Winning, losing and the importance of being honest

For us all to WIN and enjoy triathlon as much as possible I believe we simply need to be honest and objective, now both of these points sounds very simple but are probably the hardest thing’s for an individual who is setting their own training to do. I hope that the points outlined below give you a good starting point on the way to being honest and objective with yourself and allowing yourself to WIN.

Test your performance to establish where you are now, as if we don’t know where you are now how can you make a realistic goal for yourself to achieve in the future.

Put your ego in a box, if your current fitness allows you to run a 5km in 30 minutes then it is not reasonable to think that you will be running a 20 minute 5km in 8 weeks.

Aim for % points of improvement, this will allow you to break the long term targets down into smaller goals.

Be patient, make a plan and stick to it, your body needs a minimum of 6-8 weeks to being to adapt to any specific training stimuli. If you keep revamping your plans, based around what you read in the pages of social media (what others say they are doing) or within the pages of a triathlon magazine article, your body will never be able to fully adapt as you will always be re-starting things every 2-4 weeks.

Always recognise when you hit a smaller target as this means you have WON.

Don’t be psyched out, someone somewhere will always appear to be doing more than you, harder than you and faster than you but in truth they are probably not and just like to talk the talk. More importantly your efforts are working towards your goals not there’s.

I hope a few of my points and views within this short article give you a few ideas and a small insight into how you can gain the most enjoyment and sense of achievement from this great sport. It has lots to offer us but to make the most of it we need to be honest and objective and always aiming to WIN for ourselves.