What happens when Nanna comes on holiday and lets Mr 4 use her camera?

2011 was a good year.

Work is good. Family life is good. I’m healthier and fitter than I’ve ever been before (which has had a clear and massive impact on the first two things).

Fitness

It all started when I signed up for the gym on the 27th of December 2010 weighing about 89kg. When I was 17 I was 72.5kg, so there had been some definite excess in those 11 years. I used an Olympic Distance Triathlon in July as my motivation.

I trained really hard. Weights, running, swimming and riding, and I hit my goal of finishing and just missed my hopeful target of 3hrs (it took me 3hrs and 4minutes).

It’s now 2012 and I’m down to 79kg. I’m hoping for another good year and to get down to 72 before 2013 rolls around.

Some stats for 2011 (yes I love numbers):

• Cycling: 5933km
• Running: 279km
• Swimming: 17km (not enough training. This is why I didn’t finish in under 3 hours!)

Favourite rides:

• My first ever ride up Cheddar Gorge on the 1st of October
• 96km in San Francisco across the bridge and up Mount Tamalpais

Goals for 2012:

• Half an hour quicker in the Bristol triathlon
• “Gold” time in the Dartmoor Classic 106 mile cyclosportive event in June
• Start racing my bike in criteriums (and maybe road races) and not fall off/get dropped
• 12,000km on the bike

Family

Having Mum stay with us for a couple of weeks, and then Dad, Krista and Tom all come over and stay as well was brilliant.

It was sad to see Brad and Renee head back to Australia, but it was great having them over here for a couple of years.

Galen is 3 (“I’m three, three and a half”) and is so much fun to spend time with it’s crazy. It was tough at times earlier in the year (especially when we were forced to move house in April), but he is now a complete joy and pleasure to be with, almost all of the time!

Onwards

The hope for 2012 is much more of the same, just harder/stronger/faster/further, and as much quality time with friends and family as possible.

I’ve become a bit of a cycling addict this year. I ride to work and back almost every day and have clocked up almost 2000 miles so far, however when it’s wet and the roads are slippery and dirty, my Allez isn’t the best thing to be on – the gears get clogged and I seem to spend more time cleaning it than riding it.

So I decided to get a new bike for the winter. I like the geometry and feel of my road bike, so went for a Specialized Langster. Almost the same frame, but a single-speed and it’s a bit lighter.

The plan is to use the freewheel to start with, then see if I can cope with it fixed.

In the last four and a half years I have paid for at least all of the following Twitter applications:

• Twitterrific (Mac)
• Twitterrific (iPhone)
• Twitterrific Premium
• Twitterrific MAS
• Tweetie 1
• Tweetie 2
• Tweetie (Mac)
• Birdbrain
• DMs
• Kiwi

But during this time I haven’t been able to give Twitter any money.

If Twitter would concentrate on their platform rather than selling their users and forcing me to use their service the way they want me to use it, I would definitely pay for the following:

• £20/year just to support Twitter
• £40/year to get a “supporter” badge on my profile like the “verified” badge the celebrities I don’t care about get
• £5/month if I could filter tweets on the server so they were hidden in any client application I chose to use

I’m sure I’m not the only one of the millions and millions of Twitter users who want to give you money. Be innovative. Be brave.

Twitter is an extremely important platform. Please don’t ruin it.

I’m not going to comment about the points system or the season, but I couldn’t find this data anywhere else.