| IMPACT Online Exclusive: On Competing in Triathlon at Fifty |
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A non-athlete's look on the benefits of sport. I often wonder what draws people to triathlon. I suspect there are many common themes that thread amidst all the personal reasons we each have. For me it was a huge door that opened by accident. 
Scott Fulton running the Banff-Calgary Relay, photo by Jonathan Huyer.
Not too many years later, the middle-aged pudge well entrenched, I found myself out biking again with a couple of cyclists who encouraged me to join them on longer rides. Apparently, they were training for something and could use the company. I soon discovered it was the Ironman USA in Lake Placid they were training for, and these weren't IM newbies. I'd yet to even see a triathlon! But like so many, watching ABC's Kona 2005 coverage hit me like a ton of bricks. Soon after, I signed up for my first race, the Tupper Lake Half Ironman. Thankfully, two weeks earlier, I had been led by the hand through a sprint distance, so at least I had some idea of what to expect logistically. I suffered a lot on the run course in the heat and humidity that June day, experiencing a total meltdown after the finish. I had never faced a challenge like that in my life-not even close. Amid a flood of tears and utter exhaustion, the hook was set. My first IM was one of those defining moments most of us have at some point-we're in, or we're out. You get it, or you don't. Either is fine, but we don't sit on the fence for long. We all talk about sport and fitness, but for me those are just a few of the outcomes of good health, and that's been the real story these last ten years. Ten years ago I weighed twenty pounds more and was well on my way to being an old, unhealthy man, years before my time. I had no conscious awareness of it at the time, yet in retrospect I was a walking time bomb. Thankfully, there was still time on the clock to make changes. Early in my triathlon training, one of my IM friends gave me a copy of Joe Friel and Gordo Byrn's, Going Long. It is still the best book on my tri list. After exchanging emails for a year or so, Friel invited me to ride with him on one of his Saturday rides out of Bicycle Ranch in Scottsdale. I have never come close to riding with that caliber of cyclists and had the sensation of being in way over my head. "Just don't cause a wreck" kept racing through my head as the thirty-strong peloton raced along. It was a total rush, all day long! Byrn and I had also been exchanging training thoughts for a couple years, and last December he offered to coach me for the 2009 season. Typically, coaches make about as good an athlete as doctors do patients. Knowing this full well, we both agreed to go in with this awareness and see how it might work. And while I'm unquestionably a challenging patient, I learned a ton more as a result of this experience, and we can claim some tangible successes in this milestone year. One of the unique things that I learned this past year from working with Gordo was the underlying role of health. I've never trained as much, and have never been as healthy or fit. But don't jump to the conclusion, as most of us would (me included), that increased training is the path to improved health. Not so. Most of us will break down or go from injury to injury if we blindly attempted this approach. Molina's great quote, "It takes a long time to get good," is so true. The challenge is in how we manage our own expectations against all the outside inputs we get bombarded with every day. I did not miss a single training session due to a tri-related injury all season. I don't see this as a fluke, rather a designed outcome. Your fitness gains from frequency are bigger than intensity, and if you're injured, you compromise frequency. Everything else quickly becomes secondary. In the age group world, we are so lucky to be reborn every five years. And at this point in life, it's not so much about getting faster, or even retaining your speed or power, but even more so about being healthy. We start to see the attrition brought on by early years of abuse at this point in life. "If it hurts, stop" is a lot harder to heed at twenty-five than it is at fifty. We get it now. So maybe all those years of missing out on organized sport are actually paying off now. The knees are sound, the arteries clean again. Life ain't bad at all. I signed up last weekend to do a marathon in November. I haven't made the journey to Boston yet, and it's on my to-do list, so what the heck! And next year, at least a couple halfs and maybe an Oly or two. Who knows? maybe even some bike racing, finally!
About the AuthorScott Fulton began competing in triathlon at the age of forty-seven. On the occasion of his fiftieth birthday, he jotted down a few notes on the nature of sport and competition and shared them with the members of his triathlon club in Calgary, Alberta, and then shared them with IMPACT. |
Debbie KIrkby makes this comment
Thu 19 Nov 2009 00:48:59 PST