Breaking it Up

One of the most important things I learned while training for my first Ironman is that its very easy to get burned out on training.  And the best way to avoid burn out is to "break it up" - or simply, do something other than swimming, biking, or running when you get a chance. And although I am not officially in training yet, I have been gradually building my training base since January and that means my mind is focused on one thing 90% of the time: training.

So, I've decided to add other interests to my life. In fact, I found something that I enjoy so much that it could easily replace triathlons if it were logistically easy to do. And that would be skiing.

I grew up in Kansas and honestly, I don't think I had even heard of skiing until I was in junior high. And since my family didn't have much money, it was not anything we did or even thought of doing. It was a totally foreign concept to me throughout most of my life (and still is in some ways!).

Anyway, my kids learned to ski when they were 5 in Eldora's Trek program. Like most kids, they loved it. They went on to be pretty darn good skiers and would handily fly down any blue slope they could find and would occasionally do a black slope.

I was not far behind but being an adult, my worldly knowledge and great wisdom that I constantly told them about only made me more fearful of the steepness, because I knew what could happen if I, say, ran into a tree. They did not have this perspective, which freed them up to ski as fast as they could with nary a worry about crashing into anything. And crash they did, but they got up and kept going. Tough little buggers.

So, they had Thursday off and we went skiing and snowboarding. They did the latter while Kurt and I skied. It was a nice diversion from the usual swim, bike, run routine and I loved it. It won't be long before I'm on a rigid training program and I cherish these days when I can do what I want.