Blog #6 for EndurancePlanet.com - originally posted on 8/26/2009
My coach has been trying to drill into me a change in my thinking for weeks. He keeps telling me that I have to stop being Kyle the heart transplant, and become Kyle the athlete. For me, as I'm sure it is for a lot of people, that's a hard switch to flip.
For years I've been a patient of one sort or another. It's dominated my life for nearly two decades. Some people are painters. Some people are great cooks. And some people are in fact actual athletes. I've been a patient.
But this past weekend I began to feel the shift. I began to feel a little like Kyle the athlete. I had a four hour bike ride on my schedule for Saturday and I actually thought to myself, "Great, light workout."
Would a heart transplant patient consider any kind of four-hour physical activity "light?" Honestly, most athletes wouldn't. Such is the screwed up world of Ironman training, where swim "warm-ups" are routinely 800 yards and recovery weeks consist of only 15 to 18 hours of workouts.
I am now knee deep in Ironman training, making the final push to Kona. There are less than seven weeks to go. Which means that that four hour bike ride from last Saturday will consistently become a four to five hour ride followed by two to three hours of running. And then Sunday we'll always be following it with three to four more hours of running and a long swim. This Sunday's swim is 3,000 meters straight, as an example.
Looking at those numbers it's pretty obvious - I am no longer Kyle the transplant patient. The numbers are crazy. And even more crazy, I actually feel good when working out. I feel strong. I feel healthy. And the day following my long bike rides up the canyons of Southern California, my legs no longer punish me for the previous days activities.
When I began my Ironman quest there was a big part of me that didn't believe I could make it happen. There were huge black clouds of doubt about how my body and mind would adjust to the daily pounding. But today, all of these many months later, those clouds have lifted. I don't just feel like Kyle the athlete. I actually feel like Kyle the Ironman.
And that feels pretty terrific.
For years I've been a patient of one sort or another. It's dominated my life for nearly two decades. Some people are painters. Some people are great cooks. And some people are in fact actual athletes. I've been a patient.
But this past weekend I began to feel the shift. I began to feel a little like Kyle the athlete. I had a four hour bike ride on my schedule for Saturday and I actually thought to myself, "Great, light workout."
Would a heart transplant patient consider any kind of four-hour physical activity "light?" Honestly, most athletes wouldn't. Such is the screwed up world of Ironman training, where swim "warm-ups" are routinely 800 yards and recovery weeks consist of only 15 to 18 hours of workouts.
I am now knee deep in Ironman training, making the final push to Kona. There are less than seven weeks to go. Which means that that four hour bike ride from last Saturday will consistently become a four to five hour ride followed by two to three hours of running. And then Sunday we'll always be following it with three to four more hours of running and a long swim. This Sunday's swim is 3,000 meters straight, as an example.
Looking at those numbers it's pretty obvious - I am no longer Kyle the transplant patient. The numbers are crazy. And even more crazy, I actually feel good when working out. I feel strong. I feel healthy. And the day following my long bike rides up the canyons of Southern California, my legs no longer punish me for the previous days activities.
When I began my Ironman quest there was a big part of me that didn't believe I could make it happen. There were huge black clouds of doubt about how my body and mind would adjust to the daily pounding. But today, all of these many months later, those clouds have lifted. I don't just feel like Kyle the athlete. I actually feel like Kyle the Ironman.
And that feels pretty terrific.
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