EverymanTri.com

Can

Click HERE for the complete story about this remarkable father and son.

Ironman; Forged by Adversity

This week on raceAthlete.com we’ll be featuring the stories of several athletes who, for various reasons, were unable to complete the recent Ironman at Coeur d’Alene, Idaho.

I find their stories to be truly amazing and in many ways much more inspirational than the stories featured on the Kona NBC broadcast.

To start with I can really relate to having to drop out of a race as I did so in my first half Ironman attempt.

But more importantly I think that you learn much more about yourself from adversity than you do from victory. I don’t mean to devalue the courage and effort it takes to cross the line before midnight at any Ironman race, but sometimes it takes just as much courage effort to keep going knowing that your goal is slipping (or has completely slipped) out of your grasp.

A good friend of mine and local running and triathlon coach Scott Fliegelman dropped out of IMCDA after the bike. He was trying to qualify for Kona, but he spent almost an hour trying to change a flat tire. This completely devastated his race day strategy and left him without a real goal of reason to finish. Below is just a short excerpt from his frustrating race day experience:

I continued pedaling, eating, and drinking my way back to the start of lap #2 without catching anyone I knew, but did see Garry and Neil heading back out looking strong. I didn’t see Liz or Mary or JJ or Heidi or any of our cheering section (aka Iron Sherpas) on my way through town (although they did see me and cheered loudly) and forged on for what would be a long, and mentally challenging 56-mile lap. I picked up my “special needs” bag at mile 63, and instead of switching out the bottles on the fly as I planned, I decided I could spare the time to stop and do so more carefully, and while I was at it use the port-o-let that was nearby instead of going while on the bike as I’d done in the past, and then I chatted briefly with a friendly volunteer, and did some light stretching…

And that was the beginning of the end right there I tried convincing myself that I was doing a really big, really well supported, really expensive group workout… or that I was going to conserve my energy and run a legendary marathon… or that I could play cheerleader for the athletes I was passing at a far less frequent rate than before, but when it all came down to it, the Ironman is really, really hard and you must be 100% focused and committed in order to fight through the pain and even complete the distance. I believe that it is equally arduous for the sub 9-hour pro and the 15-hour first timer, and now I was somewhere in between the two… a “no man’s land” with a silver lining which I could not reveal for myself.

Despite having coached 1,000’s of athletes to “find comfort in discomfort”; a concept where you welcome the familiar sensations that reinforce that you are indeed doing exactly what is necessary to reach desired goals, I could only find “discomfort in discomfort” each time I checked. I was still eating and drinking on schedule and physically had plenty left in the tank, but emotionally I was near complete exhaustion as I cautiously went through the motions on the hills and twisty roads between miles 75-100.

I began to negotiate with myself about the meaning of the upcoming 26.2 mile run. I came up with several reasons to do it, and several more against the idea, and allowed the two opposing camps to battle it out in my brain as I rode slower and slower back toward T2. The reasons “for” included: respecting the sport, setting a good example for F4 athletes to persevere despite adversity, getting to the bottom of my fitness (even if I didn’t meter it out as evenly as I planned between the sports), and not “raining on the parade” for my friends competing that day… many for the first time. The arguments against included: being utterly exhausted mentally from dealing with nearly 90 miles of riding on a sketchy spare tire and trying not to fracture my hip, saving my legs the three weeks recovery they would need from the marathon and therefore moving right into XTERRA training mode with the possibility of qualifying for Worlds in Maui (not a bad back up to Kona), not having fun any longer, and lastly, my Mom and Dad would’ve definitely wanted me to stop!

When I finally committed to the decision to drop out after the bike, it was a decision I made 100% for myself, and with a few days now to reflect on it… it was the right choice. It came down to this…
By deciding to “give up”, I feel I still showed respect to the sport and my fellow competitors by demonstrating just how difficult it is to complete an Ironman, and that every athlete who did so on the day, whether more or less gifted than I, should feel incredibly proud of their accomplishment. I now know that the next time I persevere, fight through pain, and overcome a major obstacle, it will mean that much more to me as it will not be easy, or automatic, or taken for granted, or even smart, but I’ll do it because it helps shape who I am and who I strive to be as an athlete.

You may recall Trish Downing from last year’s Kona coverage or from my recent podcast. Trish Downing, a paraplegic athlete, is the second female wheelchair racer (first female paraplegic) to complete an Iron distance triathlon (Redman Triathlon 2005...finishing time 18:03). She is a member of the physically challenged National Triathlon Team and a pioneer in women’s wheelchair triathlon.

She also competed at IMCDA this year and had to drop out on the bike portion of the race. She is still striving to get the one paraplegic athlete slot for Kona. The ugly swim conditions combined with the hilly bike portion made for a tough day for her. Here's a short excerpt from her race report

When I got on my bike, I was still feeling fairly optimistic. I knew I wasn’t in great shape because my swim was even slower than Hawaii, but I wasn’t throwing up salt water, so I figured that had me a bit ahead of the
game as compared to Kona. I also knew I had a lot of climbing ahead of me.

The beginning of the race was about a 10-mile out and back that went through town and along the lake. Although it had a bit of minor climbing, it was nothing compared to what I had coming ahead. I really had to keep my speed up because I learned in the race meeting the night before that I had to be
in from the first loop (56 miles) of the bike by 1:30. Otherwise, I wouldn’t make the time cut. That was different from Kona where they just let you go as far as you can in 10.5 hours and THEN cut you. I was feeling pretty beat from the swim, but the first part of the bike went well. After about 15 or
20 miles though, the whole story changed. I knew there were hills out there, we had driven the course, but they never look as bad from the car.

We counted about seven MAJOR climbs (short but steep) from the car, but it seemed when I was out there, that everything was uphill. It reminded me of one of the last training rides I did in Colorado…the Elephant Rock. That is one of the hardest rides I’ve ever done (and I’ve only done up to the 50-mile ride, never the century), but when I did that ride a few weeks ago, I thought to myself, “there’s no way Idaho is going to be this hard.”

Well…surprise, surprise, it WAS that hard. In fact, on one hill, when I was moving at approximately 2 mph, there was a cyclist at the side of the road, dressed in a racing jersey, but obviously a spectator and not a racer, and he said to me, “didn’t I just see you a couple of weeks ago at Elephant
Rock?” I was surprised, a Colorado guy, but all I could say to him was, “yes that was me and this race sucks as bad as that ride!” He just laughed as I pulled away.

It was nice along the route to have some screaming downhills…I think I got up to 35 or 40mph a couple of times, but on the flip side, I also saw my computer register “0” mph once or twice as I inched up a hill. Needless to say, I knew I wasn’t going to make the time cut. The difference in Idaho however was that I couldn’t have continued after one loop if I wanted to. My cold was back in full force, I was exhausted and I simply didn’t have anything left in the tank. When I got picked up in Hawaii I was moving at
the fastest pace I had gone all day. When I pulled into transition at C d’A, Neal and Steve had to pull like a rag doll from my handcycle, I gave a farewell interview to the camera that had been following me for the day and I turned in my chip.

We'll be featuring the entire race reports on raceAthlete.com this week. Sometimes it is easy to forget that we all have our own challenges to overcome. It can be something as straightforward as trying to qualify for Kona or something as unusual and difficult as trying to do it without the use of your legs.

But whatever your own personal challenge these stories illustrate that just getting to the starting line is truly 99 percent of the battle.

The Secret Sauce

I have a friend by the name of Martin who is an exceptional endurance athlete. I say endurance athlete and not triathlete because he is an exceptional swimmer, cyclist, and long distance runner.

Just to give you an idea of his level talent, I've never seen him place outside of the top ten in any given race he has entered. And that includes triathlons, marathons and long distance swim events. He almost always wins his age group and believe that is saying a lot in a city like Boulder, Colorado that is stuffed to the rafters with highly talented endurance athletes.

So what's his secret? What's the secret sauce that makes him such a winner?

I think I figured it out this weekend on a long easy run with my dog.

For instance, just like my dog he makes running look effortless. I kind of plod along shaking and rattling the ground with my heavy heal strikes while Happy, my dog, just effortlessly trots along next to me looking like she could do this all day and night.

Martin has that same sort of easy and happy-go-lucky running style. He can easily run a sub 2:45 marathon while looking like he's taking a stroll through the park on a lazy Sunday afternoon.

But that's not the secret sauce. I think that has more to do with natural genetic talent and years of hard training. I really believe that if we put in the time, we can all look effortless in any given endurance sport. In the case of running our genetics may not allow us run sub six minute miles, but we can certainly run sub seven or even sub eight minute miles and make it look easy.

So what is the secret sauce that makes Martin such a winner?

I believe it the same stuff that athletes like Lance Armstrong poses in spades. It is the ability to put it all together come race day. This intangible ability is what separates the great ones from the rest of us weekend warriors. It is the ability to harness all of those hours of training and preparation and consistently raise your game to the next level when you need it the most.

I sometimes swim with a guy at masters who always likes to say that racing gets in the way of his training. In other words he loves to train, but hates to race. He says that he swims for the pure love of swimming and that racing would get in the way of his pursuit. I completely understand what he is saying…especially when I'm standing at the edge of the water before a big race. I think to myself "what's the point of all of this pressure," as my stomach does somersaults from all of the tension. "Wouldn't it be enough just to swim for the pure love of swimming or run just for the pure love of running," I wishfully consider just before the guns sounds the start of yet another hard effort.

But once the race starts, and I get past the initial few moments of panic, and I start to feel the strength and power of my muscles and lungs, I understand why never racing would never be an option for me. It is just too much fun, and too much of a reward for all those of training to really ever give up.

But unlike my friend Martin, I cannot consistently put it all together for a winning effort on race day.

I suppose at this point it would be important to define what winning effort means for me because it has changed over the years.

When I first started racing triathlon a winning effort simply meant finishing the race. It seemed like a simple enough goal…just drag my tired and cramping body across the finish line. It really didn't matter if I came in first or last. I just wanted to finish. The problem with this goal was and is (at least for me) is that of you set the goal low the reward tends to be just as low. I would finish a race feeling tired and not all that happy. Sure I had finished, but certainly not in a time or place I could tell my friends about and certainly not with a lot of style. Dragging my sorry butt across the finishing line looking like pale and sick turtle was not something to brag about.

So my goal changed. It evolved from just wanting to finish to wanting to finish strong. To me it meant being able to finish a triathlon running.

Now my old coach Wes Hobson would say that's not really a goal. Since you can't measure it and you certainly can't quantify it. And he's right. A smart goal needs to something that is reachable, attainable and most importantly measurable.

By my second year of racing I was able to finish a triathlon running, but I still wasn't satisfied. So I set a new goal…to just finish my first Ironman. You think I would have learned by now. I was able to finish the Ironman, but it was like my triathlon. Dragging my tired butt across the finish line was great, but something was still missing.

And then it happened for the first time last year at the Chicago Triathlon (Click HERE to read what exactly happened). I got a hold of some of that secret sauce and to my complete amazement I was actually racing for position. And the experience of actually racing was like nothing I had ever dreamt about. It was so much fun that I could not stop smiling for a week. Who would have thought that Lance is had so much fun leading a race. At least I hope he did.

It was fantastic to be fighting it out for the podium…even though I didn't realize it at the time. I only knew I was racing a guy in my age-group to finish.

As usual after the race I went for a nice lunch with some good friends. It wasn't until I got back home to Boulder that another friend told me they had called out my name at the awards ceremony. That must be a mistake I thought, but it wasn't. I had taken second in my race category and it felt terrific.

Who would have known that the secret sauce is not only less filling, but tastes great?

So now I'm completely hooked. I want that feeling of putting it all together on race day for a winning performance again.

I don't just want to finish.

I don't just want to finish strong.

I want to be a winner!

And that really means that the hard work has just begun.

When perception changes

Take a look at this photo of a “traditional” German beer bug.

We picked up the mug in Bavaria a few years ago. At first inspection it looks like a typical souvenir knick-knack that you might buy in Munich at any one of the dozens of souvenir shops near the city center.
But take a closer look at the characters and scenes depicted on the mug. I especially like the scene toward the bottom…the one where the one guy is walking on his hands.

In fact, if you look closely you’ll notice that this mug depicts the various stages of inebriation. What looks like a nice and respectable decorated souvenir from Bavaria, turns out to be a comical tribute to Bacchus the Roman God of drink and debauchery.

BTW: Don’t even look at that little scene on the bottom right side with the guy on his knees just in front of the standing women holding her arms above her head. You really don’t want to try to explain that one to the kiddies.

My point is that if you saw this beer mug on my shelf, you probably wouldn't think twice about it. Your perception would be that of just another typical souvenir from a long forgotten vacation.

Here’s another example of when perception changes. Almost ten years ago we moved from downtown Boulder to the outskirts of town. We lived just one block from Pearl Street and best of all all of the shopping, restaurants, bars and night clubs of downtown. As an example for all of you big city types, it would be like living one block from Michigan Avenue in Chicago, or one block from Times Square in New York.

It was perfect.

We could go out late at night and stumble back home after a long night out on the town. When our son Tommy was born, my wife wisely suggested that it was time to trade the downtown condo for a suburban house. I hated the idea of leaving the center of town. I really loved being in the middle of all the action and close to everything that I thought was important. We had lived that same way in Prague…right in the heart of the oldest part of the city and close to everything.

So it was with some fear and trepidation that I started the new house hunt. We soon realized that we could never afford a house anywhere near the city center. It was the same problem with a larger condo. We were in fact lucky to be able to even live downtown as home prices were just beginning their upward skyrocket as the high tech bubble drove the local housing market upward.

I remember to this day the first time we drove through to what would eventually become my new neighborhood. It was a new suburban sub division that was being built on the edge of town. I thought to myself that never in a million years would I live so far from the center of town and in this fine example newly minted suburban hell.

Ten years later I’m still here. It turned that I had very little choice in the matter given our budget and my fevered determination to stay in town.

It was my current neighborhood or nothing.

The funny thing is that I probably couldn’t afford to buy into my neighborhood today. Prices in Boulder have gotten so high that I consider myself very lucky now to live in town.

But the stranger thing is that after about a month of living on the outskirts of town my perception of this location completely changed. What once was the middle of nowhere quickly became a short ride to downtown.

In effect that map in my head completely and utterly changed. The distance to everything I valued like the mountains and local parks just flipped, and what I had considered to be the middle of nowhere became a neighborhood just a few short miles from downtown. I believe this happens to all of us at some point.

For instance, it is how a local friend of mine can easily commute several hours each day to and from his job. I don’t think that he considers it vary crazy that he has to drive across all of Denver just to get to his job every day.

It is the reason that many of my old Chicago friends don’t think that an hour commute to work each day is too bad. It is that same reason that (especially in big cities) like Atlanta and Los Angeles, what were once considered outlying suburbs and commuter communities are now considered close in towns and neighborhoods.

I’m thinking of all the turn of the century towns that surrounded our big cities. These places were once considered the suburbs or even the country, and are now the best newly fashionable central inter city neighborhoods. Our perception of these places changed overtime, and when that happened so did the market value of the homes in towns like Brooklyn, New York and Oak Park, Illinois.

For me that same mental switch happened sometime over the last few years regarding exercise. I thought of this today as I was on running on the treadmill at 6:00 a.m. doing my first indoor speed running workout of the year. A few years ago the idea of just getting up at 5:30 in the morning would have been something so silly that I probably would have called a friend to have a good laugh.

“Guess what Steve, I actually though about getting up this morning before the sun and going for a very hard run. Isn’t that the funniest thing you’ve heard all year?” I would ask, as I hung up the phone with my buddy and went back to bed for a late morning snooze.

But today, it seemed perfectly natural and normal to get up and get in an early run before my lunchtime swim. In fact, I was grateful to be able to take my wife’s place at her speed workout and get in some early morning running.

What’s even stranger is that I feel like my body wants and indeed needs at least an hour of rigorous exercise each day. I really hate it when because of work, travel, sickness, or other commitments I’m not able to swim, bike or run for at least an hour a day.

Do you remember the old government guidelines that stated that we should exercise at least three times a week for a half hour to stay healthy and fit? That seems completely crazy to me now. My body and mind seem to thrive on hard physical exercise. After an hour of early morning swimming, running, or biking I don’t really feel tired, instead I feel sharp and bright like a well oiled machine.

I’ll stop right now because this is getting very close to sounding like one of those late night infomercials for the Bowflex or Abodominator machines that eventually end up keeping the dust bunnies company under your bed.

My point is just how much my perception of exercise has changed, and how much that change has affected my daily outlook on working out. Just like the thought of living in my current neighborhood 10-years-ago seemed completely crazy, so the thought of working out once a day for at least an hour would have seemed completely insane just a few years ago.

I recall a conversation on a group run in the old days when somebody pointing out the triathlete in our small group and said how completely crazy she was because she was going to bike home after running 10K. Funny thing folks…today I’ve become that crazy triathlete.

What I’m trying to say is that if you don’t consider an hour commute to work crazy, I hope you understand why I don’t consider a daily one hour workout crazy. Plus, if you have to commute an hour to get to work…at the end of the day you still have to get home.

It’s just a simple matter of perception.

To race or not to race, that is the question?

I recently got an email from a reader who is going through a very tough time. She was well beyond the point of when it rains it pours. After a recent divorce, bankruptcy, and illness, she was questioning her commitment to race her first half Ironman this year.

And who could blame her? As you well know, as the race gets longer so does the training. One hour fun runs turn into three hour slogs. A nice and easy 20-mile bike ride turns into a must do 80-mile butt burn. The weekly swim quickly becomes a 3000-yard Masters Swim fest at least three times a week.

And not only does the training increase in both intensity and duration, but the cost and complexity of the race also dramatically sky rockets. Who among you all can tell me right here and now what goes in all 5 race bags during the standard Ironman ordeal?

Or who here has spent hours and/or days just trying to get to race? Traveling with a bike has all the grace and elegance of traveling with your baby pet elephant. The only difference is that the typical airline gate clerk can probably actually check in your elephant without making you open and unpack it.

So what did I tell her?

Sometimes the best thing you can do is not race.

When all your training seems to be going downhill…

When you don’t feel the passion just the pain…

When you can’t focus or find the fun…

When your heart and head can’t agree…

When the race becomes a burden, and the burden get’s to be too heavy…

When your head says yes, but your injured body screams no more…

When you see only the trees and never the forest…

When the other side of the mountain turns brown…

When your heart turns cold…

When your bike gets dusty…

When you days are just too short…

When your family, friends or God need you most…

Sometimes the best thing you can do is not race.

So what did I tell her?

Sometimes the best thing you can do is race.

When everything else in life is falling to bits…

When you feel like you have no control over your family, work, eating or health…

When you have so very little to look forward to when you wake up in the morning…

When you need something to jump start your day…

When you need conquer something that seems unconquerable…

When you need a reason to hit the path, pool, and road…

When you want to sleep like there is no tomorrow…

When you want to feel the real power of your muscles and lungs…

When you need to feel in total control of a few precious minutes of the day…

That’s when you have to close your eyes, make a mental fist, and determine that you will go the entire distance no matter what life puts in your way.

You will sweat…

You will suffer…

You will swear…

You will survive and cross that finish line.

You don’t know or care what awaits you on the other side of that line because right now, this instance, the next few hours, days, weeks, and months …the finish line is all that matters.

So what did I tell her?

I wrote back and said that she must absolutely do the race. Sometimes a race can not only become a goal, but indeed is the only goal worth accomplishing.