Jeff's Zone 2

Great book on WWII (and leadership)

I just finished reading Partners in Command: George Marshall and Dwight Eisenhower in War and Peace.

This book is fantastic. It is a great read for anyone who enjoys reading about WWII and military history (as I do). But in this case it also explores the key senior relationships in the war. Not just between Marshall and Ike, but between the Allied Joint Chiefs, between Roosevelt and Churchill, and between Ike and his subordinates.

It is fascinating to explore situations where these leaders had to decide which organizational and political battles to fight, when to allow organizational conflict to occur and when to stop it, when to trust and support the decisions of their direct reports without getting in the way, and when to step in and exert their authority. All when the fate of the Allies and millions of lives were in the balance.

There are many lessons in here about how to lead people and teams that apply to business and life as well as to war. I highly recommend it.

Ironman Arizona 2008: Mission Accomplished!

My second Ironman! What a great experience.

Here’s how it went...

The water was murky, but actually quite comfortable. I took the time to look around and see all the people lining the bridges and shore cheering set against the deep blue sky-- it was a real sight to behold. It was perfect.

I had been working very hard on my swim this winter and had high hopes to improve my time from IM Wisconsin 2006. The canon sounded and we were off. Whoever said the Ironman swim start is a contact sport was wrong… this whole swim was outright combat. I was hit in the face five times, kicked, pushed under, you name it, all the way to the final turn into the finish. I tried to stay clear at times but wanted to draft so I got back into the mix. I was a little worried that I had burned too much time but when I got out of the water the clock read 1:03!!!! A 10 minute swim PR!!!!! Ok, the work so far had paid off. I was stoked.

The bike… Hot and windy up hill, fast down hill. I was hoping to ride around 6 hours and finished the first loop at just under 2 hours so I was on track but knew I had a lot of work ahead of me.

Loop 2 was tough. The heat picked up (rising to 95 degrees for the afternoon), as did the wind (22 mph sustained winds). Loop 2 was slower than I wanted by about 15 minutes, yikes. Not all of it was from cycling pace (special needs, etc.) but I was possibly a little too cautious on the up hill saving my legs.

Loop 3 was much better, perhaps because I knew I had one more hard effort up and then it was a sprint to the finish. I pushed uphill in the big gear and flew downhill all the way to the finish and it felt great. Loop 3 was about 2 hours for a total time of 6:19. Overall slower than I had hoped but I was ok with it given the conditions.

I got out of T2 in the blazing heat (still 95!). My legs felt decent, but I immediately felt a sharp pain in my left knee and I was very bloated, making it hard to run. For the first 5 miles or so I had to run/walk and hope I could pull it together. At the same time I was doing everything possible to manage the heat… ice in the hat, in the back pocket of my tri jersey, everywhere. I drank plenty of cola and it really seemed to help the stomach and the energy level.

Around mile 6 I was able to run without walking and realized I was going at a pretty decent pace. I used extra time at each aid station trying to get cool. I have asked myself a few times in retrospect whether I spent too much time at the aid stations and probably could have had a faster run, but I can’t second guess the call at the time. I took the time I needed and ran as hard as I could between the aid stations.

With 10 miles left I was really hurting but I also knew that I could go sub-12 if I could just hold it together. With 6 miles left I picked up the pace again and bet that my efforts had kept me cool enough and that I could go through the aid stations much faster.

There was nothing left in the tank when I finished in 11:53, a PR by almost an hour and a half!

I am ecstatic with the result. But, more satisfying in many ways was sharing the whole experience, starting last summer, through the winter, in Training Bible Coaching Tucson training camp, and at the race, with so many friends/teammates from Multisport Madness who supported and encouraged me every step of the way! Thanks of course to my family, friends, and coach Jenny Garrison!

Master's Swimming

For years some of my friend's encouraged me to join a master's swimming team. I always hesitated. Big mistake.

I finally joined Naperville Waves one last Fall and I have to say it has been an amazing experience. Waves is one of the better teams around and working with the coaches (I won't name names for privacy reasons-- but you can see who they are on the website) has helped my swimming and fitness tremendously.

I would encourage anyone who really wants to get better at swimming, whether for competition reasons or just fitness, to go joint a team. I am swimming twice the yardage per week than I did preparing for IM Wisconsin, and every workout is better.

The reason I hesitated at first was that I was concerned that I would be out-classed. Well, I was pretty much right about that! ;-) There are some amazing swimmers on this team-- former college swimmers that pretty much put the best triathletes I know to shame (really-- you should see some of this!). But, where I was wrong was that it didn't matter. There are also plenty of swimmers at all levels getting in the pool, getting fast, and getting fit.

When I first started, the coaches got me to change my stroke immediately..... a combination of bad habits and old techniques (learned from my HS swimming days 20 years ago) were taking a toll. I am completely rebuilding my stroke... working on front quadrant swimming and longer distance per stroke. Faster, more efficient, and more fun. I am also being forced to swim different strokes. I am actually swimming butterfly with reasonable technique! I am *far* from where I need to be but much better than where I was. I have no doubt that I will take serious time off of my last IM swim at IM Arizona come April.

But even if you aren't planning to race, the nice thing about swimming... it is great for fitness and doesn't create the same amount of stress on the body that running and other sports can. You can get a lot more intensity in per week and recover faster.

So, for those of you who have been on the fence or wishing they could get back in the pool.... do your research on the best teams in the area and go join one.

If the government really wants to stimulate the economy...

... don't give out rebate checks. Give out gift cards.

Social Network Proliferation

Irwin Lazar commented on the recent influx of invitations to link to people on a new social network, Spock. I couldn't agree more. As soon as I got the emails I was turned off by the tone, and after visiting the site I couldn't figure out how this would do anything but further clog my inbox.

Right now I utilize three social networks: Facebook, Plaxo, and LinkedIn. In my view they serve distinct purposes and command different levels of attention.

Because I view these sites differently, I am trying to be very careful about how I view a "relationship" (or, friend). When Plaxo first introduced their "Plaxo Pulse" service, I noticed a massive increase in the number of requests to link to people ,similar to the "race" we have all seen by some people on LinkedIn to create massive relationship lists. While I like the new Plaxo Pulse service, I have avoided createing too many relationships on it because I use it differently than LinkedIn.

Here is a quick summary of how I use these sites and what to expect if you invite me to connect:

1. LinkedIn: I find this very useful for finding contacts through existing relationships. And, contrary to the original intent of only establishing "trusted relationships", I do tend to link to people I barely know (and accept link requests from the same). At the end of the day, the larger the network the better the chance of meeting someone that might be a valuable relationship in the future. So, if you want to link to me in LinkedIn, by all means do so!

2. Plaxo: I think Plaxo's ability to keep my address book current is fantastic. I am also loving the new ability to create synch points and synchronize address books across machines and platforms. I literally keep my address book at work, my work cellphone, my home computer, a personal cellphone, a yahoo email, and a google email all in synch automatically. It is truly a great service and enormously helpful. However, when it comes to linking (connecting) using Plaxo Pulse I am a little more selective than with LinkedIn. Why? because it seems that when you connect to someone they get added to your address book (and then synched with every other address book). I suspect there is a way to manage that using synch groups but that is more trouble than I am willing to go to. Bottom line: when I get a connection request, if I don't know you well enough to have you on all of my address books (including my cellphone) I wont accept it. Better to use LinkedIn if you want to connect to me.

3. Facebook: Other than the fact that my Facebook news feed is becoming so packed with sponsor adds and viral spam from applications that I haven't even loaded (but have been loaded by friends) I love the ability of Facebook to keep me connected to my friends (more on that in future posts). because of Facebook's security and privacy model, it is pretty much the only place I will upload photos and information about my family so I can share that with friends. Thus, the bar for me connecting to someone on Facebook is much, much higher than Plaxo. In fact, if I don't know and trust you well enough to let you know when I am not home, see pictures of me in triathlon gear, and see information about my family, I won't connect or accept a friend request on Facebook. I think this also has ramifications for the use of Facebook at work, but more on that later.

Not sure if others use similar guidelines but I thought I would share mine.

As for whether there is room for other social networks... I think so, but they have to serve a very specific niche IMO and ideally extend the other networks, not act as silos. I can think of a few areas where I would love to build a social network that would not overlap with the ones I mention above (and could even add value) but they would have to have a very specific purpose. To be frank, I am going to leave it at that... you never I know, I might try to build one of them some day. :-)