This past weekend Dave raced in the Philly Sprint Triathlon. My oldest friend Lisa also competed as part of relay in which she had the hardest part (IMHO) – the half mile swim in Philadelphia’s Schuylkill River. I was a cheerleader and very thankful to watch as the course was identical to the SheRox Tri which I will be racing in 33 days. A few brief reflections:
First, I am enormously proud of Dave, who was man enough to take his wife out on the town the night before for our anniversary, beat his goal time for the race (he did the entire thing in 1:46:51), and look really great doing it. (Nice shorts hon!) And I won’t even gripe over the fact that he really hadn’t trained very hard for this race, whereas I am training obsessively.
SWIM. BIKE. RUN.
Second, as proud as I am of Dave, I am 100x more proud of Lisa who tried something of which I know she was rather fearful. Lisa is one of those extremely smart and talented people who never gives herself enough credit. I hope the fact that she kicked some serious butt (her swim time was just 13 seconds longer than Dave) will be a serious kick in the butt that she can do so many things, including write (maybe even as a guest blogger at MoB, hint hint).
LISA (MIDDLE) WITH HER RELAY TEAMMATES VAL (LEFT) AND SANDY (RIGHT)
Lastly, we did not bring the boys down to the race, mostly because we had stayed in the city the night before and it would have been inconveneient to have my Mom drag them downtown so early. But even if it was going to be easy, I would have found a way to let them stay home. Lisa’s husband was good enough to bring her two daughters to see her climb out of the river, but left soon after as there is only so much of waiting and watching any kid under 18 can take.
I am not a fan of having your kids at the race – and realize I am likely in the minority. I watched many men and women cross the finish line with their little children in their arms and all I could picture is trying to carry Noah or Chase that last 20 yards and falling flat on my face, never to cross the finish line.
My guys watched me when I did the indoor triathlon in May and all I can remember is hearing them yell “RUN FASTER!” on the sidelines. Not exactly what you want to hear when you are praying your legs will carry you one more mile. They meant well, but the urge to yell back at them was strong. Luckily, I couldn’t speak at the moment and they were saved.
Sorry fellas! I love you more than oatmeal but I’m not “doing this for you”. I’m kinda doing it for me. So no kids at my race in August. I will be glad for grownup support to cheer me on but worrying about whether the kiddos are having fun is a distraction I don’t need on race day. And carrying myself across the finish line is all I want to do.
