ID#

Because of the culture of my family and ethnicity, I am no stranger to numbers that identify, rank, and assign one's place in some scheme of worthiness. In the work place and many social circles, I've been sized up by my GPA, SAT/MCAT scores, dress size, annual income, net worth, and square footage of my home. Triathlon is no different. In my group of tri pals and training friends, we all have some idea of each others running E-pace, T-time for the 100 yard swim, bike splits, FTP, and most recent Ironman results. For some of us, prestige and one-upmanship is assigned to these numbers. I'm not talking about some friendly competition at the local sprint or using a slightly faster training partner as a benchmark for progress. I'm talking about people who actually think they're better than someone else based solely on how high their Vdot is or how many watts they average on the bike.

As a MOP'er on a good day and BOP'er on an average day, I don't hang much of my self-worth or identity on these numbers. While I get alot of satisfaction from improvements that I make in my training, my frail ego can't be held up by my athletic statistics. Mind you, I'm far from swimming for the sheer and absolute joy of swimming. I do love running for the sake of running; and I can't think of a truly bad day on a bicycle (even spiraling into the depths of heat stroke at Eagleman). I truly enjoy tracking my training progress quantitatively. Bring on those numbers, graphs, and charts--I love them all! However, I am no more my FTP than I am the dollar amount of my bank account.

That being said, I have revisited my reason to do IMLP again. Since mile 18 on the run of my first IMLP, I vowed to return because I knew I would fall quite short of my time expectations. Even with No-friggin-way-I'm-doing-this-again sentiments swirling around my head at the finish line and the following 48 hours, I felt that I had to come back to Ironman to try and get a faster finish time. I felt that my finish time did not reflect my fitness, my ability, or my hard work. After a year of looking back, dissecting, and over analyzing, I know that my finish time IS a reflection of tactical errors including overeating on the bike, taking too much time during transition, and being unprepared mentally and emotionally to handle truly dark moments. I want to return to Ironman to "make it right."

Make it right?! As if it wasn't enough to toe the line at the start without an injury and finish without a visit to the medical tent? Apparently, not. I do not want to be identified by a 15:30:02 Ironman finish time. So everything I pontificated 2 paragraphs ago has gone out the window! Must be that I'm satisfied with my FTP, net worth, square footage of my home, even my lowly Vdot...but not with my IMLP time. Hrrhmph!

Is that reason enough to suffer through another Ironman? Perhaps, I'm asking the question in wrong way...In order to commit to the training that may or may not result in me moving myself forward for 140.6 miles in less than 15 and 1/2 hours, am I willing to do it just for a result, an arbitrary number upon which I have hinged my athletic self-worth? Or should I want to move myself forward for 140.6 miles on that glorious day, be grateful for the priviledge to do it, and enjoy the sweet and fleeting moments of peak fitness? Or do I want another chance to get my nutrition right, to pace the bike and run better, to overcome my own doubts and negative thoughts?
Those are all valid reasons. Depending on where my mind is during training or the race itself, I'll remind myself of each of those reasons. However, I think the 1# reason is that I like the training. To quote Gordo: Training is fun, racing is tough. For the most part, I found training for that first Ironman to be quite enjoyable. What wasn't fun was the anxiety surrounding the actual race. I was afraid to DNF my first Ironman. I remember thinking that I would like do second Ironman and train without the anxiety of finishing a first one. So why can't I just train: swim, bike, run just to do it? I'm quite sure that I wouldn't train if I didn't have a race. So triathlon for me isn't just about good health (training to the edge to injury, mental and physical fatigue far exceeds the requirements for health) or the love of running and cycling (and a slight tolerance to swimming). It's wrapped up in a finishing time, a ranking in an age group--numbers that I give weight to defining a part of my identity.
See you at the sign up line on Monday morning!