July 17, 2018 - Second phase of the season - Ironman specific block

One of the biggest changes I have experienced during the last three months is my ability to perceive the fine line in training workload between fatigue and adaptation. In general, I find my mind is usually at least a couple of steps ahead of where my body and in reality where my mind really should be. I frequently want to do more, only to find two days later I am on the limit of how much I can handle. Growing up as a swimmer has certainly influenced my thought process when it comes to gaining fitness and finding confidence heading into race time. As a swimmer, you go hard at least 5 days a week, during a season you are more or less exhausted for 6 months, feeling like you are always just a little behind fatigue wise. Then, you rest for two weeks and hopefully you feel amazing but even if you do not you know you are rested and are capable of swimming fast. As a swimmer you almost derive confidence from knowing you have been beat down and tired for such a long period of time. Swimmers are always anxious to taper, they look forward to it from day one of the season, in many ways you are very dependant on this drastic rest towards the end of the season to extract any real performance from your fitness. It took me the better part of four years doing things incorrectly on my own, to realize that this method of training has no real application in long-course triathlon training. In the early days of working with my coach, Andrew Yoder the deficiencies in my training were huge, I frequently pushed way too hard on easy sessions and as a result I rarely had any energy to push as hard as I needed to on quality sessions. These habits were reflected in my racing, great endurance, not much speed. These days the margin between a good workout and one that did not go to plan is much narrower. Unless you are doing something obviously different than planned, going too hard rarely feels like it at the time. I would probably say something like,”I just felt really good” when asked about a session that I clearly pushed too hard on. Two days later when you have a three hour endurance ride and it is raining, you might not go, you might be out of mental energy from the great session two days ago. Now you are going to take a day off or push yourself too hard to get through it and suffer through the ride, both of which ruin long term consistency and ultimately, fitness. I am certainly smarter than I was four or five years ago but the temptation to push things a little too hard is always there. The fitter I get the more I want to push. I am constantly reminding myself not to push too hard, to think about being able to finish a run three days down the road and ultimately to be able to show up on race day fit, but also fresh and motivated to work hard all race. Another obvious factor is health, if you are injured and cannot train, it does not matter how much you pushed yourself that one day, or on that one session two weeks ago. Once your number one priority is being able to train to plan every single day, staying in control at the end of sessions and always keeping a little margin for error in your efforts becomes much more natural. An important step is losing the temptation to validate oneself in any one specific session, rather, finding fitness and confidence from consistent long term work. The more I train with consistency and control in mind the better I have felt and the better I have raced. That has certainly made the transition to this type of long-term training easier, but there have still been leaps of faith along the way. The major battle in my head this year has been balancing all of a sudden having as much time to train as I want, with a realistic amount of training that my body and mind can absorb, with the goals that I have and fitness levels I know I need to achieve, in order to race in the profession field. I am constantly having to remind myself that if I stay healthy, remain consistent with my training and keep learning in every race I do, I have the potential to continue improving at this sport for the next ten years. I know this and am confident that it is true, but it is still hard to ignore wanting to put myself in as strong of a position as possible for each race and for next season on a larger scale.

I am currently in the midst of the last block of hard training before Ironman Canada before gradually resting for the next two weeks. Overall, I am very pleased with my preparation over the last four months. I am confident that I have made the most of the switch to full-time training and racing and as soon as I had the opportunity and time to train the way I needed and wanted to, I did so. Obviously, one always wants more time to train and prepare but I can honestly say I am ready and excited to race. I know how consistent I have been and how many changes I have made in my life and in my training to get to this point. I also know that I have given myself the chance to be very successful. You never know what will happen on race day but I am confident that I can handle adversity and have the capacity to perform everything I can control at a very high level.

June 20, 2018

Most days I miss swim coaching. Having my athletes through The Endurance Drive is great, but conducting workouts on a daily basis is a much different experience. I think it took me about a month to realized I missed it. I am slowly becoming used to my new life as a full-time triathlete but I know that I will be back in college coaching at some point in my life. My daily routine is entirely different for the first time in six years. Mornings no longer mean pre-daws alarms for morning practice and despite an uptick in actual working out my feet no longer hurt from hours standing on deck. However, I do still smell like like a pool most of the time. My priorities revolve around nutrition, having great workouts on a daily basis and coaching my triathletes. I have also had more time to spend on many areas of my life that were often put on the back burner such as cleaning, being organized, a relationship and making sure my cats are enjoying themselves (not that this ever got jipped in the first place). At first, this new daily routine was foreign, even after a long day of working out, talking with athletes on the phone and doing tasks around the house I did not feel like I had done anything. I have had to redefine what I consider to be work, having done more of less the same things for the past six years. At points I think training has been a release or a break from coaching, now it is my main focus and I have been able to enjoy it more than ever before. Being able to be any sort of professional athlete has been a goal of mine for essentially my entire life, being close to that goal is very strange. I have a long way to go and it is important to always stay humble and patient with fitness but the results this year have been very encouraging and certainly make this little adventure seem worth it. At the same time I will be the first to tell you that there are always bigger races and faster people so it is good to stay level headed after wins and work just as hard on Monday as you did before the race.

Winning the first two races of my season has been very enjoyable. Being successful is obviously great but what has meant more to me is why I have been successful and how the races played out. I have been thinking of making this move towards professional racing for most of the past four years and I am not only very happy with my decision to step away from coaching but I am happy I have been able to make the most of this opportunity so far. Taking a break from coaching was not an easy choice but a unique opportunity presented itself and I would have been crazy to say no. I have always known I was willing to do the work to be at a very high level, I just needed the opportunity and the consistency to do so. This sport has allowed me to show who I am as an athlete far more than swimming ever did and having seen consistent improvement over the past six years I have been eager to continue that trend. The racing itself has also felt a lot different this year. I am able to actually control my efforts and trust my strength and endurance. I think a lot of this comes from being able to maintain perfect consistency with my training and focus on recovery during the hours I have off each day. I knew that standing on my feet or sitting at a desk all day between workouts was a bit of a limiting factor over the last few season but being successful and having the races play out so differently this season has really validated that belief. Even things as small as having a few minutes to clean and tune before my bike before and after a ride or taking time to properly roll out and stretch while running all help achieve the goal of long term consistency.

The biggest change over the last month has been for the first time in a long time I no longer feel bad or as if I am shirking other responsibilities when I am training. I know this is not forever and most of the time I still can’t believe I actually have this chance, so I am going to enjoy it and make the most of it in the meantime. Looking forward, my focus has shifted to Ironman specific training. I will get my first look at what the next month and a half will be like this week. I not only enjoy but also think I respond well to volume so I am really looking forward to the next block of training. I am pleased with how I have adapted to the prior work load without injuries or any other major setbacks so I will be interested to how I handle even more load. In the meantime I have an Olympic distance race in Big Bear State Forest this Saturday so I am looking forward to a few days of preparation, rest and then a hard effort on a beautiful course on Saturday.

June 1, 2018

Six years into racing triathlons and pre race nerves are definitely still a thing. As I previously mentioned these nerves usually manifest themselves in my stomach. Although I have not been able to eliminate the feelings of anxiety I have certainly been able to accept the nerves as part of what makes a race special as well as finding ways to limit the impact on my racing. One of the biggest challenges during my first few years of racing was eating pre race. I was so nervous that even trying to consume some of my favorite foods was a task. Most of the time this lead to even more stress because I wasn’t eating properly and then a stomach ache to rub it in since I had forced myself to eat on an upset stomach. One of the most eye opening moments for me was my second 70.3 ever called the Quassy Challenge Half. Long story short, pre race I was very nervous and while driving up to the race with my parents, I got sick to my stomach. Having been convinced that I had to have the ideal pre race meal to perform I started a race on essentially an empty stomach, fueled properly during the race and had by far my best half ever to date. This caused a shift in my thinking regarding pre race nutrition. I realized that the fueling with real food during the days leading up to my races was of the utmost importance while on race day I began experimenting with essentially fueling with only things I would eat during the race before the start. This slight change in how I approach my morning nutrition has not only lead to better races but I believe has lowered pre race stress since I am no longer worried about struggling to eat a proper meal in the mornings. Pre race nerves will always be a factor, nerves are a good thing, they mean the event is important and they mean you care, managing and channeling those nerves is the real goal. In my six years of racing triathlons nothing calms me down more than proper preparation. Knowing I have done everything in my power to train and recover for a race is ultimately what should give one confidence.

Despite my best efforts race weeks always tend to feel like selfish weeks. My mood is often on edge even as family and friends around me make plans and sacrifices to not only watch but also help me race. In my first few years of racing it was often my Mom, Donna, who got the brunt of my pre and post race antics. She bravely drove down the east coast with me to my first half in Florida, only to watch me walk most of the run and struggle big time in the heat. Needless to say, I did not handle these early disappointments well. Despite my moodiness surrounding racing my Mom stayed positive and supportive throughout. Over the previous three years I have come to appreciate how much the support of others not only makes my racing possible but also more enjoyable. Having spent most of the past three years racing with my training buddy and business partner Jim Anderson I learned an entirely different approach pre and post race logistics. When traveling together to races we did our best to keep things light but at the same time knew what we were there to do and had common ideas of what the 24 hours before a race should look like. Conversations to and from races often strayed far from triathlon and not only helped keep things loose pre race but often helped put an event in perspective on the way home from a tough event. I learned a lot from racing with Jim and I can safely say a lot of my pre race routine and mentally comes right from his playbook. Stay calm, talk to some randos in transition, race hard and make sure we have a lot of good snacks for post race. Most recently my girlfriend Nyssa has been my most frequent companion. As far as I can tell she really enjoys watching and supporting at the races. When I am at a race with Nyssa I am calm, I know what to expect from her emotions wise, I know she will be thanklessly helpful and perhaps most importantly she is quick to remind me of a positive mindset and all of the hard work I have done.

The plan was for last weeks Ventura Breath of Life Olympic Triathlon to be one of my solo adventures. Just to make sure I did not have things too easy during race week I ruined my phone two days before race day by leaving it on my side view mirror and driving away. Always something. Every time I am without phone I realize just how attached and addicted we all are. As my Dad said the day before the race, people got places without phones for a long time I am sure you will be fine. Obvious and in the end true but still an added stressor I could have done without. Having finally arrived at the hotel in Ventura and beginning to relax I was pleasantly surprised to find out that Nyssa was actually able to make the race and ended up arriving shortly after I did. There is a certain sense of calm that comes from knowing you will have company on race morning, knowing your bags will be safe or even just seeing a familiar face flash by on the bike or run. I think I have learned a lot from the races I have done solo over the past two years but given the choice I certainly enjoy having a supportive crew of friends and family at my races. Support keeps me calm, keeps it all in perspective when I am having a poor day at a race and also makes winning and being successful even more enjoyable. This race in Ventura was no different. Nyssa and I planned our pre race plans to perfection, I had just enough time to prep, get warmed up and then settled down for a few minutes before the race began. Out on the course Nyssa was not only a welcomed friendly face on the side of the road but also helped run the social media for my coaching business, The Endurance Drive. Ultimately, it was a successful day and with the help of Nyssa I was able to control my effort effectively and take the overall win. Back to work.

May 14, 2018

I have no problem working hard, but patience has always been in limited supply. My coach Andrew Yoder and I have spent two years trying to control my training so that I am able to absorb the work and then demonstrate that fitness come race day. Seems like an obvious concept now but the temptation to validate myself through daily training is tempting and in many ways kind of fun. Fortunately, I have come to see the benefits of training with long-term goals and strategies in mind. I think it is no coincidence that last season was the first year where I was essentially injury free the entire year. This new found patience has certainly been put to the test during the first month of full-time training. It has been difficult to resist the temptation to do all the training at once and achieve all my goals within the first few weeks. For me, it has always been hard to balance where I know I need to be fitness wise with what I am currently capable of or realistically able to maintain. My full time job as a swim coach over the past 6 years has in many ways served as a governor to limit my training, which was perhaps a good thing in the end, although on the flipside it did not provide the opportunities for recovery, simply limiting my potential to train. Now that training is my main priority and other things are being scheduled around it, the temptation to overtrain is back in the spotlight. I am smarter than I used to be when it comes to training, but every once in awhile it takes pushing an endurance ride a little too hard and struggling on quality work the following three days to remind me how much I need to control my training. I think in many ways I am just excited to see where I can get my fitness given the ideal training and recovery environment. Patience will always be a work in progress for me.

Aside from training my other focus during this transitional time is on growing my triathlon coaching business, The Endurance Drive. My training partner and friend Jim Anderson and I started this business about a year ago and I have certainly enjoyed getting to know and coaching my group of athletes. I was fortunate that all of my athletes chose to stay with me through the move and I have enjoyed the new task of doing all of my coaching remotely. My work for The Endurance Drive has been largely a side project over the past year, while continuing to work as a collegiate swim coach so it has been enjoyable to make that one of my main priorities and find ways to translate what I have learned as a swim coach and as a triathlete myself into development of my athletes. I am fortunate to have five very different athletes at the moment so it has helped me develop a wide array of workouts as well as strategies for extracting the most out of each of my athletes. The experiences I have had with these athletes over the past month has shown me I am capable of making this a serious business and has made me eager to attract new clients here on the West Coast. Perhaps this is the case for most small businesses, but attracting new clients has certainly proved to be the most challenging aspect of the entire online triathlon coaching business. If I am honest about my personality, promoting a new company and seeking new clients is far from natural so it has and continues to be a good personal challenged to put myself out there in situations I may otherwise avoid. I am looking forward to the start of the racing season in just a couple weeks, from not only an athletic point of view but also as a means of starting to get to know the community and get the Endurance Drive name out there in the Southern California Triathlon scene.

Speaking of being excited to race, the nerves are back. Nerves have always been part of the pre-race routine for me but this has been an especially long off season so it seems they are starting a bit early. I have learned to manage this anxiety/anticipation, but for the most part, starting the swim is really the only thing that will calm me down. I always feel a great deal of anticipation and excitement to see what kind of fitness I have brought to each race and how hard I am going to be able to push myself. Despite coming from a swimming background in college and then spending the last six years of my life on a pool deck there are still pre-swim nerves. Not so much the fear of getting punched in the face or not be able to make it, more will I be able to get clear of the pack, will someone swim with me, where will I settle effort wise to maximize my potential in the swim without compromising my bike and run splits. To be honest, I do not enjoy the hour or two before a race, despite my persistent training and mental preparation. I would be lying if I said nerves don’t get the best of me from time to time. Unfortunately, for me this usually manifests itself in my stomach but I have worked on many ways of controlling this over the years. Fortunately, the most effective cure for my nerves and pre-race angst is to start the race. When I start swimming and I get through the first few breathing and sighting cycles I can finally relax and let my fitness take over. Over the past six years this is where I have felt most comfortable, in the water, on the bike or on the run but in a race focusing on my effort and executing a perfect plan. It certainly does not always go as planned,but win or lose mid-race is where I feel my best.

I am looking forward to the Olympic I will be racing next weekend in Ventura, CA. Course is flat, fast and I think it should be a good test of my early season form. A lot has changed since I last raced in September; an entire swim season has passed, I am no longer a swim coach, I am training/running triathlon coaching business full-time and I moved to California with my girlfriend Nyssa. After a less than ideal off-season training wise, I have worked as hard as I know how to over the last three months to get myself ready for this block of racing. There have certainly been many encouraging signs over the past few week and I cannot wait to see how that translates to my racing.

April 19, 2018

Having whittled my possession down to what could fit in a car, including two cats, I set off for what would be a three day tour of the southern route across the States. It felt good to finally be on the road. I had spend months keeping this decision a secret and then most of March packing up and saying goodbye to all the great friends I made during my three years in Hanover New Hampshire. Now I was finally beginning a new phase in my life. Having spent years wishing to find a way to train full time it was finally a reality.

After months if not years of being in limbo it was finally time to make the cross country drive to my new home in southern California. For what had felt like quite a long time I have struggled with the balance between work, life and my desire to train and push myself to new athletic levels. I knew that I was bumping up against my ceiling to improve in any one area which eventually led to frustration across the board. It felt as if I would build momentum in one area and start to see some real growth and potential, only to realize I had left behind other important aspect of my life. This internal debate between my professional, social and racing life has been a front and center part of my routine for most of the past three years. In my opinion I had three choices; keep the status quo, put racing on the back burner and consider it a hobby and a way to stay fit, or take a break from my career as a swim coach and devote myself fully to racing and training to really find out what I am capable of.

Ultimately the decision to take a break from college coaching was not an easy one. College swimming has more or less dictated my life for the last ten years and as with any change, taking the leap is hard even if you know the results will be worth it. Having seen glimpses of what a few weeks or the occasional month of ideal training led to I knew this was a risk I wanted to take. Despite having received nothing but support from the local community and loved ones it still felt difficult to explain to others that I was leaving a full time career and putting my pursuit of being a head coach on hold to race triathlons. An important realization was that I do not need to complete all of my life goals by the time I am 30. Seems obvious but I am not sure I grasped this until recently. With all that in mind the decision was made to step away from college coaching and focus on my personal racing career full time with a goal to make the leap to professional racing. Having felt that the rest of life was interfering with my various athletic pursuits for more or less all of life I was finally in a position to focus on myself and see what a full time commitment would lead to.

As with most things in life during my early 20’s I was fairly convinced I could do everything solo with no help from the outside world. I think I almost felt that was the only correct way to achieve things or keep others sheltered from risks associated with selfish pursuits. Fortunately, I have matured and realized that the support of others not only makes things like pursuing a dream of being a professional athlete a reality but it makes them more enjoyable. This shift in thinking was not easy but I am sure that I would have never taken such a leap of faith on my own. I owe a lot to everyone who has molded me over the years and in particular those who have helped me make this dream a reality. As it turns out a lot more things are possible when you let others’ into your life and let people support you. Seems straightforward but when you spend all of your professional hours making others athletic experiences as ideal as possible it can be a hard switch to flip and let others help you.

I enjoy having long term goals, I think they bring focus and urgency to one's daily existence. For the past six years those goals have almost always had to do with triathlons. Despite spending most of my waking hours as a swim coach my daily, weekly or several month goals always revolved around training for a race. What excites me most about this new phase of my life is that for the first time in a long time my goals and what I spend all day doing will be aligned. I am fairly certain that I will return to coaching at some point but in the meantime I am looking forward to a new adventure.

After a relaxing pitstop with my girlfriend’s parents in Austin, Texas it was time to get back on the road. I think we all, but mainly the cats enjoyed the break from the car and would have gladly stayed in Austin much longer but we were equally as anxious to arrive in our new home in Southern California. So off we went only to arrive in Claremont California about 16 hour later and in the middle of the night but greeted by Nyssa and Ophelia (her cat) nonetheless. My dream was finally reality, or at least the start of it. Getting out here and taking a risk on something new was the biggest hurdle, I am confident in my abilities and I know I will do the work given the right opportunities. Above all I am just thankful for all the help and support and excited to see what I am capable of. Time to train.