Susan trains for the Danskin Triathlon!
For those of you who know me well, you know that I signed up for the Danskin last year and decided not to do it about 3 weeks prior to the event. I couldn’t get over the fear of swimming in open water. Open water swimming is very disorienting. I could swim in the shallow end a few strokes at a time, but going into the deep end really freaked me out. For about several days, my anxiety was sky-high until I made the decision to quit. It was a relief to give myself 12 more months to train.
This year for the triathlon, I also had the added benefit of a training buddy. My two friends who did the triathlon last year were Kim C. & Joy. Joy lives too far away to train with and Kim is very independent. I may have known two people who were planning on doing the Danskin triathlon, but for all intents and purposes I was training alone. I hated it. Training for the Danskin by myself really magnified my own loneliness. It was horrible.
The Seattle Danskin triathlon is the biggest all-women triathlon in the country. It is so popular, that when registration opens in February, it closes the same day! The Danskin is a “sprint-length” triathlon. The swim is 800 yards (that’s almost ½ mile), 12 mile bike and a 3 mile run – although my training partner and I choose to walk.
When I quit last year, Heather M. and I talked about doing the Danskin in 2008 and I was excited by the prospect of a training partner. I knew that it would really help my training and confidence. Unfortunately, Heather and I suffer the same malady as many Americans – we over-schedule our own lives. The Danskin takes place in August. We registered for the Seattle Danskin in February. We started training in June. That’s right. We had 12 months where we KNEW we were doing a triathlon and we wait 10 months to start training. We just kept on putting it off and putting it off.
I was worried but Heather was very confident that we still had plenty of time to train. I kept on telling her that I was thinking about taking some open-water swim clinics or triathlon clinics and she kept on saying the “we can do it ourselves”. But we weren’t “doing it ourselves”; we weren’t doing anything.
Let me share some fundamental differences between Heather and me. Heather is a former lifeguard and I’m pathologically afraid of the water. She used to commute to work via bike and I’m still learning how to switch gears on my expensive bike that I’ve ridden maybe a dozen times. Oh, and she’s 10 years younger than me. I finally told Heather that if we didn’t start training in June, I wasn’t doing the Danskin.
We started doing some leisurely biking and we started walking for distance in June. We had signed up for a ½ marathon in late June and wanted to increase our stamina for that. Unfortunately, the weekend before the Virginia Mason Half Marathon, I went white water rafting – and really busted up my knee. I could barely walk. The Half Marathon was out of the question for me! My doctor let me know that the triathlon, which was 7 weeks away, was still a possibility for me. However, Heather & I had yet to do any training other than walking and light biking.
I’ve never been injured before and I couldn’t believe how long a body takes to heal. Walking and biking were out of the question for me for weeks. Luckily, my doctor felt swimming would be a great therapy for my knee. (Biking actually turned out to be the best therapy for my knee – that was the biggest surprise of my training.) I started my swim training about 2-1/2 weeks after my knee injury. However, my childhood asthma had some far-reaching consequences. It took me forever to be able to swim 800 yards with little to no stopping. My lungs were just not conditioned for this kind of workout. It took 5-1/2 weeks of swim training to finally get to the Danskin swim distance.
Heather & I did some open water training too. I was still nervous about going into the open water, but it wasn’t nearly as nerve-racking as 2007. First of all, I was a much better swimmer this year than last year. Five days before the race, I swam ¾ of the Danskin length in open water. That was actually the day that I knew that I wasn’t backing out of the Danskin. At this point, I KNEW that I had the ability to do the tri.
So no more excuses…
This year for the triathlon, I also had the added benefit of a training buddy. My two friends who did the triathlon last year were Kim C. & Joy. Joy lives too far away to train with and Kim is very independent. I may have known two people who were planning on doing the Danskin triathlon, but for all intents and purposes I was training alone. I hated it. Training for the Danskin by myself really magnified my own loneliness. It was horrible.
The Seattle Danskin triathlon is the biggest all-women triathlon in the country. It is so popular, that when registration opens in February, it closes the same day! The Danskin is a “sprint-length” triathlon. The swim is 800 yards (that’s almost ½ mile), 12 mile bike and a 3 mile run – although my training partner and I choose to walk.
When I quit last year, Heather M. and I talked about doing the Danskin in 2008 and I was excited by the prospect of a training partner. I knew that it would really help my training and confidence. Unfortunately, Heather and I suffer the same malady as many Americans – we over-schedule our own lives. The Danskin takes place in August. We registered for the Seattle Danskin in February. We started training in June. That’s right. We had 12 months where we KNEW we were doing a triathlon and we wait 10 months to start training. We just kept on putting it off and putting it off.
I was worried but Heather was very confident that we still had plenty of time to train. I kept on telling her that I was thinking about taking some open-water swim clinics or triathlon clinics and she kept on saying the “we can do it ourselves”. But we weren’t “doing it ourselves”; we weren’t doing anything.
Let me share some fundamental differences between Heather and me. Heather is a former lifeguard and I’m pathologically afraid of the water. She used to commute to work via bike and I’m still learning how to switch gears on my expensive bike that I’ve ridden maybe a dozen times. Oh, and she’s 10 years younger than me. I finally told Heather that if we didn’t start training in June, I wasn’t doing the Danskin.
We started doing some leisurely biking and we started walking for distance in June. We had signed up for a ½ marathon in late June and wanted to increase our stamina for that. Unfortunately, the weekend before the Virginia Mason Half Marathon, I went white water rafting – and really busted up my knee. I could barely walk. The Half Marathon was out of the question for me! My doctor let me know that the triathlon, which was 7 weeks away, was still a possibility for me. However, Heather & I had yet to do any training other than walking and light biking.
I’ve never been injured before and I couldn’t believe how long a body takes to heal. Walking and biking were out of the question for me for weeks. Luckily, my doctor felt swimming would be a great therapy for my knee. (Biking actually turned out to be the best therapy for my knee – that was the biggest surprise of my training.) I started my swim training about 2-1/2 weeks after my knee injury. However, my childhood asthma had some far-reaching consequences. It took me forever to be able to swim 800 yards with little to no stopping. My lungs were just not conditioned for this kind of workout. It took 5-1/2 weeks of swim training to finally get to the Danskin swim distance.
Heather & I did some open water training too. I was still nervous about going into the open water, but it wasn’t nearly as nerve-racking as 2007. First of all, I was a much better swimmer this year than last year. Five days before the race, I swam ¾ of the Danskin length in open water. That was actually the day that I knew that I wasn’t backing out of the Danskin. At this point, I KNEW that I had the ability to do the tri.
So no more excuses…
posted by Susan at 1:53 PM
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