You gotta get up and tri…

On Sunday 8^th September I  accomplished something that I never thought in all of my wildest dreams (And I have some pretty wild dreams!) I ever could or would. If you’ve missed the fact that I have whaffed on about it for the last month, a couple of weeks ago I did my first Triathlon. All in all the day was a bit incredible and is something that I’ve felt compelled to write about…

In August when I agreed to give the triathlon a go, I knew that the training and actual event would be really hard, but I also knew that if I succeeded it would be an awesome feeling. So holding those two things in tension, I decided to give it a tri.

I hate cycling and actually don’t even own a bike, while I wasn’t exactly a stranger to open water swimming, it was something I hadn’t really done in years and I am still a very new runner (only graduating from couch to 5k in May). The odds were very much stacked against me but I knew I needed to tri.  

One of my character traits that I love and find really annoying in almost equal measure is my stubbornness. Tell me I can’t or shouldn’t do something and I will show you that I can or will find something even better  to do in the process of trying. I wouldn’t say that I will try anything, but you can almost guarantee that if I do decide to try something I will become completely consumed with it and try until I can’t give anything else. Which is the reason that I don’t really “do” failure, because I’m just so flipping stubborn and will carry on trying until I win or die (whichever comes first!).

It’s scary to try. There’s a risk in trying. If you try your hardest it will become all you think about. There is a cost to trying, it will hurt. There is the chance that if you try you will fail. But there is also the chance that if you try, you will succeed and exceed your own expectations!

The very great Pink’s song “Try” puts what I’m trying to say better than I’m managing, “Where there is desire there’s going to be a flame, where there is a flame someone’s bound to get burned, but just because it burns doesn’t mean you’re gonna die, you gotta get up and try.”

And so with my stubbornness stoked to the max I decided to tri and began training and just as I’d expected it was all consuming. For four weeks training for the triathlon was all I could think about, all I could talk about and all I could do! I know I got on some people’s nerves, believe me I got on my own nerves! But I had to give it my best try so when the big day came I would know I had given everything and completely earned the feeling of complete and utter elation when I crossed that finish line.

I am so glad I tried a tri.

There are few people who I couldn’t not mention in writing about my Triathlon experience and so I want to finish up with another open letter…

To the one(s) who helped me tri…

Poops, I hate that you had to be injured  for me to get the opportunity to do this but thank you for having faith that I could do it, thank you for helping me train, thank you for coming and cheering. Thanks for helping me tri.

Team Badass and Mr Buggy Bootcamp thank you for training alongside me, thank you for helping to make training so much fun and something that actually I looked forward to, thank you for all the burpies. Thanks for helping me tri.

Team Lex,  every single one of you who came along and screamed at me, thank you  for cheering the whole way round, thank you for running parts of the course with me and thank you for making me cry for that whole last kilometer. Thanks for helping me tri.

The girl who was next to me in transition, Jess? Thank you for chatting to me while we set up and putting my newbie mind at ease, thank you for being my pacemaker during the bike. Thanks for helping me tri.

The incredible guy on the finish line, thank you for cheering every single person home, thank you for making every single one of us feel like we wee winning gold at the Olympics. Thanks for helping me tri.

To the one who swam, cycled and ran every single kilometer with me and listened to my countless, exhausted, wheezed prayers of “Get me round, help me finish”, thank you for giving me the tenacity to try, thank you for providing me the ability to finish and thank you for being with me every single step. Thanks for helping me tri.

Lex (198^th of 255) xx