Worst Triathlete Ever.

I'm going to start this post by saying that I suck as a triathlete.  But I'm ok with that...and I'm not talking about my times--I'm perfectly satisfied with how fast or how slow I've gone in past triathlons, depending on your point of view.  A number of years ago, I set a lifetime goal for myself of achieving a sub 13-hour Ironman, and a number of years after that, I achieved that goal.  That's probably the only concrete goal I ever had in this sport, and I achieved that goal.

So, the reason why I'm saying I suck as a triathlete is that I have just made the decision to stop, and that's something that triathletes rarely do.  I am still currently registered for Full Vineman at the end of July, and I'm pulling the plug on the whole thing.  So, I suck as a triathlete because I'm doing the one thing that the hoards and masses of triathletes who are out there would never imagine--I'm proclaiming that there is more to this sport than just the long-ass version of beating the crap out of yourself for an entire day because those distances were set as the "ultimate test of endurance."  I am....well, I'm done.

Last week, I had three injuries flare up on me--my plantar fasciitis was especially active, I tweaked my knee on my long run, and my back spasmed on me on Thursday--due, most likely, to the stress of 90 minutes of Thursday night traffic on the 405.  Running has evolved into an endurance event of pain tolerance--and I don't enjoy a single minute of it.

Brian hit the nail on the head when we were discussing this over the weekend--I started seeing all sorts of problems crop up when I made the decision to start training for an Ironman-distance event again...and it comes down to one thing--I'm trying to shove a square peg into a round hole.  As a swimmer, I was best at the sprint freestyles and the butterflies--all races that lasted less than 2 minutes (well, except the 200-meter fly...I wasn't that fast).  And as a triathlete, I've been down this path of doing races that last 5, 6, 12, and even 16 hours on a bad day.   Frankly, it's a friggin' miracle that I lasted through 3 Ironman triathlons, and an even bigger one that I did well on my third one.  This penchant toward speed is consistent across all three sports for me--My 5k times are faster than they should be relative to my 10k's and half-marathons--and I friggin' hate running full marathons.  While biking, I can generate all kinds of wattage for short bursts that would seem to indicate that I should be able to hold an effort for a 40k higher than I actually can.

So, I do not fit the mold.  I am no longer interested in trying to fit the mold. Trying to fit the mold causes me to do workouts that break me down to the point that I wind up with tight, weak muscles, and then I wind up injuring myself.  I'm done being on the gravy-train that longer is better, and that a "real triathlon" is a hundred and forty point six miles of unadulterated hell.

So, why is that triathletes all go in this direction of longer is better?  And more is better?  I saw a posting today that 100-milers are the new marathon--what the hell is up with that?  Marathons already break down your leg muscle beyond the point that is healthy for you--so please, people, just stop already.  Running 100 miles is not healthy. Period.

I'm Drew Giacobe, and I say Olympic Distance triathlons are awesome--but they're only awesome if I can back into swimming shape again.

Goodbye, obnoxiously long bike rides on the river path.  I am done with you.  And goodbye my dear love/hate relationship with the long run.  I'm moving on. 

Apparently, it is time to change the name of my blog.

"The carousel never stops turning."

"The carousel never stops turning"--anyone who watches Grey's Anatomy will immediately know where this quote comes from, and what it means.  And everyone will also very likely have their own version of events that seem like life keeps going and never seems to stop throwing punches at you.

Right now, I'm dealing with a mortgage refinance, a solar panel installation, a demanding training schedule as a triathlete, my job as an aerospace engineer, and a check-up on my birth defect of a heart with a hole in it as a result of my annual physical. I've also just finished getting through an appeal of an application for life insurance that was originally denied because of a lack of documentation about that hole in my heart--assuming I am not randomly killed by a comet crashing into my house in the next 3 hours and I survive past midnight today, my husband should be fine to continue to live in our home in the event of my untimely demise.

I don't for a second think that the things that I'm dealing with are any different or larger in magnitude than what most of the world does.  I'm just insanely jealous of people who manage to keep these things in line better than I do.  "It's too bad you grew up--it's horrible being an adult."

Right now, I'm trying to cope with an incompatibility between my commute time, my time working, and my time training for triathlon.  To simplify the description, I was spending between 2 and 3 hours a day getting back and forth to work, and trying to get 2 workouts in most days really didn't mesh with that and my job.

I most recently tried to flip my work schedule to early in the morning and get my training in during the afternoons.  My days consisted of waking up at 4:30, and getting out the door by 5:15 to miss traffic in the morning, followed by working a straight day through without a lunch to 2pm so I could miss the evening rush hour (that goes from about 2:30pm to 7:30pm).  I would arrive home a brain dead zombie, and not really care about the patches of beard I had missed shaving that morning.  I grew irritated with my workouts.  Swimming is 7pm to 8pm, and I had problems winding down afterwards...often leaving me awake until 11:30...followed by a 4:30am wakeup.  I redefined "grumpy." And then I hurt my foot again during a training run.

Your body doesn't heal well or recover well from workouts when you're sleep deprived--and I don't sleep well to begin with, so when I recognize I'm not sleeping well--it's especially bad.  I fell apart on Wednesday and decided I needed to fix something, and I am incredibly fortunate that I'm being allowed to work part of my work week going forward at a facility that is closer to home.  My 1 hour to 1.5 hour commute each way will drop to 5 minutes on those days.  I am hopeful that this change will be the thing that brings my life back into the realm of reasonableness.

I spent some time chatting with my coach about the best way to make use of my new schedule, along with some concern about being 12 weeks out from Full Vineman and not feeling very well trained.   The awesomeness of having Joanna as a coach is that she is a never ending fountain of knowledge about how to deal with any amount of crap that might be going on in your life.  After talking with her and coming up with a game plan, I felt like I had the answer and everything would work out with the new plan.

So, I have this new concept for how to deal with weekly training, and I go to look at my work week and personal life issues for this week, and 3 out 5 days have things that aren't in line with what we talked about.....of course!  Tomorrow, I have a meeting in El Segundo, so commuting happens again--Tuesday, I get to have my heart imaged (yay.), and Friday, I've got to take Brian to the airport in the morning, obliterating when I was going to swim.  The effing carousel never effing stops turning.  And it kind of bothers me that for the screenshot that I took of my schedule, I could not fit the time I have scheduled from morning until night all on the screen at the same time.

It all works though--I've got to reorder stuff during my days, and it will probably take a week or two to get things to fall in line.  I'm just hoping I can look forward to riding the carousel now, rather than feeling like I have to get off of it and run screaming from the fair.