I am getting ahead of myself?

x2.  Find a plan and train for it and enjoy the journey!

~Mike

Do you have a coach? It might be a good idea to enlist the services of a coach, and take their advice at each step along the way. Heap of people on here are amazing and know so much about this stuff that it blows my mind (I'm not one of them, I might add), but I'm in the same position as you, aiming for an IM with little other tri experience, and the major advice given to me by everyone was to get a coach.

That way, your programme will absolutely fit you and you might be able to get straight to focussing on the right type of training right away, rather than perhaps starting a programme that might be geared for an athlete with a different set of strengths? If you feel comfortable with doing so, a great first step would be to talk to a coach. They'll take your wish to do the distance seriously and you'll get good answers from them.  Good luck!

I am of the school that 'almost always' recomends going for it  as Pennstate posted.  Your post was easy to respong to becuae: 

1.  You have done a marathon.  Many people do their first IM having never covered 26.2 miles on foot.

2.  Your stated goal is "FINISH"

3.  You currently "swim semi regularly ... for about an hour continuously".  I never swam an hour in my life till I was 3/4ths into my first IM training.

4.  You regulary bike 25 mile - a good start.

5.  You have 11 months and are "completely dedicated" and will "train hard"

6.  You're gonna get a new bike (which makes one morally obligated to ride it often).

If you think it would help you to do a triathlon or two before the IM, you have plenty of time to find some local sprints or Olys.  11 months is more than enough time to safely ramp up your volume so I don't see any issue there.

You sound motivated and anxious now and...well, hope deferred makes a heart sick.  So I don't think putting it off for the sake of maybe doing it a little faster a couple of years from now is worth it.  Doing one will give you experience and give you an idea of what it will take (training-wise) if you want to set a specific time goal for your next one.  Or you may find that IM training is 'too much' and drop by to HIM or Oly or sprints. 

Good luck with whatever you decide and welcome aboard!

~Mike

To just finish anyone with the right drive can do an IM in 11 months, probably a lot less.  When you put the numbers together and the total time up to 17 hours is a lot of time to just finish.  The question is do you want to just finish or do it well?

In my life with family, work, special operations rescue team work, etc, I knew I'd have one opportunity to do my IM with the best possible result and have trained that way and have built to this point over the last two years.  The wife and I are dropping some serious coin on this IM trip and want it to be the best it can be.  It may be a few years before I get a chance to do an IM again and when the sun rises next Saturday morning I know I'm ready for a good day, not just to finish but to enjoy the entire experience.

So what do you want to do?  Survive or finish strong, then you'll have your answer.

Good luck with whatever you decide.  It's one heck of a journey and I hope I have a decent ending next week.

Please don't think 'just finish' will be a grueling, agonizing experience and you won't enjoy the day or the experience.  My goals for both my IMs were "just finish" and they were both wonderful experiences and, without a doubt, the most fun I have ever had in any triathlon or marathon.  I finished my send IM with a 'just finish' time of 14:30.

But don't think it's all about the finish line either.  You will see many IM finishers here with signature lines or banners on their blogs that say the IM is about the "journey" and that is so true.  From the time you sign up until the time the starting gun goes off IM will never be far from your mind.  It can consume you at times.  You will find yourself in meetings at work daydreaming about your IM and calculating your bike pace and how much margin you can give yourself on the run etc.  Instead of listening to the Sunday sermon you will be checking the splits on your watch from your long run that you did that morning at the crack of dawn.

During peak training months, you will find most of your free time is spent doing s/b/r...and even when you aren't training, you are too tired to work in the garden or take the boat to the lake or do much of anything.  You might find days where you swim in the morning, run at lunch and bike in the evenings.  You mightl chuckle when you take your shower after getting off the trainer at night that this is the 3rd shower you've taken today!  At times you will be floating on endorphine highs and think you will spend the rest of your life doing this and other times you will question  your sanity for ever signing up for such an undertaking.

But it's all good.  :-)  It's part of the 'experience' that people talk about.  Race day is the celebration....the summit at the end of a long climb.  People talk about the cost of an IM being $550 but the real cost of an IM is the time commitment, the mental commitment, the physical commitment and the emotional commitment.  Likewise, the reward is not the finisher's medal or certificate with your time, it is the memory of nearly of a year pursueing a goal.

~Mike

I can tell you this, he is currently more fit right now than I am and if I was inclined to do an IM next year I would not think twice about it.  11 months is a long time!  He has trained for an completed a marathon so I think he knows what it takes to build up to martathon fitness.  He swims an hour continuously now and I'd guess if he "had to" he could swim 1.5 hrs and complete the 2.4 miles right now.  Certainly w/ 11 more months he will be in great IM swim shape.  So really it comes down to biking and 11 months is way more time than needed to get into biking shape.

Karen, you suggested he do some shorter races first and he certainly has time to do that if he thinks that will help.  Personally, I do not that is necessary.  I can't think of anything that you are gonna learn in a sprint or oly that you can't do for the first time in an IM.  IM transitions are nothing like sprints or Oly trans.  Maybe I'm missing something but I don't see what doing shorter races does to help one finish an IM.  He might learn something from a HIM that might help him mentally but frankly, if you look at the training volume for a good HIM plan vs the training volume for an IM plan, they are not that different.  So do the race your really want to do.

To the OP...look, there is no way we can read a few lines about you and predict how you will perform or enjoy an IM.  Everyone is different and we all have different levels of commitment, financial situations, goals, amount of free time, family commitments, genetics.....I could go on and on.  So we tend to answer questions like this based on our paradigms.  You asked if you can finish an IM with 11 months of committed training and the answer is yes.  Should you wait?  That is a decision you'll have to make for youself.  You've got a little more information now and you can see there is no consensus among IM wheter you should do it now or later.

Side note...being a student of life, I find questions like yours interesting.  I think one of two things is usually true.  1.  You already know you are gonna do it and are searching for confirmation of your decision.  or 2.  You are truly 'one the fence' and looking for something to push you one way or the other.  Either motive is ok and nothing wrong with either.  I hope you found what you were lookng for.  :-)

~Mike

I want to thank everyone who posted a response to my question. I found all of the input very useful. Apparently there is no true right or wrong answer and it is a decision that I have to make on my own. I just completed my marathon on 10/10/2009 and for 2 days after the race swore I would not do another. On the 3^rd day I started looking for a ½ IM for next year and started training for it 9 days after the marathon. While training for the ½ IM my mental images and motivations are of completing a full IM and that is my ultimate goal. I think like Mike said my mind was already made up and I was just looking for confirmation when I posted my question. I am going to do it, so let the journey begin! I am sure I will be a regular on this site now and will try to use my very limited knowledge to help anyone who could benefit from it. Thanks again!