It doesn’t seem like 6 months since my first meeting with Coach Fi to discuss my training programme for my first Ironman. I remember us both sheltering from the cold on a dreary January evening, and me bombarding Fiona with hundreds of questions over a couple of cups of coffee, I just couldn’t wait to start my programme and now in the blink of an eye and several hundreds, if not thousand of km’s of swimming, cycling and running – IM France is imminent, I will be on the start line two weeks today!

A lot has happened in that blink of an eye, hilly sportives, a sprained ankle that took forever to heal, team road trips, V02 max testing, broken bike :-(, new bike :-), a love/hate relationship with aqua-running, physio sessions, a bike course recce weekend, team rides with bacon sandwich stops :-), team rides without bacon sandwich stops :-(, team swims followed by team talking nonsense at The White Horse, tentative runs along the towpath willing my ankle to heal … being part of a great team and making some fantastic friends along the way.

It seems that there hasn’t been much else in my life apart from work and training so far this year. I’ve never been coached before, I’ve really enjoyed the structure of a training programme, knowing that I just have to follow the programme – and trust Fi to do the rest.

With the hard training behind me – it’s time to rest up, eat well, get fresh and focus on preparations for the big day.

IM France, here I come.