Unexpected inspiration

It’s a pretty well-known phrase – you can run but you can’t hide. I’m sure many of us have used it in the past in a range of contexts, whether social, sporting or in another more aggressive area of life.

Well this week was my week to run and hide. After several weeks of stop start training due to what seemed like a never ending bout of illness, I wanted to run (but couldn’t) and chose to hide. Now we’re not talking about proper man flu, but just enough to make walking up the steps seem like a training session, or being awake for a whole day an achievement in its own right.

I’ve said before that if you want inspiration, you sometimes have to go after it and let it in. Knowing this, I kept away from the bookshelves, Muhammad Ali, magazines and any source of inspiration that would have helped. You see, I just didn’t want it. I didn’t want to train, so any kind of inspiration that I did let in, would probably mean I would end up training. No thank you. I chose to hide. But as many of you know, inspiration sometimes finds you and often not where you expect it!

So with inspiration at arm’s length, the end of illness upon me, not only was I set for a period of hiding, I also contemplated my future in the sport of triathlon and its associated disciplines. The answer it seemed was darts…

We have a dart board in the office and there isn’t a day goes by when those arrows are thrown at the board. One of my afflictions (and there are many) is that I am unable to do nothing. So throwing a few arrows at a dart board gives me an excuse to think. And so I started to think. I figured that with the right training I could be a World Champion within a year (at darts).

Don’t get me wrong, I am rubbish at darts, but recognised that unlike most sports, fitness doesn’t play a part and the action of throwing a dart is fixed (i.e. always the same), therefore I could improve and theoretically attain excellence. I easily rationalised what would be my meteoric rise to World Champion; you are always the same distance from the board, the darts are always the same and the board never moves. It’s even played indoors with no wind. I am such a geek, that I worked out that I would probably walk around 600 meters an hour collecting the darts.

And this is where I struggled to come to terms with my new sport – It just wouldn’t cut it from an exercise fix point of view. And above all when we commit to something, it is always going to get difficult at some point, so we ultimately have to want to do that sport, to help us get through those tough patches when they arrive.

And then it came – the thunderbolt. Picture the scene; happy family life at home, I was actually going to take a shower that had nothing to do with exercise and the girls were getting ready for the day. As I walked to the shower (obviously dressed for the occasion), I had a very brief conversation with the girls that went something like this:

Daughter 1 (aged 11); Hey Dad, did you know that you can have an operation to get fat removed?

Dad (amused and pretending to be confused); really?

Daugter 2 (aged 9): It would have to be a long operation though Dad!

Dad: speechless.

I did chuckle and have to confess that I was super impressed by the 9 year olds sarcasm and sense of timing. But I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I had been like Dorian Grey – hiding the problems and pretending everything was okay.

And that was that – my inspiration was back and complete. I could never have gone looking for inspiration in that form – it just came to me and it worked a treat.

So thanks to my kids, I had a great week’s training last week, have revisited my 2012 targets, planned my first half of the season and am mentally back on track. I have even decided to race this year’s Duston triathlon (which is the only Just Racing event that I have previously raced) with an aim to beat the time I did in 2009 (?).

And finally, I would like to thank you all for all the feedback and comments you have been sending in and would like to share some words of wisdom from Robbo in Leicestershire:

‘Some people look for reasons not to do things but I say you only have one moment in life. Yesterday cannot be changed, tomorrow may never come, so that moment is now. So take ownership of this moment and your life and just go for it.’

See you at the races.
 

Big Al