Balancing performance, health and having fun?
Yesterday Nikki and I were talking about the balance between training to do events and do well (whatever "well" means to each individual) and doing events just to be happy. It's a hard line to understand because for many of us* competing with ourselves and doing better than we have done before is a lot of what makes endurance events fun. It helps make us happy.
The issue that I was struggling with was how to stay close to the line of improving and doing what it takes to improve, yet understanding that this is a hobby and should help improve my quality of life not decrease it.
I sometimes wonder if we* are becoming programmed to always believe that there is more out there that we must get. Two recent sports examples: Dwayne Wade in his Sunday Conversation on ESPN discussed why he was holding up two fingers during their celebration of winning the NBA title. One was a "taste". The other example came from the book "Lance Armstrong's War"
that discussed how in a photo after Lance won his 6th Tour, in the team photo, his team was holding up six fingers, Lance was holding up seven.
These two guys are professionals. They make their money through sport. Even though I am trying to create a professional life as a trainer / coach, my competing is still very "hobbyish", so the question to myself is "Can I justify the same bigger and better philosophy and still remain balanced and healthy?"
What are some things that I think might make competing in endurance events decrease my quality of life? Keep in mind that these are all issues I struggle with, and force me to continually reassess the role of competing in my life.
1. Training when hurt or injured, neglecting health, our pursuits are a good way to enhance our health, but it can be easy to let them inhibit our long-term health too.
2. Becoming too focused on results and not taking the time to step back and enjoy the accomplishments that have occurred. It's so easy to want to do better next time, that we forget to enjoy the journey we just had. At the Derby Marathon, I remember thinking, within minutes of finishing, about what race I'd do next and how I could do better.
3. Becoming too competitive and developing a "winning only" mentality. Perspective can be a really hard thing to keep at times and over the course of my journey I've found that I dis-like running road races the most, because the competitive aggression is pretty thick even at small "neighborhood" races.
I've always been embarrassed by the language (many, many f-bombs) I used during the Kentucky Adventure Races in '03. It seemed silly after the fact. But the greatest thing to come from the weekend came when one of the other teams used their "mic time" after the race to let other racers know that Josh and I stopped on the mountain bike course and came back to them to offer help and tools. Ironically, that day we did better than my f-bomb episode day.
That's the short list. I'm interested in hearing what everyone else thinks. How do you balance the equation of "fun" and "competing"? What about endurance events make you happy? (Hopefully you can post some comments, hopefully I can figure out how to moderate them!)
*By saying "us" and "we", I am referring to the endurance minded athlete. I have generally associated the Type A, goal-oriented, success driven characteristics to "us", but that maybe a very poor generalization?
The issue that I was struggling with was how to stay close to the line of improving and doing what it takes to improve, yet understanding that this is a hobby and should help improve my quality of life not decrease it.
I sometimes wonder if we* are becoming programmed to always believe that there is more out there that we must get. Two recent sports examples: Dwayne Wade in his Sunday Conversation on ESPN discussed why he was holding up two fingers during their celebration of winning the NBA title. One was a "taste". The other example came from the book "Lance Armstrong's War"
that discussed how in a photo after Lance won his 6th Tour, in the team photo, his team was holding up six fingers, Lance was holding up seven.These two guys are professionals. They make their money through sport. Even though I am trying to create a professional life as a trainer / coach, my competing is still very "hobbyish", so the question to myself is "Can I justify the same bigger and better philosophy and still remain balanced and healthy?"
What are some things that I think might make competing in endurance events decrease my quality of life? Keep in mind that these are all issues I struggle with, and force me to continually reassess the role of competing in my life.
1. Training when hurt or injured, neglecting health, our pursuits are a good way to enhance our health, but it can be easy to let them inhibit our long-term health too.
2. Becoming too focused on results and not taking the time to step back and enjoy the accomplishments that have occurred. It's so easy to want to do better next time, that we forget to enjoy the journey we just had. At the Derby Marathon, I remember thinking, within minutes of finishing, about what race I'd do next and how I could do better.
3. Becoming too competitive and developing a "winning only" mentality. Perspective can be a really hard thing to keep at times and over the course of my journey I've found that I dis-like running road races the most, because the competitive aggression is pretty thick even at small "neighborhood" races.
I've always been embarrassed by the language (many, many f-bombs) I used during the Kentucky Adventure Races in '03. It seemed silly after the fact. But the greatest thing to come from the weekend came when one of the other teams used their "mic time" after the race to let other racers know that Josh and I stopped on the mountain bike course and came back to them to offer help and tools. Ironically, that day we did better than my f-bomb episode day.
That's the short list. I'm interested in hearing what everyone else thinks. How do you balance the equation of "fun" and "competing"? What about endurance events make you happy? (Hopefully you can post some comments, hopefully I can figure out how to moderate them!)
*By saying "us" and "we", I am referring to the endurance minded athlete. I have generally associated the Type A, goal-oriented, success driven characteristics to "us", but that maybe a very poor generalization?
posted by gary at 12:21 PM
3 Comments:
I'm still new, so I'm still getting better and better by leaps and bounds as I go along. (oh god does that sound totally bragging or what?! I think you know what I mean.) So far, I haven't hit a point where doing the event wasn't enough to bring happiness. Generally, the result is finishing, which is the goal thus far. But I am constantly looking at longer, farther; I have hit points where I want more time to train...I run so slow, my long runs really take a lot of time away from my family. That's a hard choice - when do I train, when do I spend time with family. When do I rest, what is good for my body??? Tough questions each person has to figure out...
Angie - you have two really good points. One is the rest issue. It's easy to start skimping on the sleep to "fit-in" another workout. Look at any professional athlete and there lifestyle, it is set-up to not slack in the sleeping area. The other is family time. I don't have much experience there as Nikki trains as much as I do and we don't have kids yet (Kelty is needy but, not in the same neighborhood as a child).
Congrats to all mothers that continue to endure!
I think some of this is influenced by the company you keep. When I trained alone and raced by myself, I performed consistently better than when I joined a competitive track club and tried to keep up with members far better than me. I suddenly felt I had something to prove and thus the scales you speak of begin to tilt too far. Unfortunately, I didn't recognize the imbalance until I was involuntarily sidelined with a major injury. And the real unfortunate thing is the people who must suffer with me the most -- my family -- are the same people who deserve the best.
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