On Saturday, I'll be racing my 17th Ironman. It's also my 5th time racing at the Ironman World Championship.
When I completed my first Ironman distance triathlon at IMFL at the age of 24, I was very young, stubborn and naive. Over the past 13 years, I've had many race day successes, failures and lessons learned as a long-distance triathlete. With growth and development (athletically and personally), comes maturity and integrity. Many years of coaching triathletes has also taught me important lessons that can make or break a race day performance. Because your current fitness level can only take you so far, there are certain qualities that can separate you from your competition. The decisions that you make before and on race day have rewards and consequences. Since your race day performance outcome is built from many decisions, here are some common Ironman race day mistakes and how to avoid them before and on race day.
- Body image - Sadly, we live in a society that focuses on competitive leanness. Many athletes are under the mindset that the leaner or more defined you are, the better you will perform in sport. Some athletes even care less about performance and more about achieving the "look" of an athlete. Rather than seeing the body as the vehicle that allows you to do the incredible in sport, many attempt to achieve a "race weight" through strict eating, fueling and dieting only to become injured, burnout or sick. Successful athletes come in all shapes and sizes. To be successful, you need to be healthy and strong. You need to be consistent with training and you need to take care of your mental health, just as much as your physical health. Restricting food, eliminating food groups or overexercising does not make you a better athlete. It makes you weaker and more fragile. Recognizing that there is no perfect body image (or level of body fatness) that is required for athletic success or optimal health, the way your body looks to perform or function at its best may not match up to the way you think you are supposed to look and this is ok.
- Comparison - It's often said that comparison is the thief of joy. In other words, comparison is a big part of how we see ourselves - our self-worth. If you find yourself in a daily competition with the achievements, looks, results of others, it's time to direct your energy elsewhere. While you may envy over someone's highlight real, you never know what the behind-the-scene moments look like. You only have so much energy to spend before and race day - why waste it on others. Have less comparison to others and more compassion toward yourself. Although it is inspiring and motivating to see the success stories of others, do not let the triumphs of someone else trump your own personal accomplishments and achievements. Never stop believing in yourself and your own training.
- Chasing an outcome - We can not control the future but you can control the current moment. Rather than putting all your energy into the results, focus on the present. Let's be honest - many times, life does not turn out how we expect it to. This can be good or bad.
This isn't a negative way of thinking but don't let your race day success (or happiness) be tied with a specific outcome that you simply can't control or predict.
Create success now. Learn to be happy with the effort, your decisions and your ability to bounce back from obstacles.
Trust that with every best effort that you give in your process, you will experience small changes that will bring a favorable outcome. One of the most liberating experiences about racing is having no expectations about the outcome. This doesn't mean low expectations but no expectations. When you have expectations, you become attached to these preconceived outcomes of how things are expected to go. This can create fear and a tremendous amount of pressure. But as any athlete knows, racing is unpredictable. There is absolutely no way that you can expect certain things to happen in a certain way or in a certain time. Things "come up" on race day and you just can't plan for everything. Additionally, when you have expectations and big goals, it's easy to feel defeated and disappointed if you don't meet those goals. Racing is a reward in and of itself for it shows that you put in the work and got yourself to the start line of a race and hopefully, made it to the finish. The last thing you want is to beat yourself up for having a "bad" race because you were so heavily focused on the outcome. While big scary goals help us all get out of bed in the morning and train when there are many distractions in life, it's important to not get attached to an outcome when you are racing for the outcome will fall into place, in the right way, by simply remaining in the present moment and constantly taking care of what needs to happen during each mile of the race. - Rigidity - To work out at any cost can do more harm than good. To have to stick to a precise nutrition plan can be risky. A smart approach to training allows for positive adaptations. If you have become a bit obsessed with rules, strict schedules and a perfect plan, I encourage you to become more mentally flexible and less of a perfectionist. I'll share a secret with you - you can still have a "perfect" training session or race, even if everything doesn't go as planned. If you find yourself racing at an intensity that you did not train for and cannot sustain, be prepared for nutrition-related problems. Unfortunately, consuming extra energy gels, sport beans and high-calorie drinks at the aid stations will not give you energy to maintain an unsustainable/untrained effort. Sadly, we can't blame everything on nutrition.
- Fear of failure - When you don't reach your goals, an effort feels harder than it should or things don’t go as you planned, the disappointment from your performance can easily be interpreted as a “failure.” Once you hold a negative image of yourself and you beat yourself up for lack of success, it's easy to feel less of yourself and doubt your ability to improve. Fear of failure can be detrimental to your athletic success. Regardless of fitness ability, successful athletes will push themselves out of their comfort zone and take smart risks. While this doesn't mean being careless or making bad choices, it's important to recognize that sometimes your decisions will pay off and sometimes they won’t - but that is part of racing. Taking too many risks is not necessarily a good thing but it is a fundamental component of working your way to success. For many athletes, the thought of making a mistake or having a bad workout or race is so terrifying that they would rather stay in their comfort zone and do as little as possible to avoid the risk of embarrassment or failure. As an athlete, there will be times when you will be challenged. There will be times when you give your best effort and the result will not what you had hoped for. There will be times when you struggle and question why you are doing what you are doing. There will be times when you are in the shape of your life but life gives you a scenario that is far from ideal. When things don't go as planned, welcome this as an opportunity to learn and grow from the experience. You learn by making mistakes. If you want to become better, you need to remove the fear of failing.