My wife and I were sitting in comfortable chairs in an anteroom, at the Harvard Club in Boston, across from Tim and Nicole DeBoom. Tim was there to be inducted into USA Triathlon's Hall of Fame, notably as the last American man to have won the Hawaiian Ironman. I asked him a question, and I knew the answer before I asked it, but I wanted to hear it anyway.
"Kona is its own animal, so, excluding that, what was your most gratifying multisport experience?"
"Norseman." No hesitation from him, as I knew there would not be.
"I know why you picked Norseman," I said, "and I've tried to explain to this to people. But every time I try I fail. I can tell by the response I get that I've failed."
Tim has won a lot of races beyond the Ironman World Championship (twice). He must have been thrilled to win his first U.S. amateur triathlon championship, and there have been a lot of other wins along the way. But Norseman, to which I've not yet been, is different. Obviously it's got a stark beauty to it that's near to unmatched. But, "I didn't know I could finish it," he said. And that's it! That's the thing! There's something about commencing a task the end of which is unsure, and when this is the pull the questions of prize money, prestige and notoriety are not relevant.
In fact, not only is event size irrelevant, it's a deterrent. "Ironman became a thing to do," he said, but the end is not unknowable. When enough people do it – have done it – the value of it changes. It's not that the Ironman has lessened in value. It's a right of passage. It's a ribbon you wear on your uniform with pride. But it's wholly different than Norseman, and when Tim started listing the other races that he's interested in I knew the list already: Inferno Tri, Celtman, Ö till Ö.
The smaller the race, the more stark, and invested with history and, if you will, the ghosts of history, the better. The greater the challenge, the better. The entry fee (whether there's an entry fee); the results, the awards (or whether there are results and awards); become unimportant or detractive. There is the thing you do because you've been training your whole life to do it, and regardless of a life's worth of training you don't really know if it's doable. "This is the thing that got me into triathlon in the first place," he said.
When I raced the Hawaiian Ironman in 1981 only about 100 people had ever finished it. I raced it not knowing if I could finish it. in 1984 I took my bike to a mountain in Mexico, the top of which sits at about 18,000 feet above sea level, the bottom of which is just about 10,000 feet below, on the valley floor. Via the bike, and run, and some ice climbing I went to the top, not knowing if it was possible. In the end it was not that hard. Any of you reading could do it. But I didn't know if it was achievable and there's something intoxicating about setting out on a journey the end of which is not known. I envy those who first attempted the Hawaiian Ironman, because they really did not know if it was possible.
Which leads me to why I'm trying again to write about, not a reason, but THE reason I'm a multisporter (and have been for 38 years). I sometimes prevail at a multisport task, but I always fail at explaining why I take on the task. Nevertheless, here my answer to a post written by a Slowtwitch Reader Forum member. This forum member wrote:
"I don't particularly enjoy cycling and suck at swimming. Though I'm starting to enjoy it a little more, I can't say that I particularly love swimming either. I do however, LOVE running, probably because I'm good at it. My cycling is pretty bad, as I probably push about 165 watts at my peak. Swimming wise, I'm about year and a half into it, but can't use the excuse of being 'new' anymore. As the running season has gone on, I've thought more and more about just focusing on running and dropping tri, though I bet I'd enjoy it more if I didn't stink at the other two legs."
I sympathize with this athlete. I came from a running background. When you peel enough layers back, and you get in there deep enough, you'll peel the swim layer off of me first, the bike layer next, but the run layer will still be in there somewhere. That's the last layer to go. When you peel that back I don't really know if there's anything beneath that. Maybe the eating and breathing layers.
My life's journey, it's mission, has been farther up and farther in. When you participate in events like Norseman and the other races named above and you traverse ancient trails trodden by Goths cresting the Alps and looking down on the Roman countryside; swim the lakes and fjords of Nordic fisherman; run the routes of ancient painted Pictish farmers of Scotland; and you do what even they could not because of your unique skillset honed through daily practice; this adds a texture to my life that keeps me working on what I'm worst at doing. I have a luxury that those in history do not have: They faced tasks they did not know they could complete because it was a matter of survival: I do it by choice, and it's not a matter of survival. But we both – I along with unnamed, unknown people throughout the history of humankind – engaged in the struggle.
I can't find fault with anyone who chooses a pursuit because he or she is better suited at it. I can only answer for myself. I swim, bike on and off road, run, ski, because I use these tools and skills to take me farther up and farther in. I swim several times a week, not because I'm good at it, but because I'm bad at it. I climb hills on my bike not because I'm good at it, but because I am determined to be good at it. At 58 years old I've been trying to get good at it for almost 40 years and I'm still working at it. Give me a few more years. I'm getting there.
I am only a moderately good athlete. I am just competent enough, thankfully, to hoist my carcass up and into rare and lovely places few have seen or are able to see (but any of you can see, because you have these skills too). I use the tools made by others, and when I didn't have those tools I made them myself (sometimes that worked out; more often it didn't; but it was always a fulfilling part of the journey). I still have places to go, routes to take, challenges to overcome, or to fail to overcome. I need all the skills I can muster to present to the task at hand, even those at which I am not particularly suited.
