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Chapter One: Lifestyle and the Cool Stuff Vehicle
Before we begin to deliver to you the nuts and bolts of how we do our long course thing, we wanted to share with you some broader themes and insights. We are leaders, often with a thirty thousand foot view of the long course athlete and what it means to many to compete at the Ironman distance. Our positions as mentors and guides to long course athletes of all abilities, backgrounds, and life situations creates a unique perspective that we’d like to share with you.
The most common theme we see with long course athletes is that of using the finish line to mark a transformation in their lives. The modern world presents us with very, very few physical challenges we can use to really “test what we are made of.” Few of us face the extraordinary or even routine physical struggles that our ancestors did. It is human nature to want to test ourselves. Triathlon, and specifically Ironman, is often viewed as an extreme sport and otherwise normal people are attracted to the allure of earning a title that is widely recognized as the “real deal.” We’ve seen many, many athletes draw a line in the sand 18 months away, and use the process of moving towards that goal to create magnificent change in their lives.
Our athletes begin this transformation from many different starting points. Some, at the very beginning, see an Ironman finishline 18 months away and focus on that goal from day one. Others are lead to that line through an almost natural evolution of the endurance athlete: increasing fitness creates a demand for ever increasing distances and challenges until, one day, they are hitting the submit button on an Ironman registration. And so the journey begins, usually with faces buried in the trees of training schedules, training zones, gear, gadgets, and books. So much to learn, so much to get done and only so many hours in the day. However, one key transformation that happens with 95% of our athletes is this: fitness ceases to be something they do and becomes what they are. They begin to live fitness as a lifestyle.
And so, as your coaches, we would like to begin our journey together by sharing with you the vision we have for you at that finishline:
Your Fitness Is A Vehicle For Doing Cool Stuff
As you wake up and, in your quest for that finishline, and just get it done, day after day, we encourage you to never forget that you are creating a vehicle for doing cool stuff. Aiming for a really big goal is inspiring at first, but since we are humans, even the most amazing of challenges can become mundane at some point. Never lose sight of the fact that the fitness, confidence, skills, and self-knowledge you are developing on the path to your race can all be applied to doing other cool stuff and even boring, every day real world stuff!
We hope you find Endurance Nation to be a place where you can learn, share, prepare, and network with other athletes who share your passion for doing cool stuff.
To hear more about our perspective on the sport, please visit the Endurance Nation Beginner Triathlete Project and listen to the Chapter 1 podcast.
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