Early lessons
By Alison Colavecchia
4.26.01 (www.slowtwitch.com)

I expected, based on all the press, that my soul and self would reveal themselves Ironday and that prior to that it was business as usual. I figured the greatest challenge I would face before race day would be fitting all the workouts into my already busy days. But as I go about the business of showing up for each day of training and trying to combine it with each day of living, I keep bumping into myself. You see everyday, day after day and week after week this Ironman goal keeps asking me to face the very things I find hardest to do: stay consistent, stay focused, be patient, stay organized and transition fast.

I have always been more of the crash-and-burn type. Give me an intensive project requiring 18 hour days for a few months, live it, breathe it, get it done and then wham, I am out. If you need to have a major obstacle or crisis overcome, a major proposal in on a tight deadline or a room renovated by Christmas I am your gal. Ask me to remember to have my children’s allowance in hand every Friday at 4pm, submit a weekly report of my hours or take a prescription at the same times each day and I am lost. Consistency just hasn’t been my strength. So it has been with my training. In the past, I would have phases where I was inactive, make the decision to get back at it, go full tilt (relatively speaking of course) and then burn out or get injured. I am learning that triathlon training––Ironman training in particular––demands a different approach. I cannot make up for limited training with a period of full-tilt training or I will simply not make it to the starting line. The training needs to be consistent.

While I appreciate my ability to "multifocus" as a Mom, I have come to accept that being able to do so isn’t always a good thing. This became apparent as I began to use the wind trainer and swim lengthier workouts. I just wasn’t able to keep track of either time or distance. I was too distracted. It did not matter how much effort I tried to put into making sure I was alert, my head was constantly going in its own direction. So I am having to learn to stay focused, to concentrate on the task at hand and turn down the volume of the noise in my head.

Perhaps the most eye opening has been coming face to face with my own impatience. The benefit of impatience is that I am someone who does not feel the need to wait until all signs say go, I , like NIKE, say just do it! I do not put up with a lot of wasted energy and have always felt the need to make time count whether at work or play. The downside of impatience is that the slow, methodical preparatory work demanded of many goals feels tedious, often leaving me unable to resist the urge to skip a few steps. Give me those BIG workouts now! If I am going to paint a room, I want to get to the painting now. I have to work incredibly hard to persist with the tedious preparatory tasks of washing the walls, taping the windows and woodwork, patching the holes etc…

The error of my ways has quickly shown itself in my training. I have learned that for my body to be able to tolerate the volume required of triathlon training (and I am still in the small stuff comparatively speaking), I have to patiently attend to what feels like detail work… things like hydration, eating well, getting enough sleep, stretching and weightlifting. Doing these things just before or after a BIG workout or race is too late. I remember reading a Peter Reid quote (but can’t recall the exact source) where he stated that "patience is always rewarded in an Ironman". That struck a chord with me. Same message, different source: My age group swimming coach, who became a dedicated marathon runner, said what differentiates other runners from a marathon runner is patience. I am listening!

Getting organized has never been a problem for me. I am very good at organizing things, creating lists and schedules. Staying organized is another story. Yet doing this 7 days a week, most weeks of the year, is exactly what this Iron journey is asking me to do. Be organized every day. If not, the workouts do not get completed or are done in a rushed, haphazard fashion rather than as quality workouts. If not, then family members feel neglected, appointments, pizza money and meetings get forgotten or I am late for things because of trying to squeeze all of it in––I failed to factor something into the plan. Each morning I am learning to take a few minutes to assess the day from all angles. I am sticking loyally to a training schedule which has given me evidence to suggest that keeping a schedule is not completely out of the realm of my behavioral repertoire. Perhaps there is even room for generalization…maybe a cleaning schedule is next!

I am not someone who transitions easily between things. I dread the end of a really great book, struggle to move into home life after a full day of work, and have always thought that walking from the water to the bike rack makes way more sense for smooth transitions than all those other strategies. Indeed the transitions required in triathlon have provided a good backdrop for a better understanding of this personal quirk. Gradually I am learning to recognize, anticipate and accommodate this trait, to see transitions as part of both life in general and triathlon racing.

There has been much learning in this first phase. In my racing, while the speed of my last half-marathon was not dazzling, the fact that I aimed for and achieved "patient, steady and consistent" is. This is me learning how to go against my own grain, learning how to do things differently…learning how to do things the Iron way…consistent, focused and patient.

Don’t get me wrong, I was not completely unaware of these quirks before, I just didn't think I would have to do anything about them in order to pursue my Ironman. I thought it was just about getting the workouts done, going harder and longer––that it would just take getting stronger physically. Nobody told me (until last week, thanks Scott) that I would have to come face to face with me long before race day.

Still Tri’n