I’ve been working with my coach, Seymour’s Greg Reasoner, for only about 3 weeks now.

Greg has completed three full-Ironman distance races and multiple other triathlons, running and cycling races.

I met him through Seymour Multisport Club when I joined a few years ago.

I’ve always seen Greg as having a lot of knowledge about triathlons, racing and training.

He’s also full of confidence and just, in general, a great, fun person. When he told me that he’d be my coach — I was so excited.

It’s great to have someone guide me on this journey.

Greg thought we’d get started with training around the end of March or beginning of April, and I started harassing him to go ahead and get started.

He finally agreed after I asked him a few times.

Greg has been emailing me workouts, usually for two weeks at a time.

Each week has been about three swim workouts, three bike workouts and three to four runs.

Now that’s a lot of workouts for seven days, and my husband and I have had to juggle our already busy schedule around.

It seems to be working well so far.

I had nothing but excitement for my training until I started uploading my workouts so that Greg could review them.

I have a Garmin 910xt watch, which tracks about everything I’m doing in regards to my swimming, biking and running. It tracks heart rate, calories burned, distance, how fast I’m going, etc. Once I’m finished with my workout, I upload it to Garmin Connect, an Internet program where Greg can see all of my data.

That’s how he knows exactly what I’m doing and how fast I’m doing it. I find myself wanting to text, email, etc. after each workout wanting to explain myself.

Well, I had a slow run because I stayed out late or I hadn’t eaten well that day.

My legs felt tired on the bike or I didn’t get all of my swim workout done because I overslept.

Seriously, every workout I feel like I have to justify how I’m not doing well. Luckily, I have been able to hold myself back from contacting him because I knew that I would sound crazy.

I was so nervous waiting to hear feedback from him from the first 1 to 2 weeks of training.

Would he be disappointed in how slow I am? Would he think that I’m not trying hard enough? I think there were a million questions running through my head.

When he emailed me about the workouts, I saw only seven words, “I like what I’m seeing so far.”

That’s it. No judgment. No questions about why this bike seemed slow, my heart rate was too high on my run, this workout wasn’t exactly completed.

I felt great, so relieved.

My coach likes what he sees. Why can’t I like what I see? Why can’t I be proud of my workouts?

I need to trust my coach and continue to do what he says. Be proud of my workouts. Realize that a few years ago, I could never have jumped right into 10 workouts a week.

I am, by far, my own worst critic.

I need to step it up and become a cheerleader for myself because on Oct. 11, I’m going to be out there on that Ironman Louisville course with only me to keep myself going.

Stacey Parisi is a Seymour native and resident. Her columns will appear regularly in The Tribune as she trains to compete in Ironman Louisville 2015. Send comments to [email protected].