In It To Win It

I have a good friend who says “adventure isn’t a race,” but on the flipside a race is a race, and I have to ask myself if I’m not racing then what am I doing on the course. I guess I should backup here; I’ve done a number of marathons, an ultra marathon, two Ironman races, who knows how many century rides and even a double century ride, but I’ve only participated I’ve never raced. If somebody passed me who cares, certainly not me, good luck brother, more power to ya sister, have a nice day, but lately I’ve been asking myself, hey man if you’re not trying to win then what exactly are you trying to do.

This line of thought really came to a head this past weekend during the Hagg Lake Triathlon down near Portland. I couldn’t do the race due to a lower back pain, but I went down with my two friends Stephanie and Piper and Piper’s high school buddy Jenna. The thing about Steph and Piper is the fact that they showed up Saturday morning ready and able to win the race – in the end Piper did win and Steph placed third. I mean they were in it to win it. This is totally foreign to me.

I’ve never entered a race with even the faintest idea of winning the thing I’ve always been the guy who was simply happy to be there: you know the line every finisher is a winner. I have one more Ironman in me and I have to ask myself just what am I doing out there. Currently I’m in the no man’s land somewhere between qualifying for the World Championships at Kona and simply crossing the finishing line in under seventeen hours. This is an eight hour gap.

I suppose the real question I have is how much is physical and how much is mental. No matter how many baskets I shoot in the driveway I’m never going to play in the NBA, this is just fact. No matter how many miles I ride I’m not going to ride the Tour. So what about being competitive in my age group in Ironman: in other words if I train harder and smarter and become willing to tolerate more race day pain would I be able to be competitive or is it a hopeless cause.

Before I step onto that beach in Coeur d Alene next year I’m going to have to decide am I in it t
o race or am I just out here for a long day with some nice people.

17,000

Bradley and I logged 17,000 vertical feet of climbing last Saturday. It was a spectacular day, all was right with the world.

Bradley approaching Chinook Pass

Ten miles without a single pedal turn

Joe, Lori, Kris = Ironpeople

Spent the weekend over in Coeur d' Alene Idaho watching my friends Joe, Lori and Kris compete in the Ironman competition. This was Lori and Kris' first iron distance race and Joe's second. Everyone did great. Kris finished 14th in her age group with a devistating 11:40. She did everything right: trained hard and smart and raced hard and smart. She came out of the water in 45th place, she got off the bike in 10th. Lori knocked off the miles with a smile on her face from start to finish. After a great swim and bike Joe got knocked back due to a bad stomach, but he perservered: you just never know how you're body is going to react to that kind of punishment.

I was bummed about not being able to race this year, but I signed up for the 2010 race. This will be my last iron distance race, unless Sam or Sophia pull me out of retirement sometime down the road.

Know When to Walk Away

A good friend just sent me an email detailing the deaths of two climbers up on Denali. They were on the Messner Couloir. I don’t yet know the details of the accident, but I know that it wouldn’t take much to send a man rolling down that slope. I remember standing in the twilight at the 14,000 foot camp watching Adrian the Romanian ski that line - I thought for sure I’d see a man die that day.

Another friend, who left God’s country here in the Northwest for Park City snow, sent a second email telling about three super hot climbers who were recently swept into the next life by a Chinese avalanche. He sent along some cool video footage of the trio http://www.vimeo.com/5065740, man those guys were so full of life, what a loss.

Both accounts remind me of how happy I am to have made it out of the climbing world not simply alive, but also with enough intact fingers to type this here blog. I was never what you would consider a hot dog climber, but I did have a few “whoa boy you’d better keep it together lest ye meet yer maker” moments. Man I loved climbing, moving fast and light through the mountains with the best people humanity has to offer, there’s visceral joy in that, but it’s time to move on.

Life, I’ve discovered, comes at us in phases, and the secret, it seems, is the ability to not overstay your welcome in one phase and thereby miss the open door into the next. I’ve gone from climbing to endurance sports such as ultra running and Ironman triathlons, and I don’t regret the change. It was time for me to move on, to seek new opportunities and new challenges. Yeah I miss climbing, but I still have the friends, the memories, the self knowledge, and as Kenny Rogers said, “you got to know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em, know when to walk away, know when to run.” I counted my money while sitting at the table and lived to tell the story, which in the end is all that matters

Never Go Full Retard

I just saw the funniest movie I've seen in years: Tropic Thunder. We watched it up at the cabin on the tiny set that Melony has had since high school (it has the same screen size as the original Macintosh computer) so I only caught every third word of dialogue, but still it was hillarious; I laughed so hard I bout busted a nut.

I've taught the kids four rules of behavior, but after watching Tropic Thunder I have to add a fifth. The original rules are:

• Don't take what isn't yours
• Tell the truth
• Don't intentionally hurt anybody or anything
• If you can't do good, look good

Now I have to add:

• Never go full retard

The Gate

Following our tradition of slightly too big architecture Melony and I ripped out our old poorly constructed backyard gate, sunk a couple of eight by eight cedar posts and hung a gate that we made out of clear cedar. Premium cedar is easy for us to find as our good friend Hootie Clark owns and operates Issaquah Cedar, but finding the metal hardware did require some searching. I finally found some nice hardware at Stoneway Hardware located, surprisingly, on Stoneway in Seattle. It was a long drive, but any excuse to go into town is fine by me.

Few things in life are as enjoyable as a cold beer after a hard day of building something that actually turns out the way you had envisioned it, so I had two.