Iron Pol

I was surprised to see my name on the March leader board at Plus 3 Network.  I made the Top 50 for "hand entered" workouts coming in at number 48, earning $18.32 for World Bicycle Relief.  One more workout would have easily moved me up another half-dozen positions, so I know I can do a bunch more if I can have a month without some kind of cold slowing me down.

For anyone unfamiliar with the site, Plus 3 Network is a tool for tracking training.  More importantly, it is a tool for turning training into donations for worthwhile causes.  When signing up, each participant selects a sponsor/cause combination.  Then, as training is documented, each participant earns money which the sponsor contributes to the specific charity.  As a means of documenting and tracking training, Plus 3 Network is far short of many of the Online resources.  But the ability to raise money for various organizations makes it a great tool.

Consider my account.  When I registered, I selected World Bicycle Relief as the charity.  SRAM is the sponsoring company.  Since November of 2008 I have logged nearly 1600 miles of training in a total of just over 235 hours.  For me logging that training into Plus 3 Network, SRAM has donated $66.52 to World Bicycle Relief.  All totaled, more than $10,000 dollars has been raised by people training for a cause.

For me, it is a no-brainer.  I'm already doing the training, and I'm already documenting the training in multiple locations.  I have to fill out my company's wellness forms and my personal tracking file.  The 30 seconds it takes to log the workout into Plus 3 is well worth the effort.

An added benefit is that various sponsors run "Challenges" that allow participants to compete for rewards.  Since starting, I've picked up some SRAM socks, a reusable shopping bag, and a couple other little goodies.  I've yet to win drawings for some of the bigger items which have included Garmin GPS units and store gift certificates.

If you haven't stopped by their site, check it out.  They have dozens of causes to which you can dedicate your training, and the site is easy to use.  It's a great way to make your training count for others, and every time a workout is entered, you have the joy of knowing you're doing something positive.