I'm an Endurance Athlete and I have issues...

I was watching a video for sale about the Tour across America and one of the comments from Lance Armstrong was "All endurance athletes are running away from something inside themselves". I'm not a Lance fan, but I do somewhat agree with his statement.

The statement I always us is "I'm an Ironman which mean I have issues".

There is no doubt that people that do Ironman and heavy duty endurance events have deep rooted issues. Hell, we all do. The only difference is if you are an endurance athlete you are indirectly telling the world you have issues and you are masking those issues in accomplishment.

It's like spinning a negative into a positive. If you have issues and are an alcoholic that's a negative. If you have issues and you are an ironman that's a positive.

Then there is the other extreme.

What if you have issues and you do nothing. You just exist. I would much rather be an alcoholic or ironman. At least I'd be living life to the fullest at some level. I couldn't imagine having issues and just shuffling through life.

But that's just me.

Yesterday I didn't train, er I mean exercise. It's the off season so technically there is no training, there is just exercise. So today I was looking forward to getting back at it. God forbid I go more than 24 hours without exercising. That would be horrible.

Kidding aside I'm more motivated to workout than I think I ever have been. The reason is that I truly value the gains I made in Arizona getting ready for Ironman Cozumel and I don't want to lose them.

In the past I took my gains for granted. Easy come, easy go. Very self sabotaging. I don't have that head space anymore. Perhaps I'm maturing. I know what pain and sacrifice went into getting back into decent shape and I don't want to go through that pain and sacrifice again. At 48 years old it's too hard. Frankly I don't know if I have the energy or willpower to do through another cycle of fat to fit.

Monday's for me are busy. Real busy. Phone calls and meetings from 7:30 am to 7:30 pm. As always I wanted to be done by 4:30 pm to go train and it turns out that I'm not done until 7:17 pm, to be exact.

Before I hit the gym I wanted to pick up this product called C4. Davis told me about it and said it's awesome for dialling in weight training. I've been using Beta-Alanine and it's been awesome. Davis says this stuff is even better. It has Beta-Alinine along with a bunch of other ingredients.

I'm not going to sugar coat it, this stuff is dynamite. It made me feel so strong and push such heavy weight that I feel I'm doing something illegal. For example I usually do lat pull downs at 130 lbs. This time it was 145 lbs. Same with Bench, 130 to 145 lbs. Everything went up at least 10 per cent. My muscles were blasted and pumped. It was an awesome feeling. I can't imagine ever going to the gym again without taking this stuff before hand.

It's taken only 48 years but I'm now a HUGE believer in nutritional supplements. I've got more muscle and seen more gains in the bast 60 days on them than anytime in my life prior, even as a young adult.

After weights I did a swim. My first 100 yards, fully relaxed and after blasting them with weights prior was a 1:32 per 100 yards. It was effortless.

I must say that since I don't care about swimming more than 30 minutes and just am swimming for fun and not structured training I'm starting to enjoy my swims. It's been rather nice listening to music and swimming away.

At the pool tonight I met a young 24 year old, Cam, in the lane beside me. An ex-McMaster University swim team member and a guy getting into Triathlons. Watching him and his buddy, another university swim team guy swim is humbling. They go so fast and make it look so easy. Although a full Ironman distance triathlon seemed pretty daunting to him.

Most kids are yet ready to do an Ironman until their late 20's or early 30's for physical and mental reasons. I told him I did my first Ironman at 21 in 1987. I felt like I was an old man telling stories "when I was a kid.....". I also told him that when it warms up if he wants to go riding I'll show him the best routes in the escarpment. I was going to ask him for swim pointers but opted not to as nothing is going to help me. I'm cool with my average swim skills.

When I got home I felt great. Major muscle pump. I can say I've never pushed my muscles so hard in a gym ever before and in 60 days I've really buffed up and want to buff up more. It's addictive.

Weights - 50 min
Swim 40:45 / 2011 meters