'm going to settle for lifting once a week.

after my last BodyPump class before track started! 

• Make time for ME each day. Okay, so this goal isn't quite running related, but after 3 years of track I know how much time and energy it takes. I'm really busy with school and work, too, so taking some time to myself each day is really important. Even if it's only for ten minutes and all I do is snuggle with my kitties or spend some time chatting with my mom, I want to make this a priority. 

• Fuel well. This one is definitely going to be a struggle - it's not that I'm worried about getting enough food because I'm really good about not forgetting to eat. What I need to work on is the timing of my meals. Usually I just have breakfast, midmorning snack, lunch, and then go 6 hours without eating and come home after practice and attack the kitchen. [Example: today I came home, ate a smoothie, a tortilla with peanut butter, some pretzels, and a small salad. hello, food baby.] 

I know that going for so long without food isn't good at all, so I'm going to try and have a small something before practice and see how it sits in my super-picky stomach. 

• Have fun! Sometimes it's too easy to get caught up in trying to beat a time or freaking out about not having a good workout. This is the last season that I will get to run track (I'm not planning on running on a team in college next year - more on that later) and I want to go out with a bang. I want to enjoy myself and have the best season yet! :) 

Me after my team got 2nd place in XC sectionals! 

What are your current running/fitness goals? Any of them similar to mine?