the emotional journey of under performance appears to me to fall in line with similar stages of that found in dealing with grief:  denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally landing on acceptance.  i feel i have moved through the stages fairly swiftly.  i actually got through to acceptance during the 5 hours of the race…

at first, i think i was in denial that i was actually racing.  telling myself…’it’s okay if those girls ride away…it’s okay’  what the hell?!?  it is not okay.  where is your competitive fire woman?!?  if a professional females comes around you on the bike, you fall back 10 meters, BUT you do not just let her ride away!  

anger, i can be angry with my tires for not popping during the race  and allowing me a perfectly acceptable DNF.  i can be angry with all the other women in the pro field for riding so strong.  i can be angry with myself for signing up for the racing knowing i would need a mental break post double ironman.  regardless, i think i have stumbled onto something there, if i am to be angry with anyone, i may as well look in the mirror.  my under performance is not only a direct result of my lack of training, but also due to my attitude during the race.  my attitude wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but i was in cruise control with a high heart rate.  

bargaining, oh this one is easy, i was bargaining all week.  

‘it will be better to race than to sit on the couch,’  metaphorically not physically, it may have been a chair come race day, but point being, it was time for me to get back out there!

depressions, up next, which feels like a revolving door emotion more than any of the others.  it doesn’t take much to get me down.  it’s not that i am depressed with my race result.  it would have been unfair on my part to expect any better.  it’s more that i hate people looking at the performance and comparing my apples to their oranges, and them thinking they have the better fruit.  because, dude, whatever, it doesn’t matter, it won’t ever matter.  i really like my apples and that’s all that matters to me today.  so i picked an apple 9 weeks too early because i had to to be in the contest in augusta on Sunday, but that doesn’t mean that come Thanksgiving weekend, my apple pie won’t freaking ROCK!  (Ironman Cozumel is the weekend of Thanksgiving.)  

and finally acceptance, acceptance that i needed the last month to recoup, to re-gather, and to learn a slightly different way to move forward so that i can continue to grow as an athlete.  acceptance that a 5 hour 70.3 race is the best i had in me on Sunday.  acceptance that good things came from this race and this day, and knowing that i will move forward stronger having finished that run even if it was against my own will.

alright i came across this today, but with that…”the end” of this grief consueling session.

http://www.pbase.com/tombriggs/image/116733707

(i guess we’ll take this as a compliment, sort of…)

the organization of the race went much more smoothly than i expected.  they held a great event.  our tri club, ptc tri, did an AWESOME job of support!  they rock the corner of 10th, and took care of me as i came staggering up, bonking a little more with every step…  so highly recommended, augusta 70.3 2010!  but i, also, recommend training for the event

tri ptc corner in Augusta…those are my people cheering…