Hank was a Smart Guy

Good solid, workout today as I remain in the "recovery phase" from the triathlon season.
I did 5 sets of upper body work and 25:00 on the elliptical as I try not to aggravate my bone spur on my right heel, plus a very sore right hammy. Enough about that stuff.

Soon will be ramping up the mileage as I anticipate 2008 to be my most intense season in my 22 years in the sport. Why not?? I'll be 55. 5 races this year. Next year I would like to do 7 with perhaps my 4th Ironman distance race to finish out the year.

Now to Hank. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

"The heights by great men
reached and kept
Were not attained
by sudden flight,
But they, while their
companions slept,
Were toiling upward
in the night."

Its the perfect poem to sum up our sport. In fact, any sport. Whomever thinks they can just "take flight" and smoke out the competition is kidding themselves.

I have been guilty of it for certain races over the years. I am not elite by any stretch of the imagination. But there has never been a race where I have posted a personal best or where I was high up in my age group where I didn't put in the extra work.

Its not that we toil while everyone else is sleeping, although some days it feels like that. Its that we don't take for granted the fact that "peparedness and sacrifice means a thoroughly satisfying racing experience."

Theres some smugness about us in this sport. We are aware that we compete in a very demanding sport and that we are in the upper percentile of fit people around. I just hope that I don't take any of that for granted. That I continue to strive to do my best. That I strive in training and that I strive in going the extra mile in doing for others.

Thanks Hank. Hey, you were ahead of your time.