Breakthrough

It's funny how you can spend so much time doing one thing, and then one day you realize something much larger that lends itself to a deeper understanding of your chosen task. Most people call these realizations epiphanies, but I'll just call mine a breakthrough because I prefer the imagery behind that wording.

I've been racing triathlon for almost 4 full seasons now. I started as a member of the University of Montana triathlon club team in 2004, and I took one year off to pursue goals of learning spanish and traveling in South America in 2005. Otherwise, I've had consistent training in the three disciplines since the fall of 2005, taking the necessary breaks each year to restore psyche and let my body recover from the physical stress of each racing season. I've seen steady progress in the sport from the very beginning, and I can only think of a couple times when I felt like I didn't improve with each race. Usually those were due to some kind of small injury or mistake made through lack of experience (which in itself is learning, and hence, improving). In fact, it's been one of the hallmarks of my career thus far that I've finished all but one race I've entered, and never truly had a disastrous result. However, it was while I stood on the track last Thursday during a particularly nice fall day that I realized how far I had come, and just how much I have matured in the second half of this year. It's hard not to plateau in most any pursuit, and my case was no different with the first part of the racing calendar in 2008. I felt like my debut year as a pro in 2007 was (in the words of a University of Montana triathlon team alum) strong to quite strong. I was in the mix in most races despite my less than perfect swim, and I was knocking on the door for the majority of the prize purses, taking home enough money to convince me that pursuing this sport as a career was a legitimate goal. And whether it was the increasing depth and skill of the professional fields at major races, or just the fact that my improvement wasn't keeping up with everyone else's, I found myself in a similar situation throughout the early part of this year; several close calls, finishing in the top ten, but not always in the money. So fast forward to this fall when I'm standing on the high school track and the thin mountain air is just the right temperature for a brutal 10x 1mile at 5:40 on the 7 minute only days after my hardest effort and best time for a half ironman in Tempe, Arizona. I'm 4 miles into this workout, doing my best to ignore the obnoxious taunts of some clever sophomore in the stands, and it hits me during my 1 minute and 20 seconds of rest: This is what I am MADE to do. I'm an athlete through and through, and I'm so far into this Ironman training that it actually feels BETTER to be running fast miles than jogging and waiting for the next one. My body has learned what it's designed to do, and it's given up the fight to be lazy and resist my efforts to transform it. These are the moments that define my transmutation in triathlon, from level to level, from mindset to mindset, from average to best.