It's Resolution Time, Baby!

Seeing as how we are now firmly in the new year and I have not posted anything in over a month, I figured that I should take a moment to reflect on past accomplishments and ponder future goals. On the whole, 2010 was a pretty good year. I lost about 50 pounds (and have been successful at keeping it off since September), upgraded to Cat 4 on the road (not exactly what I wanted, but I will take it considering my limited racing), got closer with Kari (always good when trying to woo one's woman), managed to run my photography company in the black all year (I ended slightly in the red, as planned, for tax purposes), and continued to make progress on my dissertation among other things. There are definitely some areas that I would like to improve; however, 2010 was definitely a good year.

What is the best way to capitalize on my achievements in 2010 and grow them in 2011. I have been told that 2011 is the year of follow through, so it only seems appropriate to grow bigger and better this year. Here are some of my goals for the year in no particular order (I do not really believe in resolutions or change for the sake of change, but I am a huge supporter in goal setting, writing them down and sharing them with others - that'd be you).

For cycling, my goal is to upgrade to Cat 3. To do that, I have been establishing a base and following Brent's instruction at every turn. Why bother finding an Olympian to coach you if you are not going to listen? Just a thought. As the off-season progressing, I will publish more of my power results (first batch coming today) and map out the prep for coming races. My first race is currently the Kenosha Spring Training Crit Series on March 14th, and I plan to race as much as possible throughout the summer to get enough experience to upgrade to Cat 3 by September. While this is completely doable, it will take work.

For school, my goal is to finish my dissertation by the Summer, if not sooner. Even though I doubt I will spend much time in the field, I am not a quitter. I am passionately against quitting, so I will finish.

For my photography business, my goal is to operate another year in the black, but grow to recoup the totality of my initial financial investment along with purchase some new equipment with the profits. This will require that I am the lead for a couple weddings this year. If you know of anyone, I am fairly cheap and always willing. Check out my work here (I know that was a shameless plug).

For my marketing business, my goal is to grow it to where it brings in a couple thousand a month on an ongoing basis, so I will have more options in life while finishing up my degree and planning a future with Kari.

For my relationship with Kari, my goal is to get engaged sometime this year (I have a feeling she'll let me sooner than later) and start to work on planning for our wedding.

For general life, my goal is to read more and spend more time growing myself as a person. I feel this was an area of weakness for me last year; even though, I do enjoy reading.

For weight, my goal is to maintain my weight at 180lbs. I am very satisfied with my results from last year and Kari will not let me get skinnier.

I believe that those are all of my goals for the coming year. There are probably more, but those are the ones that are most important and in the front of my mind.

Now onto the interesting stuff, the results of my baseline power test with Brent. In 10 minutes, I covered 3.83 miles (an average of 23 mph). My average watts were around 300 for the 10 minutes, my average cadence was around 100 rpms and my average heart rate was around 180bpms. I did not do a good job of setting my Garmin at the beginning and end of my test, so I am just going off of the spreadsheet Brent compiled for me. It is definitely a good start point for the beginning of January with a few more months of indoor training until the race season starts. Guess who is excited?! Also, Kari did great! She covered 3.08 miles for an average of 18.5 mph. How awesome is that?!