Tag: ironman

Well now THAT’S gonna leave a mark.

This is what instantly flashed through my mind as I peeked over my left forearm to discover that it looked like a wild animal had gone and chomped a big chunk out of my elbow.

Just a handful of seconds earlier, I’d been chugging along on my trusty old bike — a 2014 Trek Speed Concept once owned and raced by my former-pro-triathlete coach — in one of the most ambitious endurance races I’ve ever attempted: Ironman California, consisting of a 2.4-mile swim in the American River, a 112-mile bike ride, and a 26.2-mile run through Sacramento.

I made it 101.1 miles into the bike course.

Then, on a shady (both literally and figuratively) chipsealed country road long overdue for a repaving, I felt a violent jolt and was suddenly launched over the top of my handlebars at about 17 miles per hour. Never saw it coming.

It didn’t happen in slow-motion. It was definitely regular-motion.

There still was time for me to think, however, as I was flying: How the heck is this happening? Perhaps using an alternate word for heck.

Then my elbow (along with several other body parts) was slamming into and sliding across the sharp pieces of gravel embedded in the asphalt. Then a paramedic was pulling up in a truck with flashing lights and looking at me and telling me, officially, that he could not let me continue to race. Then I was getting hauled back downtown in another truck, jammed into the rear seat with two other triathletes who had to drop out.

Then an urgent-care doctor was walking into the exam room, taking one look at my elbow, and letting slip the words, “Oh, s—!”

Eight stitches later … uhh, yeah, that’s gonna leave a mark.

But this is the part where I tell you that the very-gnarly scar that eventually forms on my elbow will always be a reminder of the value of having good friends.

Bonding over Boston Marathons and beer

In my 20s, I struggled with friendships. I moved around the country a lot, and as a result I found it difficult to form and maintain significant ones.

I wasn’t quite Paul Rudd’s Peter Klaven in “I Love You, Man,” the brilliant 2009 rom-com about a groom-to-be who starts actively recruiting male friends after realizing he doesn’t have any — or, at least, not one well-suited to be his best man. But let’s just say my speed-dial list didn’t go much beyond my wife and my immediate family.

Everything started to change, gradually, after we moved to Charlotte in 2006. I’ll give you the CliffsNotes version:

• 2008-2010: Started running, after years of sitting on the couch playing Zelda and Tetris. Joined a running group, and made some casual friends whose affinity for marathons and triathlons rubbed off on me.
• 2011-2012: Became friends with a Charlotte-based pro triathlete who left a running/triathlon coaching business she was working for to start her own. Formed casual friendships with some of her clients.
• 2013-2014: Qualified for my first Boston Marathon and completed my first Ironman with her help, alongside a small but growing group of still-mostly-casual friends.
• 2015-2020: Took an increasingly active role in creating social events for the athletes on our team, which very slowly was evolving — from something that felt like it was held together by Scotch tape into something that felt like it was held together by at least a little glue.

Then the pandemic hit, and for many months we couldn’t hang out indoors. But we could still run together. So we did. Frequently. Since we were all working from home and more flexible. Since there was nothing else to do on the weekends. We’d run on Sunday mornings, then go get breakfast on whatever patio was open, and talk for hours. We’d run on Tuesday evenings, then stand around until long after our sweat dried, cracking jokes and (responsibly) drinking beer.

I know Covid caused a lot of despair and a lot of death. I know it also caused a lot of people to feel pretty isolated. For that, I’m genuinely sorry.

From my perspective, however, that period of time was a gift. Before the pandemic, we’d had a strong foundation for a solid friend group. Afterward, we owned a big, beautiful house.

Then one day near the end of last summer, a unique opportunity came knocking on our door.

‘How much money would we have to raise?’

My friend Chuck was adamantly opposed to the sport of triathlon.

Whenever someone in our group brought up the idea of him trying a tri, his response was always the same: “Absolutely never.” So, like good friends are apt to do, we brought up the idea as often as we could.

On this particular day, we were at a big team pool party. Seven or eight of his primary antagonists, including me, were all standing around when the idea came up, again. Chuck said “Absolutely never,” again.

I decided to go after a weak spot. Chuck’s late father suffered from Parkinson’s disease, and he’s long been a big supporter of The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research. Without really thinking about it, I asked, “How much money would we have to raise to get you to do an Ironman?” He replied, without really thinking about it, “Uhh … $15,000.”

I was stunned. I felt like that’d be easy. He obviously felt raising $15K would be very hard, and thought tossing out that amount would shut us all up.

It didn’t. After we all shook on it, I went home and created a fundraising page in his name.

You can probably guess where this all goes from here. Two and a half months later, Chuck grudgingly registered for the 2025 edition of Ironman California. And since we were never going to make him do something he really did not want to do alone, those seven or eight of his primary antagonists, including me, signed up, too.

What we didn’t anticipate was how viral this would go on our team — in large part to support Chuck on his journey but also just because it was becoming a numbers game.

To explain: It takes months if not close to a year to properly prepare for an Ironman. It involves workouts that can see you leaving the house before 6 a.m. on a Saturday and not returning until mid-afternoon. Training alone can break the strongest athletes, mentally. But if you have others to train with, who are doing the same Ironman race, on the same schedule, the idea becomes easier to stomach.

By the time all was said and done, 33 of us were signed up, including about a dozen first-timers.

(Quick aside: I wish I could help you appreciate how stupefyingly unusual this is, to get that many people who know each other to register for the same Ironman. It’s maybe sort of like convincing 30 people you know to all go skydiving with you on the same day at the same time. The previous two Ironmans I’d done, I knew about five other people racing.)

We became like a fraternity, bonding over our shared suffering, over teasing Chuck about his burning hatred of cycling, or over teasing me about my burning hatred of swimming, or over the journey’s simplest of pleasures: oatmeal-creme pies at the end of long runs. We found excuses to get together for a beer as often as we found ourselves meeting at Huntersville Business Park for our regular Saturday-morning rides.

And although the law of averages says that with so many people riding their bikes on so many public roads for so many miles in this bike-unfriendly city will eventually result in an accident, no one among our group had a crash.

Until mine, on race day.

It could have been much worse

I’m not gonna lie, my elbow HURT.

Also, yeah, I won’t sit here and tell you that I’m happy I didn’t get to finish something I’d spent six months training for.

I had just 11 miles left to ride, a sore butt and an aching neck. I was looking forward to getting off of my bike and running around the city, looking forward to spotting all of my friends in our matching pink-and-blue tri suits, giving them high-fives, cheering them on, maybe even ultimately crossing the finish line with one of my favorite friends, like I did at the finish line of my first Ironman, 11 years ago.

But I promise you — even as I was sailing through the air, even when I was sitting there in the middle of the road bleeding as other cyclists zoomed past, even as I was in the truck with those two other athletes who’d also had to drop out, even as I was getting stitched up at the urgent care — I didn’t spend a second feeling sorry for myself.

I was too busy thinking of my friends.

I’m serious. This isn’t me trying to say something that sounds noble. This is me saying that, once I had my bearings and a temporary bandage on my arm and an idea of what treatment I needed, I was mainly focused on making it back to the finish line in time to see my friends cross.

Unfortunately, it’s pretty hard to get around cities that are hosting an Ironman, and, well, it takes some time to get into and out of an urgent care center.

By the time I got into the exam room, though, I had my phone on me, and I had my wife with me, and we were closely following the app that was tracking all of my friends while also trying to politely listen to the doctor. And when my iPhone wasn’t buzzing with notifications about someone’s progress in the race, it was vibrating as it delivered a parade of texts from friends checking in to make sure I was OK, or to say how sorry they were about my wreck.

I’m fine, I assured them. It could have been much worse, I wrote.

But as the texts kept coming in, alongside all the race updates — which were starting to reflect not just progress but finishes — I was finding my way to putting a finger on the feeling that was giving the pain in my elbow a run for its money.

Finally making it to the finish line

I was more than simply “fine.” I was grateful. And not just that my injuries weren’t worse.

I’m grateful for this journey I’ve been on. This whole journey, which started with an interest in getting healthy, was enhanced by my intentionality about building and growing a sense of interconnectedness within my social circle, then found surprising new ways to enrich my life.

I’m grateful for the physical ability and mental fortitude to even attempt something like an Ironman in the first place.

I’m grateful for a partner, in my wife, who supported me in training for it even when she had to spend half the weekend alone (and who has since my accident been a pro at nursing my wounds).

I’m grateful for a wonderful friend group, those who were racing and without even knowing it helped distract me from my own misfortune, but also those who weren’t and took the time to show concern for my well-being — to in almost every case express more sadness that I couldn’t finish the race than I felt myself(!).

And I’m grateful that although I missed seeing many of those friends I trained with actually complete the race, I was there in time to see Chuck make the final turns toward the finish line.

So that he could blame me, in person, for making him do this stupid race.

I have a couple other notable scars on my body. A dozen years ago, I got four stitches in my thumb, when a flower vase broke in my hand. As a little kid, I got three stitches in my knee, cut with a Swiss army knife when I tried to throw it at a target on my bedroom door and, um, missed. Neither are fond memories.

I think, though, that this one on my elbow will always give me a good reason to smile.