Why I Withdrew From My First Triathlon and Learning to Be a Dad

Last Fall, after clearing a major work-life hurdle, I decided to tackle a huge challenge, and signed up for a Half Ironman for this September; I have never done a triathlon of any length. I started training pretty hard in December, and managed to injure both of my shoulders, being a fool at the gym. I lost several weeks – no swimming, no biking, and I could barely lift my then infant daughter. After six weeks of PT, I signed up for a swim class, and started gearing up. As summer approached, my wife and I realized that I could take a couple of months off and be a stay-at-home dad. I had grand visions of training with my daughter – grand, and seriously naïve.

My daughter had her first birthday in early July. She loves going for rides in her bike seat with daddy; we have a Thule jogger, and she loves going running – each of these (I now know), however, she enjoys for about an hour, and then she is done. I had planned out lunch and snacks, and diaper changes, and clothing changes, and sunscreen applications. It all seemed so doable, and a total kick.  We would log bike mileage, switch to the jogger, and log running miles. This was going to be the best daddy/daughter time ever. She was going to be like luggage, only really cute, and she would love every minute. I had not really checked with her.

There were also some setbacks rooter in places other than naiveté (though, perhaps naïve tinged).

My wife and I boogie board, so I had thought that my wetsuit would be fine. That was incorrect. So, I had to buy a wetsuit. This took some time – at least partly because I was trying to keep the total expenditures down, and, well, they were growing. By the time I had the proper suit, time was starting to grow tight. Then came the issue of how to swim with my daughter around. Finding a sitter for that time was a problem. I was mostly down to one day a week of open water, with my wife on the beach watching our daughter; I was eating up everyone’s time.

The bicycle: I have good road bike – a Marin San Marino racing bike; it is old, but I love it. I had to figure out how to add water bottles; I decided on two more, mounted behind the seat. I was astounded at what bike stores think one will pay for this bracket – all done, it would have been over $300. So I searched Amazon, and pulled it off for much, much less. I am even quite happy with the result; but, this took a lot of time. I was logging most of the miles, however, on a mountain bike, with the seat for my daughter. The first week of August, the bike was stolen off my bike rack, while I was driving the car. My wife, without hesitation said: at this point, there is no turning back; you have to buy another bike. So the expense part ballooned. Then, the bike store screwed up the order, and I lost another week and half with no mountain bike.

With less than a month to go, I finally had everything: a training bike, a race bike, a great wetsuit, and a phenomenally patient wife.

I had also, by now, learned that my daughter was not going to go along with five hour training days. Period. So it was one event a day, and even that was shorter than I had hoped. I still felt I could pull it off.

With frightening little time remaining, I had to improve my swim distance; the pool just did not relate to the ocean. So I pushed it on the few occasions I had. One day, I was out pretty far out, in rough water, and I had an asthma attack. That led to a bit of a panic attack. I was too far from shore to be comfortable. My confidence started to plummet. That night, I walked into a dumbbell on my porch (poetic, I know), and filleted my toe. My, how a toe does bleed. That straw broke the camel’s back.

With the few weeks I had left before returning to work, I walked on the beach with my daughter, hiked the redwoods, and slowed way down. I was there for her first steps, and her first words.  I had asked way too much of her, and a little too much of myself. It really hurt to withdraw, but it was for the best, and over the summer, I learned a great deal about myself, and, most importantly, I learned even more about being a dad.