As Ariana Schiff swam in her first triathlon, the people officially keeping an eye on swimmers from a boat peppered her with questions.
“I didn’t know how to swim, and they kept leaning over and asking, ‘Do you want to rest? Do you want to hold onto the boat?’ They thought I was going to drown, and I was one of the last people out of the water,” she said.
Nevertheless, Schiff somehow finished the 2013 Loveland Lake to Lake Sprint Triathlon in 1 hour, 54 minutes and 4 seconds.
Sprint triathlons attract beginners in the sport, given the shorter distances in the three consecutive events when compared to the daunting full triathlons: a half mile swim versus 2.4 miles; a 12.4-mile cycle versus 112 miles; and a 3.1-mile run versus a 26.2-mile marathon.
Schiff, now a full triathlon amateur athlete hoping to go pro, in early January shared why anyone can finish a triathlon if she can.
Daily Camera: Even without celebrity you act like an ambassador for the sport. Why?
Ariana Schiff: I am trying to talk the ‘new year, new me’ people crowding the gym now — the New Year’s resolution crew — into this sport, into appreciating that taking on a triathlon is not always about being inherently good at it. A lot of other triathletes have some sort of background in at least one of the sports at the high school or college level — some indication that they could excel. I had none. I was a gymnast growing up. But this is about being the best you can be. It’s a process versus results-only perspective, and training for triathlons makes me feel like I am coming alive even though it is the most intimidating thing to start at the bottom of a sport with the longest road to the top.
DC: What worries plagued you in the beginning?
AS: I wondered if I wanted to train for 20 to 30 hours a week. Could I could sit with all the discomfort associated with training and competing? I also have some age awareness. I am 32 and realize that my window to do triathlon at a high level is closing. Younger athletes still live in some state of invincibility. Being an older athlete makes me focus more intensively on how to prolong my competitive window, how to optimize the performance of my body and mind.
… Some days, it is really scary to have such massive goals within a sport. And I meet people all the time who talk themselves out of it. They say that they would love to try triathlon, but they don’t know how to swim or they don’t have a bike or they aren’t good at running. I like triathlon training because athletes can make multi-year plans. You have time to learn how to swim. You can get your hands on a bike. You can become a better runner.
DC: What sparked your interest?
AS: A loss. I was a project manager for an outdoor company before my job left me. I knew that I could look at that like my life was falling apart or look at it as a time for something new to come together, and it did. I started my own business, Mars Black Creative … to continue designing packaging with a more flexible schedule that comes in handy training for triathlons.
DC: What is your training sweet spot?
AS: From about 10 a.m. to noon. By then, I’ve been up since 6 a.m. working, and I’m ready to take a break to train. Then, I go home, eat lunch, and work some more. I usually go to bed about 9 p.m., and I understand that this kind of schedule is not realistic for lots of people. Lots of people need to be in a chair working at certain times, and they can’t come back from their lunch break sweaty. Lots of people have to take care of their spouse and kids. So, they will need to work out a training schedule that fits them to do this.
DC: What is one of your favorite recipes and why?
AS: Most Thursday nights, a friend and I do a big shop and cook up a storm in her kitchen to make a weeks’ worth of healthy meals for each of us. We use a 30-quart stainless steel bowl to mix just our greens. It is a production. But this preparation helps us stick to the food diaries we want to keep.
Whiting (Leary, her friend) has gluten intolerance, and I eat primarily only plant-based food. So, every week I usally include a sweet potato chili recipe that I originally picked up from minimalistbaker.com — a website that specializes in recipes that “require 10 ingredients or less, one bowl, or 30 minutes or less to prepare” with a focus on recipes that are almost exclusively gluten-free and vegan.
DC: What coaching, services and organizations have you tapped to train?
AS: I have worked with a strength coach, a swim coach, and an overall triathlon coach from Apex Coaching in Boulder. I get blood draws every couple of months Sultanbet to get a slew of blood-based biomarkers of interest to high-level athletes. A company called Blueprint for Athletes, now a sponsor of mine, analyzes that sample. Many of the indicators that show up will highlight overtraining, recovery issues or nutritional deficiencies … This year, I also am very excited to be training with Vixxen Racing (vixxenracing.com), an elite, Boulder-based amateur triathlon development team of 18 other women.
DC: How do you measure progress?
AS: For me, taking on triathlons is not so much of a physical learning curve, but a mental one — a challenge to develop tolerance for physical discomfort and a lot of really trying psychological circumstances … Beating the crap out of your body there are going to be weeks that you feel absolutely terrible. For most, the usual response is to retreat, to move in another direction. But I have learned to be better about sitting with discomfort. Now, I am so much more intentional about acknowledging the reality of discomfort and also, in some sense, welcoming it. Training with this mentality has helped me put more value on patience, investment, long-ranging planning, accountability, and ownership of failure — assets that can move me forward inside and outside of the sport. That is one major way that I have measured progress.
DC: What has tested that mentality the most?
AS: I raced my first full Ironman Triathlon last August in Boulder, and until the second half of the race when I broke the second metatarsal on my left foot, I was hoping to get into the Kona slot. That race ranking would have qualified me for the Ironman World Championships in Hawaii.
I had been training for this triathlon by running at Marshall Mesa in Boulder, and I got a stress fracture in my foot when I stepped on a rock. That stress fracture snapped about 15 miles into the marathon, the last phase of a triathlon. I kept running on my broken foot — something I should never have done. But I think I was experiencing a little bit of the delirium that can happen toward the end of this kind of competitive endurance event. My goal was to finish in under 11 hours. Instead, my time was 11 hours, 43 minutes, and 39 seconds, and I did not qualify.
DC: Did pity partying tempt you?
AS: Of course! After training for 25 hours or more a week, I needed crutches and had a knee scooter that I called “The Rascal.” At the gym, I moved from machine to machine this way to keep up with some training. The frustrations of this kind of recovery after building up the strength and endurance to compete in a full triathlon put me into horribly foul moods. When that happened, I would set the timer on my cell phone for 25 minutes, just 25 minutes a day to allow myself a pity party. And then, I knew it was time to get on to something productive.
DC: Given the engrossing nature of triathlon training, does your life reflect any sort of balance?
AS: I consider myself 50 percent driven perfectionist and 50 percent artist space cadet. The perfectionist part of me — if I’ve got a 60 minute workout in my training plan — will ride my bike for exactly 60 minutes. In Training Peaks, a Boulder County company, when you upload your training data the system assigns a color based on the percentage of completion of that workout. If you complete it according to plan, the boxes on your calendar all turn green. So the perfectionist part of me strives for solid green weeks.
But the artist part of me never knows what is going to happen until I’ve finished the process. I have an idea, but not a strict plan. So, I use painting as a way to think through issues, a way to solve problems. For me, internal struggles can be expressed as color or texture. Painting gives me the opportunity to say, “I feel this way. It’s important.”
DC: So what if you don’t get there?
AS: It is somewhat contradictory to say that I want to go pro in triathlon and then to say that I am not 100 percent focused on that. But I am getting so much value out of the sport in terms of my overall life.
I was in the pool yesterday, and I spoke to a woman who had just returned from the funeral of a family member — a cyclist who had been killed in a hit and run in Texas. When she shared her grief about that, I took off my goggles, and hugged her, and just let her go. I, too, have had my share of traumatic losses, including my dad dying from cancer when I was 11.
I know that every single time I get on my bike I could get hit by a car. But I chose to continue showing up because my joy in the sport is greater than my fear of it. And even if I don’t make it as a pro, none of my investment in this will be wasted.
Sweet Potato Chili
1 red onion, diced
1 teaspoon olive oil (or preferred oil)
3 medium sweet potatoes, washed and chopped into small pieces
1 15-ounce can diced fire roasted tomatoes
1 15-ounce can black beans, drained and rinsed if sensitive to beans or with liquid if not
1 quart vegetable broth or equivalent with bouillon
1 16-ounce bag frozen collard greens, chopped
1 tablespoon chili powder
2 teaspoons ground cumin
Smoked chipotle and hot sauce to taste
1 bunch cilantro, chopped
2-3 avocados, peeled and cubed
Note: Substitutions include a cup of lentils softened with added vegetable broth in lieu of black beans and 1-2 tablespoons of Sun Brand Madras curry powder instead of chili powder. For more variety and heat, throw in some Hatch chiles.
Directions: In a large pot over medium heat sauté onion in 1 teaspoon oil until translucent and soft.
Add remaining ingredients, and bring to a low boil on medium high heat.
Lower heat to medium low heat, and simmer for about 30 minutes or until the sweet potatoes are fork tender and the soup has thickened.
Add water if needed to achieve desired consistency.
Serve with fresh cilantro and avocado.
Yield: about 6 servings
Source: Ariana Schiff’s adaptation of a recipe written by Dana Shultz on minimalistbaker.com.
Pam Mellskog can be reached at p.mellskog@gmail.com or at 303-746-0942.
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