Is it worth it?

After missing two days of training because life is busy (and I was feeling a little lazy), I started wondering if all this training is worth it.  I skipped one swim, one bike, and one run the last two days and as a result I had time to eat dinner with my family one night, sleep in an extra hour one day, and volunteer one evening.  It was a nice change of pace. Don't get me wrong, I would still need to do something to keep the weight in check and the heart healthy, but I wouldn't need to do quite as much.

My volume so far this year is good for me.  I've averaged 6.7 hours of training per week over the first 34 weeks for a total of:

Bike:129h 13m 33s  - 2037.91 Mi

Run:70h 42m 38s  - 409.18 Mi

Swim:28h 42m 22s  - 60380.84 Yd


6.7 hours doesn't sound like much but if you include getting workout stuff together, cool down time, putting workout stuff away, showering, etc, that probably adds 30-45 minutes to every workout which adds 2-3 hours per week for a total of 9-10 hours.

My volume chart varies all over the place due to race, recovery and vacation schedules.

Funny, while typing this I was also going to mention my house is a mess and so is my yard so I would have time for both of those things.  Truth be told, if I back off on the exercise, I will fill the time in with something I enjoy and neither house work nor yard work fall into that category :-).

This is something I will be pondering over the next couple of months as I decide whether or not to do a full Ironman next year,  stick with HIMs, go back to Sprints and or Olys, go just to running, or whatever.  I'm still doing my private HIM October 2nd, then taking a week off.