Triathlon and Being Happy, Purpose and Passion

As Featured on Xtri

I've been doing a lot of targeted reading lately -- thank you Twitter, which is truly a great tool for developing daily reading lists -- and have started to notice a common theme surrounding individuals that tend to be, in the broadest sense, mostly happy. They are highly motivated and engage in activities that give meaning to their lives. They go about their days with what I am starting to realize are two key ingredients: purpose and passion. When I stepped back to examine how I fill my days against the two P's, naturally I put my involvement in triathlon under the lens. At this current point in my life, the results were overwhelmingly positive, so I'll continue to spend a good amount of time swimming, biking, and running.

From a "purpose" standpoint, the most simplistic evaluation is that I want to be as fast as possible. But, as I peeled back the onion a bit, I realized that this has more to do with the process of becoming as fast as possible; the things I learn about myself at the end of strenuous workouts, the intimate relationship I continue to develop with with my body, and the ability to hold myself accountable for results both positive and negative. The sport adds meaningful complexity to my life, and it forces me to grow and discover new things both physically and mentally... characteristics I can't say hold true for even the best reality TV...

In terms of "passion," this is less empirical and far more intrinsic. Does triathlon make me tick? Yes.

I think it is hard to disconnect the two P's. If you do things with [and that have] purpose, it's a lot easier to be passionate about them.

So, given that triathlon can consume a lot of our most precious resource (time), it is important to step back once in a while and test involvement in the sport against the two Ps. If you pass the test, odds are you'll not only be a happier person, but also a better triathlete since I think we tend to perform best at things that make us happy. If you don't pass the test, it could be a warning sign for the antithesis of happiness -- going through the motions -- and a cue that maybe it's time to pivot to something new.

I'll end by sharing a few things that inspired these thoughts, and although not as explicitly, do a far better job expressing what I'm going for above. I highly recommend reading the interviews.

A) In response to more recent articles about intense endurance sports and general health, someone posted on a forum, "I don't do this to add quantity to my life, but to add quality to my life."

B) I couldn't help but notice the striking similarities in the lessons offered between two extremely different people, both of whom seem quite happy:

Interview with endurance sports junkie and founder of Art/Apparel company Endurance Conspiracy Tony DeBoom:

http://www.slowtwitch.com/Interview/Inside_the_Endurance_Conspiracy_3323.html

Interview with the esteemed Harvard Business School Professor Clay Christensen:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/danschawbel/2012/06/05/how-will-you-measure-your-life/

Morning Masters Swimming Trajectory

I've noticed a very typical cascade of emotions that regularly accompanies my early morning 5K Masters swim workouts.  For my peers in the sport, maybe you can relate.  For anyone else, maybe you experience this with other exercise challenges.  Either way, I got a good laugh out of it, and it's pretty insightful as to why "just showing up" is really half the battle...

Night Before Sad.  This is an improvement on what used to be "anxious" when I first joined the group, but only marginally.  When I worked for a consulting firm I often had to travel from Monday-Thursday, catching a very early morning flight.  On Sunday afternoons, I would get what I called the "Consulting Blues" when packing my suitcase for the week. This is significantly less, but slightly reminiscent.

4:30AM Indifferent.  At this point, I have tunnel vision toward coffee. My task is to make it and drink it, and that is where all my focus is.

5:15 Creative. I find myself thinking "Maybe today should be a rest day," or "I haven't prioritized a run in a while, I wonder what Coach would say if I ran first and just did my own swim after."

5:30 Cold. What's nice about this is that much like the coffee that came before it, en route to the pool, I'm just focused on trying to get warm, so there are no negative emotions, simply a primal drive to warm up.

5:50 Rushed.  Funny how after everything I laid out above, I hurry up and rush in the locker room to ensure I don't miss 100 meters of warmup.

6:00 Anxious.  Oh the warm-up.  Can't go without it (trust me, I've tried, miserable result) but it's literally equivalent to needing to stare at the 6-inch needle (Coach Mohammad) prior to the Epidural (the main set).

6:20-7:25 On.  This is the beauty of swimming with a group, most of whom are faster than you.  I have no choice but to just swim.  The god-honest truth is I generally don't have enough time in between intervals/sets to do any thinking, so I just swim.

7:25-8:00 Euphoric.  My arms feel like rubber, my form is lost, but I'm cooling down!!

8:00-8:15. Rushed.  Got to get to work, whether that be another shorter training session or the office.

Post Training for the Morning: Happy. Hungry.  I've never done a Masters workout I regret, and I've never not been pretty ravaged at 10AM on a Mon/Wed/Fri.

My Theory on the Lance Armstrong Confession

Sharing here because I haven't heard this theory on Lance Armstrong's potential confession with conditions anywhere else yet, and it makes sense to me.  Disclaimer, I'm not a psychologist or cycling insider, and put these thoughts together in the middle swimming with an ankle band on (pure misery), so take em for what they are worth...

1) Lance Armstrong Understands the Evidence is Too Much to Overcome: Self explanatory. The case against him is so strong, and will only get stronger over time as more cyclists/doctors/friends need to rid themselves of having the weight on their chest. Lance doped, and we don't need him to tell us.

2) Lance Armstrong (LA) Liked being a Public Hero: Hard to be a public hero, let along be out in public, given his denial in the context of the mounting evidence mentioned in #1.

3) For Lance, It's Not Enough to Apologize and Walk Away: A "confession" (in quotes since we all already know what he is speculating telling us which makes the whole thing a bit odd to me) and true, heart-felt, very well written apology may enable LA to show his face in public, but I don't think he would have hero status; certainly not in the minds of the people, and probably not even in his own mind, which matters a lot to a guy who loved nothing more than being the man.

4) Confession with Conditions Ripe for Redemption: All the reports thus far say that LA is considering speaking with authorities if there is potential for his lifetime band from competition to be reduced...this is the golden nugget in my opinion, and gives Lance a chance to continue his fight even after admitting he doped.  The story will change slightly from "I never cheated" toward "Everyone was doing it and  I am really the best against a level playing field," but the point is it allows LA a big huge "but" each time he says "I cheated."  More details on what I mean by this in the next points...

5) Hey, I was Pretty Good at this Triathlon Thing: Say what you want, but when LA entered the sport of triathlon, he showed potential promise at racing long-course events; enough to draw Macca and Crowie back to Kona (in their own words).  I can't stay definitively  but I highly doubt Lance was doping during his recent return to triathlon; it would have been downright stupid given the level of scrutiny and testing.  If he was not in fact doping during the return, then one could say Lance was a FOP professional triathlete clean.

6) Confession that Lets LA Race Triathlon Gives LA a Chance At Redemption, At Least in His Own Mind: I would bet that LA's thought process may go something like this: "Well, I'm certainly damned right now, but c'mon, everyone in the peleton was doing it.  I can tell the public that everyone was doing it and I was the best against that level playing field, and then train my ass off and try and win/place highly at Kona to be able to show the public that I am the best against a clean -- God, I [Brad, the author] hope so anyways -- playing field too."  This at least allows LA to be a hero in his own mind, and will help him sleep at night because he can still tell himself he is the best before his head its the pillow.

A lot of folks have said that LA wants the conditions because he loves racing and seeing himself ranked against others, but I think it is actually because he think he has a legitimate chance of winning in triathlon and using that as his "but" after he has to say he cheated.

Potential Problems: Aside from everything logistically and legally (e.g., civil suits against him, etc.) there are a few other problems with the above theory.

• Personally, I think it is a long-shot that LA can really compete with the top dogs at Kona.  Triathlon is not a 112 mile time-trial, and running a marathon after biking for 112 miles is different than running a hard tempo run after 56 miles (the latter, something LA showed us all that he was pretty good at). 
• Even if Lance were to do something so crazy as win at Kona, what about the compounding effects of his doping?  Again, I'm not an expert, but I bet some experts will say that what he was able to do while doped up in training years ago triggered physiological adaptations that still help him today in a clean state.
• Finally, while this may give him a chance to be the best in his own mind, I think those that have closely followed the sport and subsequently this saga will have a hard time taking any confession seriously when LA did things like this on Twitter after the evidence was made public