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Tridentity Crisis...

Friday, 19 April 2019 23:10

Let’s give ourselves permission to redefine what it means to be a triathlete .....

By Kelly O'Mara (triathlete.com)

If you run, you’re a runner. That’s all it takes: a few laps around the park a couple times each week. If you ride a bike, is something you need to call an exterminator about.
But if you…what…you’re a triathlete? If you triathlon? Our identities as triathletes are closely tied to racing. Too closely sometimes. You can swim and bike and run all you want for fun, but until you complete an actual triathlon, with a start and finish line, it’s often hard for you to consider yourself a triathlete. (And let’s not even start with the triathlon snobs who... 

act as if you’re not a “real” triathlete until you’ve done some arbitrary number of races of some arbitrarily designated length.)

These definitions are all a little silly. There’s no reason your identity as an athlete needs to be tied up with an entry fee. Who is any race director to say who or what you are? Are you not an Ironman if you simply complete the distance by yourself for fun, without Mike Reilly there making a big deal about it?  READ MORE