How training for an Ironman changed me
as a software engineer
The Start
I have been going through the phases of being athletic and not being athletic throughout my life. I was getting sick at least once a month and was gaining considerable weight. My weight slowly reached 234 as a 6'1 person. The more pounds that I put on, the more sick and lethargic I became. At the time, I was applying to colleges to get my Masters degree, which I ended up going to CMU. I vowed that whenever I moved for my Master's, I would start to get back in shape.
Eventually, I moved to Pittsburgh to attend Carnegie Mellon University and study software engineering. I was scrolling through X/Twitter when I came across this post. The post was about someone (that I didn't know) who ran a marathon to raise money for the Toronto food bank.
Inspired, I took this as a sign to spontaneously train to run a marathon in a Star Wars costume to raise money for the Pittsburgh Food Bank. Plus, it meets my need to get into shape. So, I started training. If you are reading this, feel free to donate to the food bank, ever. Everyone provides a meal to a person in need! You can donate here, if you wish.
Training
I started running. I was over my own head. I could not even run a single mile without stopping. I quickly grew a respect for runners as I realized how long a marathon actually was. As an inexperienced endurance athlete, I decided to start ramping up my miles each week. In week 1 of training, I did around 5 miles, and then in Week 2, I did 7 miles, and so on. At the end of the week, I would do a 'long run', which, as the name implies, is your longest run of the week. Each week, I added a mile or 2 to the long run's distance.
Eventually, one Saturday, I was headed out to run 20 miles. This was only after two and a half months of training. Looking back, I certainly was not ready. I ended up completing the distance, but then, the following day, I woke up with plantar fasciitis. If you don't know what that is, I just injured my foot. This injury is prevalent, and it just means I overtrained myself.
Since I couldn't really run until my foot was healed, I had some downtime to reflect on training. Certainly, I realized that training to run a marathon (26.2 miles) is hard. There is a reason that only 0.01% of people actually complete a marathon.
Ironman transition
The difficulty of running made me think of how hard it was for my brother to complete an Ironman race. An Ironman is a full-distance triathlon, which means in one race, you complete a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile bike, and then a marathon (26.2). Yeah, it's crazy. Naturally, after this realization, I signed up for Ironman Thun, which is scheduled for August 25th. Luckily for me, I already had the swimming covered since I was a great high school swimmer. I am good at swimming, but swimming is known to be the least significant part of a race.
Getting injured and then immediately signing up for an Ironman might seem counterintuitive, but I promise that it is not. I got injured so fast because running has a high impact on the legs. I was still pretty heavy and out of shape. Pair that with too many running miles, and you will get injured. Biking, however, has a much lower impact on your body and is safer(if you are inside). The same is true for swimming. Because I needed less pressure on my foot, these were great alternatives for training since I still had a marathon to run. So, I started training all three of the disciplines.
School, Research, Ironman
I am currently speed-running my program at CMU and completed it in two semesters while simultaneously conducting research in the robotics department, and now I need to train for an Ironman? Yes.
The management of all three of these has been a great teacher for me, and I still have much to improve on. These three things became my entire life for the past couple of months.
Eat, Sleep, Study, Train, Repeat.
Having a race scheduled is a different type of motivation. Without the race, you can easily push off training. That 13-mile workout tomorrow can wait, right? Not if you need to run a marathon after a 100-plus-mile bike in a couple of months. That race will be here before you know it. Not completing the Ironman is simply not an option in my mind. I have told many friends and family, and the pressure is on.
This same philosophy applies to school and my career. As the hours of assignment and training stacked up. I could sacrifice none of them, so the only option was to become efficient in my process.
The only way out is through 🧘
The progression of improvement in endurance training is very apparent (which is why it is addicting). When I started, I couldn't run a mile, and then, before I knew it, I was running 2 miles a run. That is already a 100% improvement in distance, which is crazy to think about. Then I went from 2 miles to 3 miles. Now, this is a 50% improvement, but before, I couldn't even run a mile, and now I just added that distance to the end of my workout!
It is not easy doing these workouts. I have made it seem like I have been robotic with my execution, but this is not the case. Sometimes, I would sit in my bed for an hour just to prolong the inevitable, which was the workout. Sometimes, the urge to skip a workout would win. As I started getting deeper into my training, skipping became harder. Skipping a workout would haunt me all day. I would feel disappointed in myself.
Suppose I slept in an extra hour and hit the snooze button. I would think later, "That hour of sleep could have been my workout." Or something like, "I could be done right now and tackling assignments". The thing was that I still had to do the workout. It is much better to not even think about the discomfort the workout will bring and just get right to it.
This experience has led me to associate this same mechanism of procrastination with every aspect of my life. The mechanism of this avoidance of disconformant applies everywhere. That assignment that I don't want to do still needs to be done. I am better off doing it now than an hour before the deadline. Nothing I am saying is profound; yes, you shouldn't procrastinate; we all know that. However, I noticed that training for an extremely difficult physical endeavor rewires your brain. There have been studies to back up the neuroplasticity around training, but even conceptually, it makes sense.
For example, which is harder? Biking for 3 hours at a moderate pace or doing a report that will take 1 hour to complete(undistracted). Most people would agree that biking for 3 hours is much more difficult, at least for me it is. I mean, biking at a moderate pace is painful. Your muscles are constantly aching, and your heart is constantly telling you to breathe in more oxygen for 3 hours! I am using 3 hours as a standpoint since this is a regular 50-60-mile bike workout.
As I continued training, I unconsciously became better at execution. Dealing with discomfort simply became a skill that can also be trained. I started doing assignments the second they were released. I started working out early in the morning. The number of miles I did each week began to climb as well. Now, I am doing half-ironman bikes for regular workouts.
I highly recommend signing up for a race.
Please, please, please sign up for a race. It will change your life. It will test you. It will be hard. The fruits of your effort will not just be some random silly race that you completed. Everything is tempting you. Your phone, the snacks in the cabinet, the gaming console, etc. You need to develop the mental tools to thrive in the attention economy that we now live in; training has certainly helped me.
There has been some discourse in the software developer community that you shouldn't work out since it is a "waste of time." Not only is exercising not a waste of time as a desk job professional, but it is borderline mandatory. It is well known now that sitting for prolonged periods of time is worse than smoking! Working out will keep you sharper, healthier, and more efficient.
If this inspired you to sign up for a race, please reach out to me!