The Race That Made Me Time Travel
It was race day at Ironman Boulder, and I showed up ready to win the amateur race. In my first attempt the year before, I had missed the podium, and qualifying for my pro card, by just 50 seconds, so I was determined to cross the finish line with no rookie mistakes.
My swim and bike went as expected. Running was my strength, so I was confident as I pulled on my running shoes. By the end of the first mile I was in third place, and I stayed steady through the first half of the race. At mile 15 I saw a friend who had been giving me intel. After the requisite “Wohoo, you’re crushing it!” she said “You’re in seventh.” “What?!” I yelled. “Some girls started a while after you, so right now it looks like you’re in seventh, but you’re doing great!” Age group competitors self-seeded their swim start and entered the water on a rolling basis, making the age group race more like a time trial. I was racing against people miles back, and they were beating me.
Being in podium position had been wind in my sails, and this just sucked the life out of me. The devil on my shoulder told me my efforts were pointless. “I should just give up,” I thought. “I don’t deserve to win.” Knowing I was in seventh place played with my exhausted mind until I did something I’d never done before: I pictured myself disappointed at the finish line. Anticipating the secret shame of relenting in a race brought me back into the right headspace. I steeled myself. “I’ve worked too hard to give up,” I decided. “This race is mine.”
I continued to run as hard as I could. Within a few miles the athletes who had pushed me back to seventh fell out of the picture. First place had a 10 minute lead, so I knew the win was out of reach, but at mile 24 I was within striking distance of second place. My husband urged me on. “You can get her, but it’s going to be close! GO!” he cheered. I dug deep, deciding again that I wanted to leave nothing on the table. I urged my depleted body to pick up the pace and crossed the finish line in an ugly sprint. The athlete I had been chasing was already there. I didn’t have the satisfaction of passing her on the course, but when the tracker updated I learned that I’d beaten her by 13 seconds! I fell short of my goal, but I was satisfied because I finished with nothing left in the tank.
Winning had been top of mind for months during training, so I assumed that focusing on my goal would be enough to squeeze everything out of myself on race day. That was true to some extent, but when I needed to dig deep I ran away from regret rather than toward winning. At that point in my endurance career I was aware of a few times that I chose to stop doing my best because a PR was out of reach or the race was harder than I’d anticipated. It was easy to come up with excuses to explain a poor performance, but deep down I knew when I’d decided to half-ass a race. Sitting with that feeling afterward always left me sour. Out on the bike paths of Boulder I chose to kick that habit, and I continue to time travel as a way of motivating myself when a race gets challenging.