I want to start off and explain why I named my story Friday Night Feeling. In the first part I will explain what the Friday Night Feeling is and later on in the story, you will understand completely why I chose to name my story this. This is my story, a story about a person who never thought that completing a triathlon was possible, and ended up crossing the finish line in Memphis in a time of 3:55:12.
I grew up in the world of traditional sports. As a kid, I grew up playing football, baseball, and basketball. I even did a short stint in wrestling, only to find out that I started so late in the game, and I was so terrible, that there really was no hope for me. I am also not that violent of a person, which did not help me on the mat.
As I came into my own during my teen years, it was apparent that football was going to be my sport of choice and I focused my attention on that. I ended up getting signed out of high school by a college in Minnesota and so went my football career. It was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. It taught me what it meant to be part of a team, commitment to excellence, and taking pride in one's work. I think I chose football because nothing compared to Friday nights just before you took the field. The juices were flowing at a level that was scary at times and all you wanted to do was jump out of your skin because you were so ready to hit the field and bring home a victory for your school. When I went to college, we played Saturday at 1pm, and I was scared that the feeling would not be the same. Boy, was I wrong! The Saturday Afternoon Feeling was even more intense than the Friday Night Feeling. I think that had a lot to do with the fact that I was playing for a college that I deeply cared about vs. playing for a high school that I couldn't really give two cents worth about.
After college, I moved to Chicago and told myself that I was done working out. I had been on a work-out regimen since I was 15 years old and now I was away from college and no one was going to tell me when or where to work out! Boy, did that lead to some dire consequences. I ended up heavier than ever. I had lost muscle mass and gained fat mass. I did not feel all that great about myself, but the amount of hours that I was working left me little time to care about it. I ate when I could and most of the time I was not making the right eating choices. In my line of business you have a lot of lunch and dinner meetings. You are not meeting at Burger King; you might be meeting at a steakhouse or an Italian joint. I knew what tasted good so I ordered that. Pile on a couple rounds of cocktails and I needed to be rolled out of the place because I was so fat. On June 1st, 2008, life changed for me, and I will never forget that day because it truly changed the rest of my life.
June 1st, 2008 was one of the worst days of my life. I was driving down the Kennedy Expressway doing my normal thing. I was driving 80 miles an hour, drinking a cup of Starbucks, and talking on the phone 100 miles per hour. As I hit the merge I felt something inside change and I was scared to death. My heart rate was at 140 beats per minute and I felt like I was just going to die. I pulled over twice and each time I wondered when I was going to check out. I ended up making my way to the doctor's office and I was in tears at this point. I thought that at the ripe age of 24 my life was coming to an end. My whole family has had heart related issues and as the family has grown, the heart problems have shown up at younger and younger ages. This is why I felt like my time was coming. I had just watched my father go through an angioplasty and was wondering if I was heading down the same road.
When I got in to see the doctor, they took my blood pressure and it was 160 over 100. Bad news! She sat down with me and talked with me about my medical history, diet, level of exercise, and overall level of stress. In that meeting it came out that I had been suffering from migraine headaches for quite some time. I had learned to medicate these with coffee, sleep, or whatever I could do, just to make it through my day. She told me that my body was most likely reacting to this level of pain and that I needed to change my lifestyle. I needed to get at least 45 minutes of cardio four days per week. When I left the clinic that day, I felt better that my life might be back on track, but I did not hear what they were saying in regards to working out. I did not change my ways.
It was not till the fall, when I suffered from another terrible bout with headaches, that I started to go to the gym. To my amazement, it seemed that my head was clearer and that I felt better on a daily basis. Even though I did not particularly enjoy the workouts, I did feel the need to stick to them. This is the point in the story where the Friday Night Feeling comes back into play again. I started to think that I was an athlete all my life and that I needed to get back into a level of competition again. I started thinking about what I could do to compete. I never was that into running or biking, and I could not swim. But I saw an Ironman on TV and thought how cool it would be to get into that kind of shape and compete at a high level. My friends, Dr. Tony B and Dr. Larry C, recommended that I sign up for a triathlon and start working with Coach Craig Strong.
Let me start out by saying that I could not swim, period! I could not run a mile without feeling like heck, and my biking skills were lackluster at best. Let me also say that on January 10th, 2009 I signed up for Memphis in May without consulting with Craig. I called Craig and we met at the pool for the first time. I wonder what must have been going through Craig's head when he saw me in the water for the first time and then compared that to my goal.
I have to make this point before I forget it. The Experience Triathlon coaches do NOT let people race Memphis as their first Olympic distance triathlon. But since I had already signed up for the race, Craig supported my choice and did everything he could to get me ready. Let me also point out that one of the biggest keys to me finishing this race was that nobody let on to me what a big task I had taken on. If they would have, things might have turned out different.
We started out slow. The pool was hard, the running was even worse, and the biking was not much better. I had knee pain while running, I could not swim 25 yards without gasping for air, and I could hardly ride a hill on the CompuTrainer without feeling like passing out. But I kept going. Craig kept telling me that this was all normal and that all the kinks needed to get worked out. One day the swimming finally clicked. Now I was swimming. Craig never told me to just swim, he told me to drill, drill, drill. During a work out I just kind of started swimming, and the feeling was amazing. I could not believe it! I never thought that by just drilling, it would lead to swimming.
Craig also put me on a run/walk pattern to take care of my legs. The more I did this, the more that the run became easier. I woke up one day and just ran for 45 minutes, pain free! This was such a mental boost. I could not believe that this was all coming together. Every time I talked to Craig, he just kept telling me how good I was doing. Well, let's hold up a minute. We did have to have some tough love a few times.
Coming from a sport that was all muscle, aggression, and power, I was training in that manner. I was bull-headed, thought you had to kill yourself to get to the next level, and thought workouts were supposed to leave you lifeless. Craig took me through what he likes to call "Mystery Science Theater", and explained to me that I was not getting anywhere by doing this. He also had me doing some strength training. I was doing heavy bench, squats, shoulders, all the stuff I did for football. He helped me understand that triathletes were not supposed to have 30 inch biceps or be able to bench press the Sears Tower. I enjoyed bench pressing the Sears Tower and having big arms was always somewhat of a status symbol on the football field. So as much as this was a hit to my ego, I did stop my heavy lifting and modified to more of a triathlete strength plan. Now this is where things started to get interesting.
I felt more flexible in the pool, my legs felt lighter in the run, I felt more loose overall and felt lighter on my feet. Mind you, we had this talk in March when I was already a month and a half into my training schedule. So we kept working and kept working, all along the way making progress.
Let's fast forward to the week before the race. That week of work was terrible and I started thinking, "Why am I doing this? Am I really ready? Why did I get myself into this situation?" I had some long pep talks with Craig. After some serious discussions, we decided to move forward with the race because we needed to see where I stood in the world at this point.
The ride down to Memphis was awesome. I met a group of ET athletes and coaches, including Coach Joe, and they welcomed me into the group. It was as if I had known them for years and we were all just getting together again. The two days leading up to the race were great as well. We did a lot of talking, preparing, and overall relaxation and mental preparation. The one key that I must say that ET takes very seriously and something that I buy into is mental preparation! This is something that one has to do in order to be successful. Craig talked to me a lot about it and I told him the stories about when I broke my leg in college. My football team was playing for the first conference championship in 32 years, so I mentally prepared myself for the pain of playing with a broken leg in order to reach the end result. Fast forward to race day.
The morning of the race was cool and windy, and just what I needed. I was scared that it was going to be hot and that I would dehydrate quickly. Boy, was I wrong! Dehydration can happen on those cool windy days!
The race started off well; I did the swim portion of the race in 40 minutes. For the most part I did feel comfortable. The last 500 yards was a challenge, but I just put my head down and told myself to get out of the water. Next came the bike and this is where I did the complete screw job on myself. I had three bottles of fluids on the bike: two Gatorades and one bottle of water. The bike was nice and cool and I was just riding along minding my own business enjoying the scenery. After about mile 20 I realized that I had not even drank half a bottle of water and had not touched the Gatorade. I felt good, so I just assumed that I was doing okay on fluids and that I would be okay once I reached the run. Wrong! I reached the transition area and I had a small meltdown. Someone had placed their bike into my spot and I had no idea what to do. I got angry and just threw my bike on top of theirs, changed my shoes, and headed out. This is where things got really difficult. After the first two miles, I began to cramp badly. My quads were shot, my hamstrings were shot, and I was starting to think that I was shot.
I got myself into a run/walk pattern for the next 1.5 miles. This took me past the turn-around point and into the 4th mile. As I approached mile 4, I told myself that I had two options. I could call for the meat wagon and have them cart me in, or just run the rest of the race and take what happens. The latter half of that thought process is what I chose and I set off to complete the race. I made it all the way to the levee and everything seemed to stop hurting for the time being. I remember running down the levee and seeing Sara and Adrian come out to run beside me. That gave me a little boost to kick it on in. Crossing the finish line was pretty amazing. At first I did not really know what my middle name was, but that came back rather quickly. Everyone from the group came over and offered their congratulations. It was pretty cool to be part of a group and have them there when you finish. After the race it was time to eat, and boy, did the BBQ taste good! When I got back into the hotel, I remember the feeling that started to set in, and how good it felt. That feeling lasted the whole night. It was the feeling of accomplishment and the feeling of actually doing something that you set out to do. After football was over I thought that I would never have that Friday Night or Saturday Afternoon Feeling again. Well, I was dead wrong. The intensity of the race, the atmosphere, and the sheer smell of competition showed me that I can get everything I need for competition out of a triathlon. The race was amazing and I plan on going back next year. I just hope I can race a little faster!
I want to make special mention of the job that Craig did coaching me. I have competed at high levels of competition before, only to have my heart broken because a coach could not prepare the team to take the next step. The day after the race was a rather emotional day for me, because it sunk in that I had finally met a coach that could actually take someone to the next level and not fall short. I can‘t say enough about how much Craig did for me, and how helpful Coach Joe was during the drive down, the preparation, and on race day, as well as the rest of the ET family. As I told Joe and Craig, when I first joined the Experience Triathlon team I took the name at face value. I liked the name but never thought a heck of a lot about why it was called Experience Triathlon. The whole goal is get people to experience what a triathlon is and open their minds up to a lifestyle that you can grow old with. I have found something that I can stay active in for the years to come. Something that will keep me in the gym, keep me making better eating decisions, and keep my mind clear. As I told Craig, there is no medicine like exercise. This triathlon helped me overcome bad headaches, life changes, and bad habits. The experience was truly life changing.
Congrats, Erick, on getting that Friday Night Feeling back! Welcome to ET!! The entire Memphis in May 2009 photo set can be enjoyed at ET Photo.
