Opportunity of a lifetime!

Tomorrow I leave for Vancouver, Canada for the Triathlon World Championships. I am so excited and honored to have been chosen for Team USA to represent our country in the sport of triathlon at the world championships.

I am sure this will be an exciting weekend. I am going into it for the experience and ofcourse all of the Team USA gear :) and to be a part of Team USA. This is especially exciting on an Olympic year. I don't have any expectations for the actual race. I had a really good race at Wildflower


so I am feeling good about it but the level of competition is a little beyond my comfort zone so I am just going into it to enjoy the experience and hold my own against everyone else.

I will give you a recap when I get back!

Perform Better in Rhode Island

I just got back from doing my first presentation with Perform Better. If you haven't heard of Perform Better they have become the #1 conference in the industry for trainers to learn and get continuing education from so I was extremely honored to be on the agenda this year among other names in the industry such as Mike Boyle, Gray Cook, Juan Carlos Santana, Martin Rooney, Diane Vives, Anthony Diluligio and ofcourse my husband Alwyn Cosgrove.

My topic was strength training for women and it seemed to be well received. I have to say I was nervous being in that line up of well known speakers in this industry. I think women in this industry and men working with women are looking for guidance and I was able to offer some advice after coaching women for so many years and from a woman's perspective. So I had a good turnout in my room and lots of great feedback.

The last Perform Better conference takes place in Long Beach on June 13th,14th and 15th. If you are on the west coast, don't miss it! The information packed in to these three days is something you can't miss if you are a trainer or someone who wants to get into the fitness industry. Check out their website for more info at www.performbetter.com.

Our entire Results Fitness team of fitness coaches will be in attendance!

Kona Bound! Congrats Erika!

Erika Lilley(above at Ironman Wisconsin) who has been my training partner, a fitness coach at my gym and a friend of mine qualified for Kona this past weekend! She is also co author with me on our book, So You Want To Train For Your First Triathlon. She raced at the California Half Ironman and came in second place and got a Kona slot! When I met Erika about a year and a half ago she first contacted me to help her with her training and told me her eventual goal was to go to Kona. I started training with her as a training partner and helping her plan out her training and have watched her grow as an athlete and push herself day in and day out to achieve this goal. I am so excited for her, what an amazing accomplishment! She set this goal and has accomplished it!

SHe is a talented athlete but more than that she works extremely hard to bring out the best in herself. Going in to this race she was not without obstacles. For one she has been busier than ever at work as a fitness coach training more clients than she has ever trained before so her time was limited and her energy was being used up...but this was not an excuse for her...also about 2 weeks before the event she crashed on her bike and it completely cracked and she had bumps and bruises and could have easily bowed out at that point...but that didn't stop her, luckily a local bike shop hooked her up with a new frame and put it together for her so she had a bike to ride.

She stayed focused no matter what and had a great race and now is going to Kona!!!!

Congratulations Erika! I am so proud of you!

First Powerlifting Competition

I am always looking to challenge myself and get the best out of myself and joining one my employees at a powerlifting meet seemed like just the thing to push myself beyond my normal limits. Last weekend I participated in my first powerlifting competition. I competed in deadlift only since it transferred over to triathlon the most of any of the lifts. I still have a Half Ironman I am training for on March 29th. Check out the video of me below lifting 297.6 pounds and setting an American record winning a gold medal at the competition!(The video is squashed a bit so I appear shorter and wider than I really am but the lifting is what your watching anyway :))

What a great experienceI had! Never would have thought. If you never try, you never know...

12 Week Challenge

The 12 Week Challenge is off and running at our gym and clients are buzzing around motivated with goals in mind to accomplish over the 12 weeks. The motivation is contagious and you can't help but join in!

Our staff also join in and have our own challenge where each of us set goals and push ourselves to new levels over the 12 weeks with our clients. We each put money in and the winner gets the whole pot at the end.

So, what's in store for me over the 12 weeks?

Ever since my Ironman I would say I have been slacking(that is compared to doing 20 hours a week of exercise). Since my Ironman I have been to Scotland twice for 2 weeks at a time(not the best for preventing post Ironman weight gain) and ofcourse the holidays and whatever other excuse I can come up with...I gained some bodyfat and haven't been as consistant as I usually like to be with my nutrition and training....YES, Rachel Cosgrove loses focus sometimes too... :) I am only human.

I think some of my clients think I don't have to work at it BUT for me if I am not consistant I have the genetic potential to gain body fat quite easily so a few months without keeping myself focused and consistant and I have gained a few pounds.

Our bodies are always fluctuating. It is hard to ever truly "maintain," you are usually either gaining bodyfat or losing bodyfat. I always tell my clients to have an upper limit that they will let themselves get to before they will take action and and get back down closer to their target weight and bodyfat. There are times of the year when everyone will edge up on that upper limit and then times to step up your training and peak at an all new fitness level.

Now is a time to step it up and peak. I have twelve weeks and over that twelve weeks I will-
1. Lose 8 pounds of body fat(to be at a lower bodyfat than when I did my Ironman).
2. Compete in the California Half Ironman at the half way point(in 6 weeks).
3. Compete at Wildflower Olympic distance at the end of the 12 weeks with a personal best at an Olympic Distance race leading to the World Championships that I will be attending in June in Vancouver, Canada.

Join me on my challenge. Check my blog regularly for updates over the next 12 weeks! Gotta go pack my lunch and train :)

Just do it!

So, I have been struggling with the fact that I have not been able to put 100% in to my training and will be repeating a race I did last year in 7 weeks time. Last year I was training for my Ironman and nothing got in the way of my training. This year is a different story. I have my business and career coming first(after my husband and family which are always #1) and then my obligation to Team in Training who I coach for while the 50 participants on my team raise money for The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. So, my own training has taken a back seat being third on my priority list. So, I know going in to Ironman California 70.3 that it will be hard to improve on the performance I gave last year and this bothers me.

So, I had to decide by Feb. 15th if I was going to pull out to get a refund and I was struggling with this decision....So, I emailed my good friend Alison who is also a coach with me for Team in Training for advice and she said,

"It sounds like you really do want to do the race but you know you won't be 100% ready for it. I say if you can do the race without injuring yourself because of being unprepared then go for it. If nothing else it would be a really good training day. You have to be ok with however you perform that day and just enjoy it for what it is. I think you will feel better if you just do it. :)"

So, decision made- I will just do it and enjoy myself no matter how I end up doing. I will put what I can in to my training these next 7 weeks and give the race everything I can that day.

I will Just do it! Thanks for the help Alison!

Pendulum of goal setting

I read a book recently, Confessions of a Self Made Millionaire, that discussed the difference between having too many goals and going after one single goal. The book talked about, among a ton of other stuff, how if you pick one single goal and go after it day and night you will undoubtedly reach that goal. But when you start adding in other goals to try to "balance" out your life you are actually decreasing your chances of reaching the first goal because now your energy is divided up.

Last year my focus was on completing an Ironman, I made my training my priority and I never missed a training session. I gave everything I had to every training session whether I would have anything left at the end to go to work or not. I completed my goal of finishing my first Ironman and crossed the finish line in a decent time. I gave it everything I had. That was my one goal last year and I undoubtedly completed it.

I had someone else running my gym for me last year while I trained for my Ironman and it's true what they say- nobody cares about your business as much as you do. As it turned out that somebody was not focused on my business at all and unfortunatley the business suffered while I was focusing on training for my Ironman.

I told myself going into 2008 that my priority is my career and business this year. So, one month into the year and we have had a record month at the gym, signing up more new members than we ever have before. We are also expanding and taking over next door. I have been hired to be on the Perform Better Tour with the best speakers in the fitness industry. I am making a ton of progress on my career and business goals and I want to keep going full force ahead reaching our potential at our gym this year and in my career. I want to undoubtedly reach my potential as a business owner and fitness professional in 2008.

The question is can I still compete in triathlons with the same performances I gave last year? Or am I Ok with my performances dropping from what they were last year? I am still signed up for a few races this year, one of which is in 8 weeks, the Ca Half Ironman, and my training has been lacking. I get in like 4 workouts a week which seems like nothing compared to what I was doing last year leading up to this same race. I am debating on if I should even be doing the race. I don't like to do anything if I am not doing it the best I possibly can and I know I will not be going into this race the best I can because my training time is limited.

Will I enjoy myself and get something out of completing the race a third time even if my time is not as good as last year? Or will it take away from my focus this year of running my business? We should be getting the keys to expand in 4 weeks so I will absolutley not be focused on this race at all because my focus will be on the expansion. But will having this race keep me in "balance"? Or will it take away from the one goal I undoubtedly want to hit this year, of growing and expanding our business to reach it's potential?

If you undoubtedly want to hit a goal- go after that one single goal with everything you have and do not get distracted with anything else. To reach a goal it almost has to become an obsession day and night. Focus on what you want!