Swim, Bike, Run, Pray #3: Icebreaker Triathlon

Man, what a tough week! Depression hit me hard and for most of the week, I had no desire to swim, bike, run, or do much of anything except cry. Or sit with a blank stare on my face. Yeah, it was a tough week.

But I survived, and competed in yesterday’s Icebreaker Triathlon. This is the 4^th year I’ve done this race, but the first year I wondered if someone would actually have to chip ice off of me after crossing the finish line! Temps were in the mid-30’s, party cloudy, and it had snowed in some areas the night before. But, as usual, when that adrenaline got going, I barely noticed. I think having gloves and a hat also helped keep me warm.

Here’s how it went:

Swim – I don’t think I’ve ever had a faster swim. I looked down at my watch a little after getting out of the water and saw 6:40. So I probably swam the 300 meters in 6:30. That’s a 2:10/100m average which is super fast for me for a race. Everyone was on top of each other, so I pushed myself trying to get though the log jams and keep people from jamming up behind me. Great prep for open water swims this year.

Bike – I tried to take it a little easier on the bike this year so I could have a faster run, but I think the cold slowed me down a bit. Then on the 2^nd loop, my chain came off switching from the small to big ring. This is something I’ve always had trouble with on this bike. I have to get it fixed before St. George as there will be lots of hills! So I lost at least a couple of minutes on the bike trying to get my chain back on.

Run – I think this might have been the first year I didn’t stop to

walk up the hills. I’m sure I was going slow, but I didn’t stop. Then coming back down, I felt good and strong – also something that doesn’t usually happen for me, so I turned up the speed, averaged around an 8:20-8:30 pace the last mile and got my fastest run time ever on that course… by about 40 seconds. That was a great feeling.

My overall time was fairly slow, but I had two wins – fast swim and run. I’ve learned from this race and one other time when this happened, that even though I know I can push harder on the bike than I did, I have to save some for the run. Because if my run goes well, I feel good about my race overall. So I think this will be my strategy for St. George. Push hard on the swim, go hard but not as hard as I know I can on the bike, then go all out and have a great run.

At the Salt Lake Tri Club kick-off party last night, we heard from Matt Fitzgerald. The thing I took away from it was: we are limited only by what we think we can or can’t do. Going faster or longer is mostly in our heads. Sure, there is some scientific evidence to show that genes, weight, nutrition, muscle mass, and training all contribute to our performance, but when it comes down to it, we are capable of much more than we think.

He offered 5 suggestions for getting past that mental wall. 

1. Set 50/50 goals. 
2. Exploit the group effect. 
3. Practice feel good training. 
4. Brace yourself. 
5. Thinking helpfully. 

If you want to know more about what these are, you can check out his book, How Bad Do You Want It? This is actually something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. This is my 4^th season doing triathlon. Why aren’t I a lot faster than I was back then? I’ve wondered if it could be stress, my heart (former SVT problems), depression, nutrition (and blood sugar problems), weight gain, or lack of strength training holding me back. But I think it’s my mind. I have to convince myself that I can go faster. And then embrace the hurt and fatigue.

My next race is St. George 70.3. The big one. Only 5 weeks, 5 days left. I’ve put in a lot of training. Besides being consistent these last 5 weeks, my biggest challenge is to retrain my mind to embrace the suck and believe in myself that I can and will do well in this race. And believe that I can go harder and faster than I’ve thought I could – at least on the swim and run. Most of all, I just want to enjoy the experience. That’s my goal.

Happy training!