What makes a middle-aged woman decide to be a triathlete - especially one who has little or no athletic ability? What a great question. Tom and Sally say "Mom's having another mid-life crisis," expecting it to pass eventually. My friends have said "Good for you," while secretly thinking "she's losing her mind." And I may be losing my mind, but I am having so much fun and a lot of new experiences with my training that I thought you could join in the fun and keep up with it.
It's all Brooke's fault, actually. She's the one who has called me religiously for the last three years to ask if I'm going to sign up for the Danskin Triathlon this year? Brooke is a veteran - a breast cancer survivor, she completed her first Danskin Tri shortly after finishing chemo. She's an amazing woman. This year, when she called no-one was more surprised than me when I actually said yes and paid my money before she did - and I roped Laurie into joining me too.
YOu can read about the Danskin Triathlon at http://www.danskin.com/triathlon.html
We were committed but August seemed like a long way off in February, and we thought we had tons of time to get in shape. The Danskin is a Sprint Triathlon (I didn't even know the different types when I started) - we'll swim a half mile, bike twelve miles, and run 3.1 miles. The last time I ran until this year was the year I turned 40 - which was a few full moons ago.
I began by losing a stone (14 pounds) and getting my mountain bike fixed with a comfy saddle and street tires. Brooke, Laurie and I joined with two of Brooke's friends, Jana and Jen (we thought the more "J" names, the better) and our training started. We did a few 3-mile walks at Chambers Creek; a five mile bike-ride in the snow at Pt Defiance Park, 18 miles on the Foothills Trail;, again in the snow; and a hike up Mount Peak in Enumclaw. I walked around the Nisqually wildlife refuge with Daryl and Mark (that's Daryl with binocs aboe), and shortly after that I visited Sally in San Francisco. We did a little hiking in Marin County.
Then I suffered a swollen ankle and strained tendon and had six weeks of physical therapy. Sally gave me a book about triathlon training which freaked me out, but I hoped for the best.
I started to tell people I was going to do the Triathlon so that I would remain committed inspite of the injury. I did a lot of swimming in the pool on campus and continued to go to yoga at least once a week, and in early April went on a fantastic three-day hiking trip to the Sol Duc Hot Springs on the Olympic Peninsula. We didn't break any distance records, but the good news was my foot didn't hurt - and we got to make snow angels.
I didn't have any apprehension about the swimming part - I can swim forever in a pool, and knew I could build up to the bike riding. But I was quite worried about the running.
Friends rallied (as they always do) and began offering to help with the training suggesting bike rides, and offering wet suits for the swimming and a variety of training tips.
One of the cool things about this is that the Triathlon also raises money to support breast cancer. So not only am I having a blast and getting healthy, but you can make a pledge in my name and help other people. If you'd like, you can support breast cancer by making a donation online below.
http://timberlinetiming.com/index.cfm?action=dspClientHome&clientid=29&showBanner=1#inst4
Regardless, I hope you'll enjoy watching the progress of my/our training as we continue over the next six weeks.....
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