My First DriTri Sprint Experience: I Didn't Wake Up Before Dawn Just to Quit

-

 You don't quit when it's hard. You quit when it's over.

I didn't complete the half-marathon distance in my first Orangetheory Marathon Month attempt, logging only 10.02 miles on the treadmill. I told myself I would refrain from joining these challenges because being so close and yet so far was such a let-down. 

The following month, however, I decided to join the DriTri sprint challenge because I couldn't shake off the feeling that I could actually finish this. If the half-marathon is 13.1 miles spread over a month, the DriTri sprint is composed of a 1,000-metre row, 130 reps of bodyweight exercises, and a 1.55-mile treadmill run to be finished within one hour. Crazy for a non-finisher, right?

Nevertheless, I took on this challenge. While on the rower, I thought that reaching the distance was easy enough because I started at a good pace. Then fatigue kicked in, about halfway through the rowing portion. I struggled through the rest of the distance as I couldn't get the timing of my breathing right. 

By the time I started the bodyweight exercises, I was regretting signing up for the event! Still, I persevered. I didn't wake up before dawn just to quit. 

I wanted to crawl to the treadmill after repeating those bodyweight exercises. I had to catch my breath and get my heart rate back to Zone 3 (71–83% of my maximum heart rate) before starting my run so I could finish strong. And so I began walking, slowly increasing my pace until I was jogging at 3.5 miles per hour (yes, I was jogging, not walking; I have short legs). The other sprinters had finished as I was halfway through the distance, but I still pushed through. I continued increasing my pace until I reached 4 miles per hour. 

... Until the treadmill indicated that I reached the 1.55-mile mark. I finally reached my finish line! And I learned a valuable lesson: Finishing a physical challenge is not just about strength, speed, or endurance. It's also about resolve. Grit.


I got a medal for completing my first DriTri sprint!

Comments

Post a Comment

Thank you for dropping by!

Before moving on, please share your thoughts or comments about the post. :)

Thanks again!

Popular posts from this blog

10 things I learned while driving on Marcos Highway to Baguio City

-
I went on a day trip to the City of Pines, which was around a 700-km drive from my house. I drove  going up there and then from the city to Victoria, Tarlac. After that, my dad took over the driving duties. It was day trip with Tita Ising and Tito Sibing with us. Anyway, this trip was my first time to go to Baguio City with me behind the wheel. As everyone who drives up knows, there are three main routes to Baguio from the lowlands: Kennon Road, which ascends from Rosario, La Union. It was out of my options because it's too dangerous to use that road in the rainy season. The second route is via Naguilian Road, which makes my trip a lot longer because the beginning of the ascent is in Bauang, La Union (further north). The last route, and the one I took, was the Marcos Highway, now known as the Aspiras-Palispis Highway. This 47-km road starts from Agoo, La Union and is touted as the safest route among the three.  As I drove up and then down (on the same day; we were in...
Read more

Skyflakes

-
One of the more famous Philippine exports is Skyflakes , a wheat-based, salty cracker. It is one of my emergency food items: I typically have some stocked at home and in my handbag in case I become hungry (like in traffic jams). When there's no electricity and it's impractical to cook rice (because the leftover would spoil), I'd open a pack of Skyflakes and generously coat each cracker with Cheez Whiz... if I had a bottle of it within reach. Anyway, each time I spent more than two weeks outside the Philippines, I'd be elated to see boxes of Skyflakes inside Asian stores (particularly when in I was Australia and in the USA). Back then, I took it as a sign of homesickness. When I moved to California, I didn't miss Skyflakes because Mommy made sure that there's a steady supply in the house. Skyflakes is embedded in Filipino gastronomy as a snack, a panawid-gutom , that anyone who reacts positively upon seeing Skyflakes outside the Philippines must have spe...
Read more

Surat Mangyan

-
Image
In high school, part of the Filipino curriculum was learning about one of the country's ancient native scripts called Baybayin . I learned back then that this script was eventually abandoned because the Spanish, and eventually the Americans, encouraged the use of the Latin script for written communications. But that's in the lowlands; the rules were different up in the mountains. In the lush mountains of Mindoro, groups of indigenous people called Mangyans  live largely in isolation away from the Christianised Filipinos. This isolation has led to the continuous development of the Mangyans' old script, Surat Mangyan . As I walked inside the Ayala Museum , I saw this bamboo tube (I'm not sure if it's an instrument) with Mangyan script written all over it. I suppose that this was equivalent to a book or a song. But I haven't figured out what's written yet, despite the translation guide provided. What I can do, however, is write my name in Ma...
Read more