Thoughts and Words to Live By
August 18, 2011-TH-
The Challenge is going well; I’m in a bit of recovery from that run on Tuesday but I did the hour, just at 5.2 miles on the trail and felt pretty solid. Lauren was a great running partner and we had a beautiful day to enjoy an hour at Eagle Creek. It was also great to decompress a bit and focus on what I knew was going to be a busy and exhausting second half of the week. 5.2 Miles is the longest I’ve ever run besides the Mini I did a month before The Wedding; but I can’t really call that “running” and it was more survival than anything. I wound up being really happy with this run and am hoping my body heals up enough to be able to tolerate more during the off season.
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| No pictures from the run on Tuesday; but this would be me turning over tables and chairs to get to food after the Mini in 2010 (don’t run the Mini without training…) |
With that being said; there are two discussions that have stuck with me in life and they are always consciously floating around in my brain. Given my tendency for sarcasm and lack of patience for those that I find wasting my time in life; both of these discussions have most likely kept me out of trouble, handcuffs, or bar brawls on more than one occasion…
My longtime cycling coach Polish Pollock that led me to my many successes on the Velodrome over the past 7 years taught me early on “you never want to fight against someone with longer arms; you’ll always lose.”
A friend of mine told me many moons ago that “you never fight with someone who has nothing to lose.”
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| Polish Pollock whispering something to me; I’m sure discussing the need to put it all out on the line |
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| One of those times I didn’t listen to such advice; which is why every official and coach is discussing penalties for all involved; still have that notice of fine hanging in my garage (and was well worth it) |
The legal process takes a small but significant step forward tomorrow as we begin depositions and both L and I are first on the block. It would be naïve to say we’re “looking forward to this” as I think it’s going to be physically and emotionally taxing unlike anything we can prepare for; but we also are glad to see a small step forward in the slow and victimizing legal process that exists.
I can only equate it to the feeling in my stomach I would always have lining up against Olympic, World Cup, and Professional cyclists in a heated track event; that feeling of laying all the cards out there and leaving nothing behind and seeing where the chips fell at the end of the day; and hoping that I didn’t wind up on the wrong side of a nasty chop, flick, or head-butt at 60 k/h.
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| match sprint at Elite Track Nats in 05 against a guy who wound up representing the USA in 2008 |
Besides, in this fight; I’ve got the really long arms and after what we’ve been through for the past 14+ months; it’s hard to imagine we have much to lose. Our heads are held high and even though it feels like we’re being led to slaughter tomorrow; I know the roles will be reversed soon enough and I’ll finally get the rest of that analytical information I need to process how and what really happened to get us here.
Cheers
-th