John 8:32 "Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." NIV

Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Perspectives

Several DCTRI peeps competed in the Louisville IM this past Sunday. I stalked them on line all day (yeah, it takes all day to complete one of those things). At one point, one of the guys did not have times recording for him and his T2 time was almost an hour. I started to worry. Was he okay? Did he get hurt? Up to that point, he was ROCKING. I mean seriously like a 1:24 on the swim, and his cycle speeds were awesome.

We all waited to hear what happened and he posted a very serene reply: "While sad to report that I DNF, J and A  are ironmen in every sense. I'll leave it to them to give their own race reports.  Suffice it to say, they both gutted out a tough course and deserve congratulations."

It got me thinking, even though D did not finish, he was so strong. Certainly qualifies as a IM in my book. All that training that goes in, the heartbreak not to finish - WOW! Gives me an even greater perspective about training and racing.

Whether you are training for your first 5k or racing your 10th marathon, we need to realize that each step we take is on unsteady ground. The tiniest pebble in our path can cause major issues. We are not guaranteed to land that stride pain free.The reason we have training plans to follow is so we can convince our bodies to do what our minds have already determined to do. None of us choose to DNF... most of the time, its our bodies that don't cooperate.

I stepped wrong on mile 5 of my 8 mile run yesterday... on Milles. There wasn't a pebble and I didn't trip, I just stepped wrong. Typically, if I keep going, the pain subsides, and it did. But after 2 hours in my (zebra print) 3 1/2 heels, it started to hurt again. Yeah, bad decision to wear the heels but my point is, during today's 4 mile run, it still was sore.

I took it slow... I think it was a 9:45 pace. Slow for 4 miles. It doesn't hurt now. I'm thankful. I have 8 tomorrow and 18 on Saturday. I'm nervous. Those 18 miles will be all alone, like my 16 were 2 weeks ago. I plan to listen to my body, not give up and push my body to do things that my brain tells me it can!

As for all of those DNFers out there... to me, starting the race, getting to the start line is what determines how successful you are. Stand up, wipe off the debris that caught you on the way down, and start again!
How have you bounced back from a DNF?

1 comments:

Unknown said...

I had a DNF due to injury....walked off the course and went to urgent care for an xray. It was the right thing to do. I think too many times people think DNF is a failure, when pushing to the end can actually make things worse. If you need to stop, be it on a training run or a race, you need to stop.