Happy marriage vs. Triathlon (Page 2)

x 1,000,000! It's all in communication!

Happy Wife, Happy Life.

I make sure there is always time for the family. Isn't that why we like to take care of ourselves?

Be honest and up front with her. Build a plan, give it to her, and get her input. She needs to buy into it. Once you get to that point, continue to assess from time to time. Communication has been the key for me.

I'm not sure I have much to add that hasn't been covered, but to me the keys are as follows...

1) Early morning workouts. I do the vast majority of my workouts before my wife and son (7) are awake. That means lots of 4am alarms, but that minimizes the impact.

2) Trade-offs. Before I started triathlons, my wife and I gave each other "sleep in days" on the weekends. I'd get one, she'd get one. I now use mine for my long bike ride. I make sure my training doesn't interfere with hers. I also make sure I plan a lot of "us" stuff to make it clear triathlon is not a priority over her.

3) Already mentioned above, but pick races at locations which interest the family. I'm doing New Orleans 70.3 next year just b/c my wife and son want to visit the city (and they preferred it over Galveston).

4) Communication. I'm planning my first IM next year and have already discussed the long bike rides with my wife, letting her know that during a certain period I'll be gone until 1pm or so on my "sleep in day".

5) Quality in training. I'm not sure I've figured this out yet, but make sure you're training smart to get the most out of what time you have. Smart training 10-12 hours/week beats foolish training 18-20 hours/week.

Good luck.

I am recently married and will be racing my first IM next august in IMMT. What has been said here is great advice and I will tell you some things that I have done to make it easier on the wife since I used the same strategy for my HIM I did last week.

1.) I talked to my wife about my goal to race an IM about 2 years ago. We like to plan things ahead of time and I knew it would take me time to build up to an IM. We decided that 2014 would be the best year because it was after we got married and a year before we wanted to seriously think about having kids. I think it is important to sit down with the wife and look at your calendar (social & work) to try and plan it out.

2.) Give her a copy of your training plan. I wrote out a monthly training plan and gave it to my wife. My wife knew when I was going to work out every day and how long that workout was expected to take. This way, we could re-adjust our work schedules around my workout so we could spend more time together. An example would be: On wednesdays I would swim in the morning (5:30am) then work 8-4 and after I got home, I would do an 1:30 bike on the trainer. Since she knew I would be waking up early and most likely waking her up too, she would sleep in and work 10-6 that way when she got home from work, I would be done my workouts, showered and then we would make dinner together. Or she would go to the gym or hang with her friends.

3.) Love the trainer- I often trained on the trainer. My bike is in the basement and my wife could watch tv, do work on the computer, fold laundry, etc while I worked out. I know she appreciated the ability to be able to talk to me and watch me workout. After a few times, she lost interest and didnt care about hanging out with me anymore and left me to it but it was good to know I was there if she needed anything and if I did my short rides inside on the trainer, going out once a week for a long ride was no big deal.

4.) Make sure you have a shared calendar. I often forget about things she has planned so having a calendar with all of our social events on it made it easy to move workouts around. Due to traveling for 4 friends weddings and our honeymoon this year, I had to re-structure a lot of my training but I was able to make it work since I knew what was coming.

5.) Make her part of the journey and value her input. I spoke with my wife about my IM goal and she supported me 100% I told her I wanted to do IMMT and showed her the town, videos, etc and she was all for it. We went to volunteer at IMMT together this year so I could sign up the next day and we turned it into a 4 day mini vacation and she had a blast. She was very inspired and loved the town and is excited to go back. Make sure whatever IM you choose, its a place that your wife wants to go.

6.) Have an honest conversation with your wife about the financial aspect of racing an IM. Part of the reason I planned mine for 2014 was to allow us to save $$$ to do it. Some people might overlook the financial commitment an IM takes because they are so focused on the training aspect. Money can cause more problems then being away every weekend for a long ride/run

7.) Life is going to get in the way at times, its inevitble. Make sure she knows that you will sacrifice workouts for important things in life. Missing a few workouts here and there is not going to make or break your race.

8.) Explain to her how much this means to you and how you will not be able to do it alone. If you explain that you need her and make her feel like this is a team effort (it is) it might go a long way. Also, try training together or getting her to help your training. I know that my wife is not as fast of a cyclist or runner as me (she can kick my a$$ in swimming though) so she will often join me on the back end of my runs to spend some time together.

Good luck bud. I am sure everything will be fine and I hope what I said helps a little. Also look into the books "Be Iron Fit" by Don Fink and "The Time Crunched Triathlete" both books have training plans and help with time manangement. I am using Be Iron Fit for my IM next year.

I just don't understand how 12 - 18 hrs/week is an issue. If you do a long bike (5 hrs) on Sat and long run on Sun (3 hrs) that still leaves 11 hrs and 13 waking hours to spend with your family. That leaves 4 to 10 hrs over 5 days to train during the week.

But the real question is, do you buy her chairs?

That is a line from the movie Phenomenon with John Travolta. In the movie the gal John is courting makes artistic chairs....and John buys them. Everyone has a passion in life. Find out what your spouces passion is and support their pursuit of it. If you don't, you are just wasting your time with the marriage as it is doomed to fail eventually.

26+ years of marriage and my wife and I buy each other's chairs! My wife's passion is horses. I bought her first horse for her 22 years ago and she has had 2 or 3 every since.

Yes, times flies and we all have to juggle priorities. Just remember though, kids learn from our actions too. My son wrote this essay in HS:


No one is more influential in our formative years than our role model. For me, it was my dad. He has taught me lessons that will hold me well throughout my life. Too many, in fact, to cover in a single essay, but I'll try to do some minor justice. My dad taught me self sufficiency, how to work hard, and determination to reach my goals.

From as early as I remember I was my dad's little helper. Every time something broke down or went awry, we were there to fix it. When I was younger I didn't understand why he fixed everything himself and showed me how he did it; why didn't he just call a repairman? I finally realized that he wasn't teaching me how to fix things, though that was part of it. He was really teaching me how to work hard and do things for myself.
Something equally important that I've learned from him is determination. He has run multiple marathons and 2 Ironmans. My dad wasn't gifted with athleticism, yet that never stopped him from setting out and trying. He taught me to approach things one step at a time until you accomplish what you've set out to do. He started out with little 5k runs and sprint distance triathlons, and he kept training until he'd done an Ironman.

My dad played an instrumental role in my growing up. He's helped make me into who I am today. I only hope that I've inherited even a tiny portion of his capability and drive, so I might turn out into someone he can be proud of.

I like the reply. I've only done short races so far, and not any in 5 years. But I am now back to training again and have sights set on HIM in May and I have made sure all of the subjects above are covered. Our 4 kids are home schooled. So I get home from work after trading out cars w/ my wife who works nights. I fix dinner, then sit and finish up school work and help w/ the 3 who play piano. The house is done by myself and the kids (req'd chores) and they are off to bed at 10pm If all of the other "stuff" is done, I go for a run or jump on the trainer. Even if it means I start at 11:30pm. My kids and wife know I am training again, but only b/c I tell them of my running or time on trainer, or b/c they see me swim at lunch when they arrive for swim team. I'm not having to miss 'daddy time' w/ them. As long as my wife doesn't have work added to her routine, the house is done, and the kids are in bed, I can train as I please. She's back in the pool and has continued to run (the bike is another story...bad wreck, 3 surgeries, and a big mental block), so that helps. If I were to shut off the internet and the tv, I would have 2 hours a day Mon-Fri either late night or early am to train...easily. 4 hours on a Sat/Sun would be easy as i could be up and done by 9am when I get to that point....The key is efficiency. When I could goof off for 30min, I think of the 30 min that I won't have later to train.

I've been a regular endurance athlete for 20 years now. I take my racing pretty seriously, even if I'm nowhere near the elites out in front.

My wife is supportive of my triathlon habits only in name - in practice, she's totally unsupportive. Won't go to any races, will always prioritize her and family commitments over mine (including "A" races) and gets immediately impatient and annoyed with me if I take a chunk out of family time to train , even in short blocks of an hour. Granted, she's a busy working woman too, but it's definitely not the picture of a supportive spouse. Lots of lip service about how she respects my training and how great she thinks it is I do it, but if any slight push-shove priorities come, triathlon comes last, if even at all.

I know it sounds like we don't communicate but we do - excellently. It's just a matter of her vision of our family vs mine, and it's fine.

And even with that limitation, I can definitely still train 10-12 hours per week, hard. I just do it before the family can even notice for the most part, and on weekends, take the kid with me if possible. AM workouts 1-1.5hrs between 4:30-6AM and lunchtime swims get it done before anyone can even complain, and get a 2hr indoor trainer ride in from 5-7AM on Sat AM, and you're covered.

I don't race Ironman (those 5 hr training rides would not work for us) but I've raced 2 HIMs in the past year at 5hrs, which is probably near my potential, so I don't think it's necessarily a deal-breaker if your spouse isn't totally on board with your training/racing. My wife and kid have yet to come watch me race a single time, and I've raced probably 20 times in the past 4 years. Just get it done before they even notice.

We don't have any kids, so my situation is different than yours. Before signing up I talked to my husband, explained to him that eventually I will be training two hours a day during the week and 5-8 hours on the weekends. He said he understood and was supportive. 8 months later he could not wait for my training to be done. B/c on top of that training time I had to get ready to train and clean up after training- that's an extra hour a day. (My time was also divided b/c two months before the race I started a new job that has been demanding on my time).

But we survived training, I am an Ironman and now he can't believe that I was able to balance everything and accomplish my goal of becoming an Ironman.

So I would say, like others have already, just let her know what is involved. Talk about it. Invite her on some of your shorter training sessions. My husband would bike ride on the trails while I ran.

Hi Man!!!

I strongly believe a Happy Marriage will be the base of your successful training. Just talk it out with your wife you just want to accomplish this one IMTX and will take one year of training , start with that and hopefully she will understand, you will have decades of happy relationship I am sure she can give you 1 year.
It will be a different story if you get hooked to IMs and change your

BT name to: "GmanWannabeSpudone"

It helps to when you talk to your wife in their lingo i got my wife to approve my buying of Carbon TT w/Carbon wheels. I know being a newbie should start with craigslist, but i know my wife if i do that I will be stuck with a craigslist TT bike all my Tri days and I just bought my Carbon Roadie 2 years ago.
I Just told my wife:

"Hon I know it is nice to have a Burberry Bike, but its more full filling to finish a race with a Louis Vuitton"

honestly our wives should be thankful we are working out , We dodged a bullet of open Heart Surgery or Dialysis.

Goodluck to you man!!!



Edited by strykergt 2013-10-10 10:14 PM

Thanks so much for the input. Everyone has offered great advise that will be definitely come in handy. Good luck in your IM.

I agree with all of the above.

Not sure if anyone mentioned it in here or not but what about trying to get your spouse to train with you? I have posed this to my wife several times and the only response she ever has is, "I don't have a bike." Certainly that obstacle is easily overcome.

Has anyone tried this and if so, were you successful? My wife and I are competitive about EVERYTHING so I'm sure this could pose an issue down the line. It seems to me, however, that many of the problems mentioned in this thread could be solved by training together.

Is it safe to say that, "The couple who tri's together, stays together?"