After competing 3 Ironman length distance races in a calendar year, as of October 15th, 2017 I was done. DONE. D-O-N-E with Ironman training. By that time it had been a solid 2 years of training or racing Ironman. I was training peaks addict. I was a slave to my coach's instruction. I woke up every morning and my first thought was, "What training do I have today?" I wasn't quite burnt out, but I had definitely forgotten how to live my life any other way, all while adamantly maintaining I don't take triathlon "THAT" seriously. Just like I try to tell people I'm not "that" competitive.
So when I completed Kona and realized my season was over, and came to the conclusion that if I want to keep this endurance lifestyle up my whole life I needed to maybe not do an Ironman race every 3-4 months on average, I literally had forgotten how to be a normal person. With a blank training peaks schedule and no races on the horizon, I found myself on the verge of an emotional breakdown due to lack of structure in my life.
I compensated by wearing my Kona finisher medal around the house and eating my way through a jumbo bag of Halloween candy while binge watching Peaky Blinders and Harry Potter and cheering on my husband, who, after seeing the greatness that is Kona, signed up for Ironman Whistler and found new motivation to go on a crazy ass diet that included mostly cottage cheese, rice, grilled chicken and various forms of cauliflower pretending to be other foods, and throw himself harder than ever into off season training. I was happy to watch from the sidelines...or, more accurately, watch him go through containers of plain yogurt from the confines of my pantry where I would hide cookies and eat them behind closed doors.
I also jumped into a bunch of random races and, piggybacking off my Ironman endurance, managed a half marathon PR (1:33) and 5k PR (20:15), mostly from pure willpower and the mentality that, while 13 miles is far, it's not 146 miles far. I can do anything for an hour and a half.
A few weeks after Kona I really missed training, but wasn't exactly amped to jump back on my TT bike. Upon which I rediscovered the greatness that is the mountain bike.
I had done a little bit of mountain biking in the past, but nothing serious and nothing over about 30 minutes. Living up in the mountains surrounding Albuquerque, I literally lived in a national forest and the woods were just begging me to come back. A few weeks before Kona I got to go down to hang out with some of the Eagle crew in Florida and got to ride a "real" mountain bike - you know, one with like, brakes. And even though I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown the entire ride because, if you know me, you know how I hate doing anything I'm not instantly great at....I had an awesome time falling into bushes, dropping F bombs, and feeling like a badass shredder chick - despite the road bike helmet, running shoes, an the fact that I consistently fell a quarter mile behind Tommy and Dana, being careful to exit my bike and gingerly walk around sticks and rocks in the path.
One fine day after a particularly frustrating work day, I stole Chris' mountain bike, put on two pairs of wool socks to fit into his shoes, and took off into the woods. I skidded, walked, cussed, listened to Taylor Swift, ate shit, and found myself laughing out loud in the woods alone. It felt good, REALLY good.
The season of mountain biking allowed me to keep my endurance and fitness up while allowing me to have the freedom of the trails. Rach and the rest of the triathlon team got really into mountain biking in the off season too, and it wasn't before long that we all had our own bikes and were screaming "SHRED!" every weekend in the foothills.
December came along and Chris and the Eagle team surprised me with my very own mountain bike for Christmas, and it wasn't long before I bought myself a hot pink helmet and some badass shredder chick Oakley's and even got cleats on my mountain biking shoes. At this point I at least looked like I knew what I was doing, even when more often than not I found myself piled onto the trail in a mess of carbon fiber, blood, and sand, huffing and puffing and wondering how I ended up once again on my ass under my bike in a cactus.
But while I love the mountain bike and even managed to win a short race in January, I knew it wouldn't be long before Ironman called me back into the depths of it's financial ruin and the dark hole that is training peaks. I watched all my friends hang up their mountain bikes and hit the season hard with structured marathon and Ironman training plans, and it wasn't long before I got the text from the bestie Rach, "I signed up for Buffalo Springs - you in?"
Some background on Lubbock: I hate Lubbock. I had the worst race experience of my life at triathlon nationals in college in Lubbock. It included hundreds of athletes getting sick from swimming in cow feces due to flooding, my bike literally falling apart underneath in the race, two flat tires, and a twisted ankle from running in flood waters on the course. Lubbock is desolate, hot, windy, and overall just a terrible place. My motto was always, "Between Lubbock and leave it, I choose leave it." and upon getting on the airplane to fly back to Boston after that race, I vowed to never go back.
Of course I was in.
Soon after signing up for Buffalo, unsuccessfully trying to break 20 minutes in the 5k, and starting with my new coach Tommy, I won first place female in my first sprint triathlon of the season after battling the course and "racing like a dumbass" with Rach, and that gave me the motivation to jump into half Ironman training.
And so started the most intense training I've ever done. Even full Ironman training wasn't as hard as what Tommy put me through most weeks. With full Ironman training I skipped some swims at least once a week, and sometimes didn't go as hard as I should have in the runs - often walking or dillydallying around or cutting my bricks short - sometimes nixing them altogether. My previous coach, who I loved, who trained me from Louisville and Santa Rosa always went pretty easy on me and never mentioned all of the red popping up on my training peaks, whereas Tommy sent me a blatant and somewhat terrifying, "These workouts are NOT optional. If you skip a workout I will fly to Albuquerque and kick your ass" text. Point taken. Green for weeks. Tommy has done a lot for me this past year and over my drowning, beat up, bonked body was I going to let him down.
My midweek workouts for Buffalo Springs were often way more intense than anything I did for Louisville or Santa Rosa, and even though Chris was training for a full Ironman, I often found myself getting home from training after him, or having the same mid week workouts.
Once when I was swimming a particularly long set at 5:30 in the morning, through tears filling up my goggles I had an entire text message composed in my head to send to Tommy to tell him this was a HUGE mistake and this was all so stupid and I don't even LIKE swimming and I quit. Another time when it was 8:30 at night and I was running in the dark after a 10 hour work day I thought of all the things I wanted to scream into the phone with the end goal I could delete the Training Peaks off my phone. Composing these 'I QUIT!' messages got me through that entire four mile run, as well as a few other workouts. Of course I never sent them- not that he would let me quit anyway. Or that I really wanted to.
The biggest things that kept me going was Rach, who was training like a beast and always pushes me to be faster and better in pretty much everything on and off the race course, and the lingering fear that I had peaked in Ironman races and I was now officially washed up living in the past, cursed to forever wear my old Ironman finishers tshirts and talk about the good old days of training and racing. Also I had never trained for a half Ironman before and I was at least mildly curious what my potential was at that distance. And all of my friends were all training for races so I might as well too - I'm not one to be left out. Plus training allowed me to continue to eat as many cookies as I wanted and as it turns out, I really, really love triathlon, and training.
And so passed the next 2 months of training. Wake up, train, work, train, sleep, compose eloquent "I quit" text messages in my head while rapping to Cardi B, repeat. And at times what felt like forever and other times felt like overnight I found myself getting faster and faster - especially in the run. It was so fun to train with Rach and push ourselves and even though training was super demanding combined with work and trying to maintain some balance, I loved it so much.
Going into the race I felt SO strong and prepared. I had no idea what to expect for results of the race, but I knew it was going to be a throw down where I could possibly win my age group and maybe even place overall. Wouldn't that be the dream?
Once again I found I had literally zero expectations for the race, all I knew is that I was so pumped to go on a weekend trip with some of my favorite people in the world and race Buffalo Springs, which is notorious for 100+ degree temps and raging winds - Kona all over again!
With the best teammates, the best coach and the best equipment, I was ready to see what Lubbock had in store.
To be continued
-Katie
So when I completed Kona and realized my season was over, and came to the conclusion that if I want to keep this endurance lifestyle up my whole life I needed to maybe not do an Ironman race every 3-4 months on average, I literally had forgotten how to be a normal person. With a blank training peaks schedule and no races on the horizon, I found myself on the verge of an emotional breakdown due to lack of structure in my life.
I compensated by wearing my Kona finisher medal around the house and eating my way through a jumbo bag of Halloween candy while binge watching Peaky Blinders and Harry Potter and cheering on my husband, who, after seeing the greatness that is Kona, signed up for Ironman Whistler and found new motivation to go on a crazy ass diet that included mostly cottage cheese, rice, grilled chicken and various forms of cauliflower pretending to be other foods, and throw himself harder than ever into off season training. I was happy to watch from the sidelines...or, more accurately, watch him go through containers of plain yogurt from the confines of my pantry where I would hide cookies and eat them behind closed doors.
I also jumped into a bunch of random races and, piggybacking off my Ironman endurance, managed a half marathon PR (1:33) and 5k PR (20:15), mostly from pure willpower and the mentality that, while 13 miles is far, it's not 146 miles far. I can do anything for an hour and a half.
A few weeks after Kona I really missed training, but wasn't exactly amped to jump back on my TT bike. Upon which I rediscovered the greatness that is the mountain bike.
I had done a little bit of mountain biking in the past, but nothing serious and nothing over about 30 minutes. Living up in the mountains surrounding Albuquerque, I literally lived in a national forest and the woods were just begging me to come back. A few weeks before Kona I got to go down to hang out with some of the Eagle crew in Florida and got to ride a "real" mountain bike - you know, one with like, brakes. And even though I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown the entire ride because, if you know me, you know how I hate doing anything I'm not instantly great at....I had an awesome time falling into bushes, dropping F bombs, and feeling like a badass shredder chick - despite the road bike helmet, running shoes, an the fact that I consistently fell a quarter mile behind Tommy and Dana, being careful to exit my bike and gingerly walk around sticks and rocks in the path.
One fine day after a particularly frustrating work day, I stole Chris' mountain bike, put on two pairs of wool socks to fit into his shoes, and took off into the woods. I skidded, walked, cussed, listened to Taylor Swift, ate shit, and found myself laughing out loud in the woods alone. It felt good, REALLY good.
The season of mountain biking allowed me to keep my endurance and fitness up while allowing me to have the freedom of the trails. Rach and the rest of the triathlon team got really into mountain biking in the off season too, and it wasn't before long that we all had our own bikes and were screaming "SHRED!" every weekend in the foothills.
December came along and Chris and the Eagle team surprised me with my very own mountain bike for Christmas, and it wasn't long before I bought myself a hot pink helmet and some badass shredder chick Oakley's and even got cleats on my mountain biking shoes. At this point I at least looked like I knew what I was doing, even when more often than not I found myself piled onto the trail in a mess of carbon fiber, blood, and sand, huffing and puffing and wondering how I ended up once again on my ass under my bike in a cactus.
But while I love the mountain bike and even managed to win a short race in January, I knew it wouldn't be long before Ironman called me back into the depths of it's financial ruin and the dark hole that is training peaks. I watched all my friends hang up their mountain bikes and hit the season hard with structured marathon and Ironman training plans, and it wasn't long before I got the text from the bestie Rach, "I signed up for Buffalo Springs - you in?"
Some background on Lubbock: I hate Lubbock. I had the worst race experience of my life at triathlon nationals in college in Lubbock. It included hundreds of athletes getting sick from swimming in cow feces due to flooding, my bike literally falling apart underneath in the race, two flat tires, and a twisted ankle from running in flood waters on the course. Lubbock is desolate, hot, windy, and overall just a terrible place. My motto was always, "Between Lubbock and leave it, I choose leave it." and upon getting on the airplane to fly back to Boston after that race, I vowed to never go back.
Of course I was in.
Soon after signing up for Buffalo, unsuccessfully trying to break 20 minutes in the 5k, and starting with my new coach Tommy, I won first place female in my first sprint triathlon of the season after battling the course and "racing like a dumbass" with Rach, and that gave me the motivation to jump into half Ironman training.
And so started the most intense training I've ever done. Even full Ironman training wasn't as hard as what Tommy put me through most weeks. With full Ironman training I skipped some swims at least once a week, and sometimes didn't go as hard as I should have in the runs - often walking or dillydallying around or cutting my bricks short - sometimes nixing them altogether. My previous coach, who I loved, who trained me from Louisville and Santa Rosa always went pretty easy on me and never mentioned all of the red popping up on my training peaks, whereas Tommy sent me a blatant and somewhat terrifying, "These workouts are NOT optional. If you skip a workout I will fly to Albuquerque and kick your ass" text. Point taken. Green for weeks. Tommy has done a lot for me this past year and over my drowning, beat up, bonked body was I going to let him down.
My midweek workouts for Buffalo Springs were often way more intense than anything I did for Louisville or Santa Rosa, and even though Chris was training for a full Ironman, I often found myself getting home from training after him, or having the same mid week workouts.
Once when I was swimming a particularly long set at 5:30 in the morning, through tears filling up my goggles I had an entire text message composed in my head to send to Tommy to tell him this was a HUGE mistake and this was all so stupid and I don't even LIKE swimming and I quit. Another time when it was 8:30 at night and I was running in the dark after a 10 hour work day I thought of all the things I wanted to scream into the phone with the end goal I could delete the Training Peaks off my phone. Composing these 'I QUIT!' messages got me through that entire four mile run, as well as a few other workouts. Of course I never sent them- not that he would let me quit anyway. Or that I really wanted to.
The biggest things that kept me going was Rach, who was training like a beast and always pushes me to be faster and better in pretty much everything on and off the race course, and the lingering fear that I had peaked in Ironman races and I was now officially washed up living in the past, cursed to forever wear my old Ironman finishers tshirts and talk about the good old days of training and racing. Also I had never trained for a half Ironman before and I was at least mildly curious what my potential was at that distance. And all of my friends were all training for races so I might as well too - I'm not one to be left out. Plus training allowed me to continue to eat as many cookies as I wanted and as it turns out, I really, really love triathlon, and training.
And so passed the next 2 months of training. Wake up, train, work, train, sleep, compose eloquent "I quit" text messages in my head while rapping to Cardi B, repeat. And at times what felt like forever and other times felt like overnight I found myself getting faster and faster - especially in the run. It was so fun to train with Rach and push ourselves and even though training was super demanding combined with work and trying to maintain some balance, I loved it so much.
Going into the race I felt SO strong and prepared. I had no idea what to expect for results of the race, but I knew it was going to be a throw down where I could possibly win my age group and maybe even place overall. Wouldn't that be the dream?
Once again I found I had literally zero expectations for the race, all I knew is that I was so pumped to go on a weekend trip with some of my favorite people in the world and race Buffalo Springs, which is notorious for 100+ degree temps and raging winds - Kona all over again!
With the best teammates, the best coach and the best equipment, I was ready to see what Lubbock had in store.
To be continued
-Katie
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