Week 26 Summary...Progress

This week began with a trip to physical therapy at Plaza Physical Therapy where I got good news from Kevin Swanson, my PT. Kevin told me my incisions were closed and I was good to begin swimming. I went straight from PT to the pool and my arms reminded me that they don't like it when I go 16 days without swimming. It was my longest time out of the water in the last year and a half. I only made it 2,300 yards before calling it a day in the pool but I would be back for more later in the week. My achilles continues to heal from the surgery although running is not in the plans for at least two more weeks. I've had no pain at all biking which is a sign of improvement because pre-surgery I would have put the pain at a 1 on a scale of 1 to 10. It wasn't enough to keep me off the bike but the fact that it is now totally pain free has me excited. I went to PT on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. After physical therapy on Friday I made a visit to my massage therapist, Laurel Darren. I have long known the benefits massage can bring to having good workouts and then also aiding in recovery. Last year I went to Laurel for massages before all my big races and I believe the work she did helped me to race well in all of them. This year I plan to use Laurel's expertise even more as I will get massages before AND after all my races. I know the pre-race massage is important to getting my body ready to perform at its' best and the post-race massage will help me to recover quickly so I can begin training at a high level soon after the races. I also will sprinkle in some massages during hard training weeks when I'm not racing. I know these will help me to reach my goals. If you are looking for a massage therapist or have never used massage for sports performance call Laurel for an appointment. She is tremendous. Her office is conveniently located on Avenue of the Cities just off I-74 in Moline, IL. Laurel is also generously offering a tremendous deal of three 1 hour massages for $100.00. I don't think you'll find better in the QC. When I was at the Bettendorf Fitness Center the other day I saw an advertisement for their massage therapist for $1.00 for each minute. That doesn't come close to Laurel's 3 hours for $100.00.
On Saturday morning I had a great 53 mile bike ride with my good friend Stephan Marsh who was home for the weekend having just finished law school finals at Creighton University. The weather was awesome and it was great to get a real training ride in, my first ride of any substance since surgery. After the ride I went to the pool for a 3,300 yard workout and I felt awesome! I couldn't figure out why I felt so bad my first 2 days in the pool and then everything clicked on Saturday. The only thing I could think of was how well the massage loosened up my back, shoulder, and arm muscles. I just felt in a great rhythm. I followed up the swim with a session in the weight room and my total training time for the day was about 4.5 hours. It felt great to get such a solid day in without any pain in my tendon. I followed that up on Sunday with a 45 mile ride with Team Tri-Fit director Steve Meek and also got a 3,000 yard swim workout in with some fast 100's.

I had the opportunity to speak to youth on Sunday who are preparing for the Hy-Vee kids triathlon to be held at the Bettendorf YMCA on June 5th. It was awesome to see how excited the kids are to be competing in a triathlon. They are the future of the sport and I hope to see this sport continuing to be the fastest growing sport in the U.S. My total training time this week was right at 15 hours which I felt very good about. I need to start eating better to lose the weight I gained in my time off. I'm still optimistic about racing the Quad City Triathlon on June 19th. Thanks for reading. DREAM BIG!

Rehab Update

Last Monday I got the cast off my lower leg and I was able to get around in a walking boot using crutches. The mobility that I had in my ankle was extremely small. I could not bring my foot up even to a neutral 90 degree position. Since beginning physical therapy at Plaza Phyiscal Therapy with Kevin Swanson I've been improving each day much more than I ever expected. I got rid of the crutches on Tuesday and by Friday I had retired the boot. I have no pain walking in shoes. I was able to begin biking on Wednesday with a 20 minute ride. We've increased that time through the week and yesterday I went outside for the first time for a 20 mile ride. I've had no pain at all while biking so I'm hoping to get the green light to begin interval work sometime this week. Through this entire process I thought swimming would be the first thing I'd be doing in my rehab workouts but that has not been the case. One of the two incisions from the surgery was not sealing shut and with that left open I would have been at a high risk of infection in the water. The good news is that it closed over the weekend and I hope to get the okay today at PT to head straight to the pool. I'm really excited about the progress that I'm making with the recovery. I enjoyed having the transition clinic on Saturday and would like to thank the poor souls who braved the terrible conditions to attend. It was nearly 40 degrees and the wind was blasting about 20 mph. Hopefully all of them were able to pick up something useful to help them reduce time in transition.

I recently had the opportunity to do a "Pro on Pro" interview arranged through journalist John Paul Severin. I interviewed fellow pro Andrew Starykowicz and he interviewed me. Andrew is a very well established pro who is an incredible rider. Last year at the 70.3 World Championships in Clearwater, FL Andrew biked a world record 56 mile split in 1 hour 58 minutes. He has had the lead in that race coming off the bike each of the last two years. The interview is at www.evotri.com if you're interested. As for my early season race schedule it has definitely taken a hit. I will not be able to race in Galena in 2 weeks, and frustratingly enough they will not allow me to transfer that entry to next year's race even though I have a documented injury. Those are the kinds of things that make me not want to go back to a race like Galena in the future. I understand not allowing transfers to someone who just didn't train and decides they don't want to race but I think a documented injury is different. I had originally planned to make my pro debut in Kansas on June 6 but that will no longer happen. My new target pro debut is July 18 in Racine, Wisconsin. That leaves me with a target race date of June 19 at the Quad City Triathlon. That will only happen if I get 2 weeks of pain free running in prior to the race. I like the way things are coming along and the "glass is 1/2 full" when I think about the summer. Thanks for reading. DREAM BIG!

Post surgery update

I saw my surgeon Dr. Mendel this morning. They cut my cast off using some device I thought was going to saw through my leg but they told me to trust that this ancient looking saw could detect human flesh and it would stop cutting when it was reached. Dr. Mendel has cautioned me numerous times to be patient in coming back from this injury and I intend to do just that. Later in the day I went to Plaza Physical Therapy for an analysis from Kevin Swanson, the head PT at the clinic. He called Dr. Mendel over since their offices are on the same floor and together decided I was ahead of what they would have expected with the recovery. With that said they still want me to remain very careful. We decided I would be able to swim with a pull bouey in the pull. That is a flotation device that goes between the legs so you don't kick. I will begin that on Wednesday if my incisions are completely closed. One of them was still slightly open today and with that open it would increase my chances of infection if I went swimming so I will wait. Kevin had me ride a bike for 10 minutes with almost no resistence. I was excited to be pedaling even with no resistance. I will continue to get physical therapy three times a week for the next two weeks. I graduated from the cast to a walking boot and will use crutches if it hurts at all in the boot. As for the looks of the achilles...it resembles a big cankle due to all the swelling. I have black and blue on the bottom edges of my feet on both sides and some black and blue going up the tendon. I've begun to ice regularly at home and it feels better with each ice treatment. The biggest limiter I can feel is that my foot doesn't have near the same range of motion it had before the surgery. I can only bring my foot up to about a 90 degree angle. Any more than that hurts. I hope to be in the pool this week and get some kind of fitness in. I lifted upper body weights today and I'm expecting to be sore tomorrow. Thanks for reading. DREAM BIG!

What I learned during a week on crutches...

For the past 6 days I've been in a cast that I expect to be removed tomorrow morning when I see Dr. Mendel. I expected to have lots of pain when the initial local anesthesia wore off but it never came. I stopped taking my pain medication on Wednesday night because it was making me very sleepy and I wasn't feeling any pain. I was falling asleep in the middle of some awesome shows on the History Channel and I knew that had to be due to the pain medication...I mean who would fall asleep while watching the history channel otherwise? I learned some things this week that was spent mostly on the couch elevating my leg. I learned that wood floors do not go well with crutches. The rubber thing at the end of the crutch worked as a suction cup on the wood floors about 7 times nearly leading to fatal accidents. I was trying to figure out if Jen would be able to sue the crutch company if I died due to those things suctioning to the floor. I also learned that Jen really doesn't know the word sympathy. She was pretty easy on me the first two days as I laid on the couch 24/7 while she took care of two kids...3 counting me. A huge thanks to my mom for helping out Tuesday-Friday with getting the kids to and from daycare while Jen was at work. The only way I could have gotten them to the car is to crawl on my knees which I did learn was very useful while on crutches. By the weekend Jen was expecting a little more from me...help with dinner, bedtime...and then at 12:30 a.m. when Owen started crying Jen asked if I could do a feeding so I grabbed the crutches, hobbled out to the fridge to warm some milk, hobbled back to Owen's room to feed him, picked him up from my knees so I could burp him and get him back to sleep. I shouldn't say I learned this sympathy thing about Jen. She's always been super tough and would have done the same had she been the one who was injured. It reminded me of when I was out of shape and we raced the Bix 3 years ago. At the turnaround of the 7 mile race I was hurting and looked back to see Jen smiling only about 20 seconds down to me. I knew she would have no second thoughts of going right by me and she did that at the 5 mile mark. I let her go and made a desperate attempt to outkick her but she beat me by 5 seconds on her way to running 43:15. The next week I wanted revenge and challenged her to a 5k. I switched strategies and decided I would try to sit on her the entire race and outkick her at the end. Just after the halfway point she dropped me and went on to run 17:45. I was 18:00. She's tough and expects me to be that way also so there was no sympathy with my condition this week.

To put my competitive spirit at ease this week I challenged our daughter Payton (who will turn 2 on June 1) to some races down the hall. Payton beat me 8 straight times. I could go about the same speed as her once I got up to speed on the crutches but she accelerated much faster than I could. She also cheated a couple times and left the starting line before she said go. She says she is training for the Junior Bix...I'm betting she walks it again this year because she doesn't handle pressure of a crowd very well.
On Saturday I got a really exciting call from my oldest brother Jason who had just completed a sprint triathlon in Newton, IA. Jason had gastric bypass surgery about 5 years ago and has made a committment to living a healthy and active lifestyle over the past year. Last year at this race his time was 2 hours 22 minutes. This year he was 1 hour 49 minutes! What an incredible drop in time! He is signed up for the Hy-Vee Olympic distance triathlon in mid-June and I can't wait to see how much more fit he is by then. These are the kind of stories that inspire me. I hope my own journey can inspire others to try to reach their own goals. It is what makes me believe I can go from losing to my wife in road races just 3 years ago to dreaming about being one of the top long course triathletes in the U.S. I watched the entire Ironman St. George race online Saturday live from Utah and during it I couldn't help but picture myself in the field fighting for a top 5 podium spot. I believe I can and will do that down the road. I have a long way to go...I'm excited to begin the rehab and start working towards my goals once again.
I want to invite anyone who is interested to a triathlon transition clinic I'll be putting on next Saturday morning at 9:00 a.m. at Crow Creek Park in Bettendorf, IA. No need to bring anything. I'll be going over some of the things I do to speed from the swim to bike leg and then from the bike to run leg. Transitions are something I value and I hope others can learn a thing or two about if they attend. There is no cost for the clinic. I hope to see you there. Contact me if you want any more details. I think some of the Team Tri-Fit members are planning to run afterwards although I don't think I'll have the green light to chase after them quite yet. They would welcome anyone on the run whether you are a member or not. I'll post a quick update of what the doctor says either tomorrow or Tuesday. Thanks for reading. DREAM BIG!

Surgery Update

Yesterday morning I checked in for surgery on my achilles tendon at 6:00 a.m. This first picture is a comparison of my legs before leaving for surgery. You can see the area around the achilles tendon on my right leg is much more defined than the left leg due to the swelling I get on the tendon of my left leg. My surgeon, Dr. Tuvi Mendel would be performing arthroscopic surgery to clean up the tendon. Jen drove me to the hospital along with our son Owen and we got checked in. I was given a really sweet gown with pink flowers on it to wear during the surgery...lovely. In addition I was also given a cool cap to go with the ridiculous gown. I'm not sure why the need for the cap when I don't have any hair. I was a little nervous going into the surgery because I wasn't sure whether this was an injury I should be operating on or if it would heal on its' own if I stopped working out for a month or two. Because it is arthroscopic the recovery is expected to be much less than a traditional full blown surgery where they open me up.

At about 7:00 the anesthesiologist gave me a mask to breath into and said he was going to give me good oxygen to breath in. His trick worked as the next thing I knew it was an hour and a half later and the surgery was complete. I also found my leg to be in a cast. Jen was with me and said Dr. Mendel assured her he found plenty of damage to my tendon when he went in. When I awoke the first thing to go through my mind was that I forgot to call for a substitute teacher for my classroom! I immediately got on Jen's phone and called our office at school. Of course they had taken care of my mistake and I think they were laughing at my loopiness than hadn't worn off from the anesthesia. Just after 9:00 a.m. Dr. Mendel came by to talk to me about the surgery. He said it was something that was definitely needed which made me feel better about the decision. He said when he got in he was able to see lots of damage to the tendon and even some bleeding coming from the tendon. He showed me pictures of what a normal tendon looks like and then showed me what mine looked like. The pictures resembled some kind of shredded beef like you would get on an Arby's sandwich. He felt very good about the surgery. He said the clean up was more than what he expected and I couldn't decide if that is why I was in a cast or if it was because he didn't trust me to stay off the leg for a week. He didn't think I should go back to work this week. I'm going to see him on Monday morning to get the cast off and begin rehab. After that appointment I can get back to my classroom where I've had lots of fun since taking back over for my student teacher over the past week. I'm not a big fan of laying on the couch all day with my leg in the air but I know this is part of the rehab for getting healthy. I was supposed to race on May 22nd in Galena, IL and I e-mailed them to let them know it was highly unlikely that I would be healthy to race. I asked them if I could defer my entry to next year but apparently they don't like doing things like that even in extreme cases of injury because they responded back that they do not refund or transfer entries for any reason. That was disappointing especially since I won the race last year. I didn't expect a refund but thought at least they could let me defer to next year.

The following picture was generously sent to me by David Fathauer who was in Sullivan braving the cold, rain, and wind to get pictures of the race. Thanks to him for sending that to me. I'm very excited to begin the "comeback" and return to activity soon. Thanks for reading. DREAM BIG!

Sullivan Triathlon Race Report and Results

On Sunday I decided to try an experiment and race on no run training the past 6 weeks. This was a sprint triathlon in Sullivan, IL...about 3 hours and 15 minutes from home. The distance was a 400 meter swim, 13.5 mile bike ride, and a 5k run on the end. I don't have any pictures because Jen was with the kids at a baby shower in Chicago. I had signed up a year ago and deferred my entry to this year due to an injury to where else but my achilles tendon. I have to thank the race director Monte Johnson for allowing me to defer the entry and for putting on a really well organized race. Going into the race I planned to have arthroscopic surgery on the achilles this upcoming Tuesday. My longest run over the past 6 weeks was 2 miles and that was a couple weeks ago but I thought at that time that I could make it 5k. I knew it would hurt but didn't expect what was to come.
I drove up to the race with fellow Team Tri-Fitter and friend Jason Gravert. The ride there was good except I missed an exit but Jason's GPS rerouted us and took us on some very rural roads in Illinois to get to our destination. The race didn't start until 12:30 so it was nice to leave the morning of and we arrived about 10:30. I had decided I was not going to run at all for a warm up which I've never done but I didn't know how many miles my achilles had in it so I wasn't going to waste any of them with a run warm up. I decided to bike the 13.5 mile course as a warm up mostly so I could check out the "dangerous" turns the race director described in his e-mails to us. It was also very wet out as it rained off and on all day. The wind was also going to be a factor as it was blowing a steady 18 miles per hour. After the warm up ride I decided I was going to stick with the Zipp sub-9 disc on the rear of the bike and the Zipp 808 up front for a little more control than the 1080 that I would go with on an ideal day. The 808 has a little bit narrower rim so it isn't affected quite as much in the wind. After the warm up ride I went for a nice warm up swim. The race would start in an indoor pool with a 400 meter swim going up and down lanes and moving across the pool as we went, so every 2 lenths I torpedoed off the wall and under the lane rope into the next lane. The swim warm up was good and I was ready to go in as the 16th swimmer to enter the water. They would send 1 swimmer every 10 seconds and we had sent in an estimated swim seed time that determined the start order.
SWIM: I started with the 2 foot bunny hop as diving was not allowed to start the swim. I got into a great rhythm early on breathing every three strokes. I was able to see the wall pretty clearly even though there were no marks on it so I went with flip turns at each of the walls. About 1/2 way in I still felt in a great rhythm but was getting tired enough I started breathing every 2 strokes. With 2 lengths to go I caught the guy who started 10 seconds ahead of me and I decided to draft for 1 length to recover just a bit. When we hit the final turn I went around him and got out of the water and headed for the bike. My overall swim time was 6:01. That ranked 7th out of the 267 finishers. For me this was a very solid swim. It included my run out of the pool and down some steps before we reached the transition mat. It is also about 40 seconds faster than I swam for a 400 meter pool swim at Scott County Park for a race last September.
BIKE: I made it through the first transition in 24 seconds. That was the fastest T1 of the day. I take great pride in my transitions. I'll be hosting a transition clinic at Crow Creek Park in Bettendorf free to anyone who wants to learn some tips on how to get through T1 and T2 faster on May 8th at 9:00 a.m. I was out on the bike and I passed one or two guys early and then didn't see anyone. The best swimmers were up the road ahead of me by quite a bit because they started ahead of me and then swam faster than I did. Because I started the race 16th and passed 1 in the water I figured out my 24 second split through T1 allowed me to pass 9 or 10 of the swimmers that started ahead of me. I moved into 3rd position about 4 miles into the ride. I could see the two guys ahead of me but they were up about a minute and a half at that point. One of them was my good friend and college teammate Chris Sweet. The first 5 miles was with the wind at our back and I was maintaining speeds between 30 and 35 miles per hour. At high speeds I can really feel the benefits of the sub-9 disc. At about mile 5 we made a really scary turn that brought some riders down and we were headed directly back into the wind. It was also a rough stretch of bumpy road. I knew this tough part is where I had to make up time. My plan going into this race was to get a decent lead off the bike because I didn't know what the run would bring me. We made a right hand turn at mile 6.5 and headed back towards the 1st part of the course where we would be doing a 2nd loop of what had been miles 3-5. When I got to the turn back to the point where riders were on their fist loop I had cut the gap to 50 seconds. The wind was again at my back which meant more 30 mph riding. That was fun. At mile 10 we turned at the death trap again into the wind for a 2nd time. I had the lead down to 30 seconds. We would finish with about 4 miles into the wind. After about 2 of them I passed Chris just as the rain started pouring down in our faces with the wind blowing right at us. I was only about 15 seconds back of the top rider and I caught him with about a mile to go. Both he and Chris has started about 2 minutes ahead of me so I thought I would be fine unless I fell apart on the run...I just about did! My bike average speed was 24.9 mph which ranked 2nd.
RUN: I had another good transition through T2 and was out on the run for the big experiment. I put on the GPS watch to check my pace. As I started I thought "This doesn't hurt so bad, maybe I don't need that surgery Tuesday." I went through the 1/2 mile mark on 5:40 pace which wasn't bad without training but then we went around a tight turn and I must have stepped wrong because my achilles sent a good jolt of pain through my leg. Okay...maybe I do need that surgery. From that point things went downhill in a hurry. I needed to get the run over. I remember looking down just before the mile mark and my pace had already slowed to 6:00 mostly because I was starting to really favor my good leg. I could tell I was starting to limp and thought the smart thing to do would be to stop...that's much tougher to do when winning the only race I may do for some time. By 1.5 miles the wheels were starting to come off. My achilles was screaming at me and the pain scale had escalated to about a 7. Before this run the highest it had gotten on the pain scale was a 6 and that was over a month ago when I decided not to run again for a few weeks. I was really favoring the good leg and any time I had to step on pavement it hurt much worse. I veered a little off course to get on softer grass. Luckly most of the run was on a limestone trail and there weren't really any hills. The only incline on the course hurt really bad. By mile 2 I wasn't sure I was going to finish. My pace had slowed to 7:00 because I was trying really hard not to put weight on my bad leg. The last 15 mile run I did 6 weeks ago today was 6:30 pace for the entire run...this was not good. Chris passed me with .4 miles to go and I didn't dare try to go with him. The pain had escalated to 9 or 9.5. I was just hoping to finish at this point. He started about 2 minutes ahead of me so I thought to hang on for the win I could finish with my brutal hobble shuffle. I did finish in 58:51... with a run time of 19:31. My last mile had to be over 7:00. My run rank was 3rd overall despite the wheels coming off. My time was good enough for the win and a $100.00 gift card to Spin City Bicycle Shop. Chris finished 2nd overall in 59:54. He looks really fit and I think he'll have a great summer. My buddy Jason Gravert had a great 1st race of the year finishing 41st. I was glad he came with me.
I already have a bruise forming on my leg and it hurts really bad walking now. I'd be really disappointed in my decision to compete if the doctor says it is bad to have the surgery now and I have to wait. I'll have to wear the walking boot at school tomorrow so I can get around class and teach kids about what made slaves more or less valuable at an auction. One last story...as I was waiting around and checking the results out after the race a guy next to me was studying them and said, "Jeff Paul, I think he got his pro license." His buddy chimed in, "No, I don't think he did. I'm pretty sure he hasn't gotten it yet." A 3rd guy said, "Yeah I'm pretty sure he hasn't gotten it yet." I said, "I think he got it in January...I'm pretty sure of it." I then walked off without them knowing who I was. Complete results of the race with splits can be found at http://www.sullivanil.us/triathlon/2010/OVERALL.HTM Congrats to everyone who raced here in Sullivan today. The conditions made it tough on the ride and a lot of people fell between the one tough turn on the bike and the many tough turns on the run. Be proud of getting this one out of the way.
I'm praying for a successful surgery this week so this race won't be the highlight of my 2010 season. I know I have to be smart about my recovery. Next week I'll post how the recovery is going. Thanks for reading! DREAM BIG!

Week 22 Summary...The BIG Question

As far as the achilles tendon injury this week there still hasn't been a change in the pain. It feels great in the morning...as though nothing is wrong. It doesn't hurt to bike but hurts afterwards for about 30 minutes. Running hurts from the beginning. Swimming doesn't hurt at all. It doesn't matter how much I seem to do, the next morning always brings me relief of any pain and a feeling it is healed. I had a busy week and went over 2 days without biking or running...not that I've done any running lately. Walking around and doing exercises would make most anyone think the injury was gone but sure enough...20 minutes into an hour ride I could tell it was not gone. Part of my busy week was 4 doctor's appointments and 1 MRI. I got the results of the MRI back and learned some new things. There is such a thing as a Kager's Triangle...google it and you'll find where it is located. That is the place where my swelling is at. The foot and ankle specialist tells me the swelling is chronic...5 weeks of no running and still swelling makes me think the same. The Kager's triangle is between the achilles tendon and the tibia. After some tough thinking and asking lots of questions to Dr. Mendel, the foot and ankle specialist I went ahead and scheduled to have arthroscopic surgery on the tendon on April 27th. If by the grace of God it heals sooner then I will cancel the surgery. Scope surgery is fairly non-invasive but more aggressive than anything I've done with it yet. It involves making two small holes near the tendon and going in with a small camera and a knife to get the swelling out. The part that sounded painful to me is that he said he makes a couple really small incisions on the tendon to promote healing...injure the area to get it to heal I guess. Despite the busy week I swam twice, lifted 3 times, and rode 220 miles. I got my longest ride of the year so far in on Sunday when I went 100 miles. It was beautiful out...1st long ride that didn't feel like the tornado from the Wizard of Oz. The flags lay still in all the small Iowa towns I rolled through. The ride was at an easy effort except for 10x 3 minutes at 40k time trial effort in the middle. Overall I finished it in 4 hours 38 minutes for an average speed of 21.5 miles per hour. I used to have to ride hard to hit that speed on my training bike and training wheels even for short rides. I felt good about the effort. I guess the sun was a little brighter than I anticipated. I didn't even know I was burning until a couple hours later when my wife noticed 3 white patches on my neck. I may feel this one tomorrow. On to the big question...

I've had some people ask me about the injury and then they ask me "What have you learned from this?" This is their nice way of coming out and telling me, "You overtrained and now you're hurt because of it!" I've had plenty of people in the past tell me that I should train less...that I may get hurt with my volumes. So what did I learn from this? I learned that I am a risk taker. I learned that I gamble to be great. I learned that I have big dreams...that I don't care how much work it takes to reach them...I have no problem getting work done. This is where we get into a bit of a philosophical debate. Some like to play it safe and make sure they are healthy to race. If my goal for the year was to place in my age group at the Quad City Triathlon I probably would have trained about 10 hours a week and most likely wouldn't be hurt right now. But...that's not my goal. My goal is to stand on the podium of a professional 70.3 race. If you can't make it to the starting line...you can't win. Show me an example of a pro who wins that doesn't take risks training their absolute butt off...there isn't one! The difference between them and I is that they have 40 more hours a week to work on recovery...stretching, massage, icing, some weird compression socks, and other gadgets. I understand how high my goals are. I simply don't think I can reach them playing safe. If I am aggressive in training...pushing the limits like I was...there is a chance I'll end up hurt...like I currently am. The flip side is that if I push the limits like I was and stay healthy I may be good enough to stand on the podium at a 70.3 race. On the other hand if I was conservative in training I would certainly make it to the starting line healthy but I also would certainly not make the podium...no chance! I've never been some guy with crazy talent in this sport. There's a reason I was 202 lbs. two years ago and a reason I never was an all-conference runner in college. I'm simply not that talented. What I do have is a relentless work ethic and a belief that if you take some chances and put in enough work you may be able to beat some people you have no business beating. You may also end up watching from the sideline. I'll take that risk. I'll always take that risk. It's the very reason I write this blog. I see myself as someone with decent ability...not great, but decent. I'm trying to prove that when you go all in for a goal...any goal, it can happen. I write to inspire others to do the same...not necessarily for triathlons but for anything in life they thought was impossible at one time. The same risks that have me injured now allowed me to get the pro status in 1 year of devotion to this sport. I hope when people think I'm hurt because I overtrained they'll also realize I won 7 races last year when I overtrained. I think about 2 runners I coached as I write this. Devin Allbaugh and Charlie Paul were two guys who chose to train far beyond the norms for high school runners. They both took extreme risks...and they paid off. They were both all state, 1st and 3rd respectively in the state 3200 meters, and they both currently run for division 1 Iowa State University. Neither of them were that talented early on in high school...they just both chose to take big risks to achieve greatness. They also both went through multiple injuries in high school. Was it worth it...I'm pretty sure I could speak for them both with a yes. That's all I have to say about what I've learned...I'll be racing in Sullivan next Sunday as a last hurrah before surgery. I think I can make it 5k on the run...it will just hurt a lot. DREAM BIG!