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Written by Louis Tharp
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Friday, 16 November 2007 16:45 |
Triathlons Celebrate “Doing” Over “Viewing”
High school, and college sports, which are highly selective, generally damaging to various body parts, and focus on skill-sets best implemented by young people, are the beginning of a life long attachment to sport -- as a spectator.
We watch the few play ball sports in high school and college and then watch even fewer play the same sports on TV after we graduate. We are herded into the spectator pen or the golf course, while the few special people are ushered onto the field. And both groups lose. The players leave their sport after a few years with latent as well as actual injuries that will cause early onset arthritis, parkinsons, and a host of other debilitating chronic diseases. Both groups take their place in front of the TV wearing their 2XL team-branded polo shirt and await type 2 diabetes, high cholesterol, hypertension, and the next beer commercial.
Until triathlons.
There are thousands of individuals who haven’t gone quietly to the couch or the vinyl seat of the golf cart after college and high school, whether they were spectators or players.
As empowered adults, we’ve chosen “doing” over “viewing.” Whether it’s the gay man who couldn't abide the homophobic school locker room, the mathlete who still plays chess and knows the definition of a quadratic equation, the daddy whose toddlers have given him a new perspective on the need for health and longevity, the Title IX mother who remembers what it felt like to play sports in college, the debutante who may still do her nails, but only so they don't get in the way during transition, the brainiac who graduated from medical school or crashed through the glass ceiling -- all these people are changing the way generations identify themselves, as triathletes.
 I see this process at an early stage as the swim coach for the West Point tri team. These cadets have decided to make triathlons a part of their lives. In our book “Overachiever’s Diary,” we welcome the world into their training regimen. These are people for whom physical fitness and discipline is a lifelong commitment, and, as talented athletes who could choose nearly any sport, they’ve chosen triathlons as the way to measure their psychological and physical progress, and to create and sustain teams. We have had Army football players, boxers, runners, swimmers, gymnasts, and soccer players who have become happier athletes as triathletes. Our sport welcomes the athlete, and our selectivity is self-selection and dedication.
I was speaking with my sports psychologist, Rhoda Green, who was a marathon runner and then a race walker. As a competitive swimmer myself, she and I were talking about why we do it. She said, "I do it to live."
It took a lot of us a long time to take back sports from the jocks, to redefine them  as lifelong activities instead of school-sanctioned memories. Younger generations of triathletes aren’t waiting – to live.
Louis Tharp is the swim coach for the U.S. Military Academy Triathlon Team and author of “Overachiever’s Diary, How the Army triathlon team became world contenders.” The book is available at overachieversdiary.com. A portion of the proceeds go to Army Tri.
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