Article Source: Rocky Mountain Sports

Written by - Ryan Riell - April 23rd, 2009

In general, every endurance athlete has goals that he/she would like to accomplish each year. Some people set their sights too low, some set them too high. It’s tough to set them just right. To help, I’ve come up with the six most important aspects of not only setting your goals but developing a plan to achieve them.

RACE GOALS/PRIORITIES: After sitting down and determining in which races you are going to compete, you have to determine the relative priority of each race (A, B and C). “A” races are the races at which you want to have the absolute best day—i.e., set a new PR. “B” races are the ones that you would like to do well in, but are not as important as the “A” races. “C” races are generally considered to be training days. Each athlete must decide for him/herself which races are important and why. After assigning priorities, the key is to predict your times. For example, if you are going compete in the Rockman half Iron-distance triathlon in early June while preparing for Ironman Wisconsin, you would consider the Ironman the “A” race and the half Iron-distance a “B” or “C” race. As for predicting your performance at the Rockman, you want to have reasonable and tangible goals such as a 30-minute swim, 2:45 bike and 1:40 run.

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