Taoist Wisdom: We’ll See
We’ll See… My good friend and fellow cyclist, Peter Springer, shared this story to his friends in his “Goodbye” email that he sent out to announce his move from Richmond, VA to Charlotte, NC. I used to ride with Peter when I worked for Capital One. We would ride in the dark late after work or early before work to avoid traffic. We once spent a Sunday biking 167 miles from Capital One in McLean to Capital One in Richmond in 100F heat. This Taoist story resonates with me as an athlete who has been dealing with hip and hamstring issues, as a homeowner whose mortgage...
Read MoreThe 4-Hour Workweek: a Must Read for All Time-starved Triathletes (and Others)
“Thanks to Tim Ferriss, I have more time in my life to travel, spend time with family, and write book blurbs. This is a dazzling and highly useful work.” - A. J. Jacobs, editor-at-large of Esquire Magazine and author of The Know-It-All At a holiday party in December, I was telling telling a friend about a few of the great books I had recently read like Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and Man’s Search for Meaningby Viktor Frankl. “These are life changing books,” I said or something to that effect. “Well, I have a book...
Read MoreThe Inner Game of Marathon, Triathlon, etc.
In my continued search for self-enlightenment and a more meaningful life, I began reading a plethora of “self-help” books…or, rather, as I prefer to call them “self-discovery” books starting with The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho and Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. My latest read has been the The Inner Game of Work by W. Timothy Gallwey (also the author of The Inner Game of Tennis). In his book, Gallwey challenges the reader (me) to re-examine how his definition of work and fundamental motivations for working. What does this book have to do with...
Read MoreUnderstanding the “Why?”
“Why am I doing this?” I ask myself repeatedly every day. “What is the ‘why’ that drives me forward and provides the meaning for the ‘things’ I’m doing like racing Silverman in November?” I can’t answer the “Why?” question with a solid answer right now. Because I can’t answer the question, I don’t have a compelling reason to race Silverman. When I reflect back to watching Chesapeakeman and being inspired to race again, it was not so much watching Brady win but the feeling of total commitment that I observed...
Read MoreVisualization and Affirmation: One Key to Successful Racing
“Visualization and Affirmation” - these were the words that northern Virginia triathlete and Olympic hopeful Margie Shapiro shared with me a few weeks ago in an email. These two words are the key to my 8:29 race at the Quelle Challenge in Roth, German – 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike and 26.2-mile run. Visualization: I think about Roth every day. I play through the race in my mind. I did the race in 2005 and 2006 so am familiar with the course and the experience. I know what to expect. Affirmation: I will swim under 54 minutes. I will bike under 4:40. I will run a 2:50...
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