A great approach to Triathlon...

I was lucky enough to attend a "Make a Wish" meet and greet with Andy Potts at the Timberman 70.3 festivities. I met him in back '09 when he and I both did the Chicago Triathlon (that was my first tri as a fat guy and he was "the" up and coming racer) and wanted to chat with him again...but considering in '09 he had a horrendous crash (striking a novice cyclist who couldn't maintain her line, the irony of that I will learn later, at 30+ mph...destroying his bike and getting sent to the hospital in a helicopter. It ruined his chance for a shot at Kona that year.) I thought bringing up that little tidbit would be bad form or worse, bad luck so I just sat in the audience listening and then taking pics of J and Jenn chatting with him.

Andy was given the chance to talk to the audience and he relayed on his approach to triathlon and subsequently its applicabllity to life. "Triathlon is all about the balance between hope and doubt" he said. "You have doubt as you push through training, through each event on race day...but that is countered by the hope that you're going to do better, be better. If you have a bad swim, you push it from your mind and focus on having your best bike. If the bike doesn't go to plan the you'll have the best run you've ever had. At the end of the day its all about having more hope than doubt. Always remain positive and focus on making the next thing your best, not doubt that it could be". What an amazing and positive way to look at things!

Obviously an approach honed through years of being a top notch collegiate and Olympic swimmer and now a 70.3 champion and 140.6 race winner. I always struggle with what to think while I'm racing, all sorts of things go through my mind, especially what could go wrong...but now I'll be thinking about hope...