06.59 AM

With the new triathlon season now just weeks away, many of you are searching online for new races to enter and join your friends in yet another great year of triathlon and fitness. As triathletes, we are all known to make lists of goals and things we need to get accomplished. Known as obsessive control freaks with type-A personalities, triathletes have something going on all the time. 6.59 AM. "Just another moment in time," you might say. True. But it's also one minute before the start of triathlons around the world. This is the moment when can you reflect on the hard work you've done to get to the start of that event and on the people who have helped you get there. This is the moment when quiet thoughts are soothing. You're floating in water surrounded by 2,000 people. You just said goodbye to your friends and family.

That moment, 6.59 AM. In the months to come you'll be inside on a trainer, or doing your countless laps in the pool, or running on the treadmill while earth on our side of the planet goes through its winter phase. When you need that extra push of motivation, think about 6.59 AM, the moment when you no longer have anything else to check off your pre-race checklist, nothing else to take care of that is even remotely within your reach, only seconds away until your inner peace gets disrupted by a cannon blast. The moment you learn not to consider yourself as part of an individual race, country or religion, just simply a human being, and triathlon is your exploration and discovery on how strong we all are in mind, body and spirit. Your finishing time will not matter. What matters is who you meet and how many new friends you make on your way to the finish line. Regardless of what happens, everyone you have ever met, everything you have ever said, every choice you have ever made has led you here. The elements have conspired to bring you to this place, to this very moment. Only you can choose. It is only you against yourself, against hope, against doubt, against pain.

For several years now, I've taken up the tradition of giving my friends who participate in their first long distance event a little note with a short instruction, "Open this on the beach at the swim start." For all of you who are participating in your first triathlon, and even those who have done hundreds of events, give a little note to your rookie friends and help them put themselves at ease. Your words might just bring them back to a comfortable place in their soul, and encourage them to endure and get to that finish line.

Dream big,