Why did you start triathlon? (Page 3)

Health reasons?  I was slowly becoming more and more inactive and gaining weight.  Nothing insane, but was about 20 kilos heavier than I was at High School Graduation.  With a second daughter on the way, I realized I wanted to be healthy and around while my girls grow up.

I'd always dreamed of doing a triathlon, and for the last 4 years have had the distances of an Olympic triathlon taped above my computer screen at work.  Started running again 18 months ago, then dug out the old mountain bike and started riding.  Did a Duathlon 12 months ago, and an Olympic tri 6 months ago.  Just finished my first half marathon!

I've lost 13 of those 20 extra kilos and feel better than ever.  Currently deciding on my next racing challenge.

I had been a runner in my younger days.(although not particularly fast and never over 3 miles)   Sometime during the early 80's I saw an article about the Chicago Triathlon.  It was this "new" race going to happen on the lake front.  I thought it looked interesting, perhaps I could do that.

Marriage, career, kids...fast forward twenty years . Never did the triathlon and now I have some significant health issues. Beginning in my late 30's I was diagnosed with a series of autoimmune diseases.  I have asthma, interstitial cystitis, eosinophilic gastritis, and Crohn's Disease.  I thought my active days were over.

After some time of feeling sorry for myself, I began to take charge of my life.  I did research, I changed doctors and radically changed my diet. And I began to run again.  The summer I turned 45 I decided to to finally do a triathlon. I joined a fitness club and signed up for a little local sprint.  I had no"gear". I wore my swim suit with a pair of shorts thrown over and rode my old comfort style bike.  As I crossed the finish line I felt euphoric!  I quickly signed up for another race two weeks later.

  I have now done every distance tri, including Chicago (IMWI in 08 and 10). Training for longer distance tri's made me decide to do marathons. I have run the Chicago marathon, qualified and run Boston.  This past summer I turned 50 and did Racine 70.3 on my birthday and wore a birthday tiara during the run.  I am in the best shape of my life and feeling great.  I love what triathlon has given me. Friendship, happiness and HEALTH.

My primary form of exercise for years after college had been basketball and weight lifting.  I finally decided I needed more cardio in my workout regimen (1 day a week of pickup basketball at best wasn't cutting it) and was getting bored with the lifting routine, though I still maintain a regimen there just to keep my strength up somewhat.  I had tried running in the past but never seemed to stick with it.  I couldn't make it a part of the routine for longer than say a month.

My best friend started getting into tri's the year prior to my first race and finally nagged me enough to sign up for a sprint race with him the following season.  That commitment was finally what I needed to keep running regularly.  I had a bike that I rode but never competitively and truthfully I didn't train a ton on the bike for that first race, just made my rides a bit more frequent and routine as 12.5 miles didn't seem that daunting.  The swim however, I made the mistake of not doing any training up until 5 weeks before the race.  I could swim, or so I thought, well I could "not drown" I guess, again 500M didn't seem like much so I had put off going to the lake and hadn't had access to the pool.  Whoah.  A big eye opener there.  My friend and I go to the lake to hammer out 500M and I don't think I went more than 25-50 before I was completely hyperventilating.  Suddenly it occurred to me I may not finish this race if I don't do something about the swim.  Now again in 5 weeks I couldn't do much other than build up a bit of endurance in the water and I side-stroked about 80% of that race.  I finished something like 83rd out of 88 out of the water, but when the race was over somehow I had met my goal of finishing in the top half overall thanks to a respectable bike for my level of training and a very solid run.

The feeling of crossing that finish line got me hooked right then and there, that and the thought of how high I might be able to go once I fully committed myself in all 3 disciplines.  Even though by tri standards I am still a lousy swimmer, thinking back to that first race and considering that I can now go out in the OW and swim close to a mile non-stop in a race (still slowly, but now not having to resort to side stroke) are still major sources of pride for me.