http://www.statesman.com/...ity/06/6FITCITY.html For Lynn Sparks, listening to her inner athlete overcame her fears of the Danskin Women's Triathlon 
Kelly West/AMERICAN-STATESMAN (enlarge photo)
To prepare for the race, Sparks participated in Team Danskin Training, an 8-week training program.
Monday, June 06, 2005
Lynn Sparks couldn't do it. No way she could swim half a mile, bike 12 miles and run another 3.1 miles.
But something made her sign up for the Danskin Women's Triathlon anyway. Her trainer suggested it. Her husband encouraged her. And deep down inside, her inner athlete piped in with a few positive words.
"I am strong and able to swim, ride and walk longer and farther than I need to accomplish the Danskin," it said.
She wrote that down, along with 11 other things that voice told her. She posted them at home and on her computer at KVUE, where she works as a creative services producer. She read them aloud, over and over.
They weren't true back then, three years ago. But maybe, she told herself then, maybe someday they would be.
"I was overweight, out of shape, I had a lot of 'I can't do it' issues," Sparks says. "And the numbers were inconceivable to me at the time. I was, 'Oh my God, I'm not going to be able to do this race.'"
Still, she signed up for a group training program called Team Danskin Training and set her sights on the beginner-friendly, super-supportive triathlon. She didn't care how long the race would take. All she wanted to do was cross the finish line. "Just sustaining, getting through the entire three subjects — it was very daunting to me," she says.
This Sunday, at age 49, Sparks will compete in her third Danskin triathlon.
"I trust in myself and I will triumph on race day."
Climbing the hill
In October 2002, Sparks began training for the 2003 Danskin.
Unlike many new triathletes, who fear the churning chaos of swimming in open water with hundreds of other racers, Sparks felt most confident in the lake. It was the bike ride she worried about — and the hills she'd have to face. Once that was over, she knew she could always walk the 5K.
"The hardest part was keeping the doubts out, accepting they were there but going on anyway," Sparks says. "I was afraid of being hurt, of not being able to accomplish it. It was doing something I had never imagined doing before."
Sparks credits Team Danskin Training with giving her the confidence and experience to make it through that first triathlon. And the second. And, this weekend, the third. The program provides two coached workouts per week for eight weeks.
The Danskin caters to women like Sparks, who might question, at first, their ability. But the sprint-distance triathlon, organizers say, is a race that almost anyone can do — as long as they have the right physical and mental preparation. That's where group training programs come in.
"Women, especially of our generation, have not been brought up to be athletic," says Team Danskin Training head coach Tracy Nelson. "Many women have never done anything athletic or played a sport, and this may be their first foray into that. So when you do cross the finish line having faced that, it's a big deal."
For Sparks, the training program offered a family of support that kept her trying.
"(Lynn) shoves her doubts way way down until she can't hear them anymore, and just keeps plugging," Nelson says.
Besides the group training, Sparks worked with her longtime personal trainer, Maurine Sullivan at Body Business Health and Fitness Club. "The first time Mo had me on a stationary bike, she had me do five miles. I literally cried because I thought that was an impossible thing to do," Sparks says.
Sparks remembers the first time she tried to ride the Danskin bike course, which meanders around Walter E. Long Lake. She quit, and her husband, Ed, had to pick her up in the car. Closer to the race, she tried again, with Ed alongside her.
"That bike ride has always been a monster in my head," she says. "But we made it through the course. That was the moment I knew I'd be able to do (the triathlon)."
That first year, Sparks practiced her transitions between legs of the race. She stood in the shower until she was dripping wet, then ran into the living room to practice pulling on her socks and gloves for the switch from swimming to biking. She figured out how to arrange her gear for the quickest change.
For Sparks, the weeks of preparation — not the triathlon itself — became the real race. Danskin day was just a celebration of how far she'd come.
"This is the race — all the doubts, all the fears, all the triumphs — it's now," she says. "It's so about life lessons."
So why do it again? "It's just such a life-altering quest," Sparks says. "And it's very different the third time because the fear is not there. That sense of wanting to achieve is."
Her goal this year is simply to do each leg of the race well. "I'm not so focused on time, although I'd like to get a little faster, to know I'm stronger."
Training
It's a warm spring morning, and Team Danskin has gathered on the track at Murchison Middle School. Nelson, the head coach, is demonstrating proper running style, moving back and forth in front of 50 or so women who are studying her form.
"Relax your hands," she tells them. "Like you're holding eggs or grapes."
She offers more tips: Take smaller, faster steps. Pretend you're running on hot coals. Swing those elbows.
One of the women, mesmerized, says, "I've never been taught to run."
Nelson asks them to run a mile — four laps at whatever pace they feel most comfortable. Sparks mostly walks, but on the straightaways, she runs. For her, it's a milestone.
A few days later, the group meets at Williamson County Regional Park for bike practice. They talk about the importance of wearing helmets and how to ride in traffic. Nelson arranges sponges in a row in the parking lot, and the women maneuver their cycles around them.
A week later, the team stands on the deck at a neighborhood pool east of Cedar Park. After 30 minutes of drills, they practice sighting — holding their heads out of the water every 10 strokes and looking at something in the distance so they can swim straight toward it.
Sparks says her confidence is growing, but doubts still creep in. Even with two Danskins behind her, she's afraid that she'll "run out of go." She has to remind herself that she doesn't have to keep up with everyone in her training group.
"On race day I get to set my own pace . . . even if there does seem to be an undercurrent of 'beat your last time.' I just want to finish and be proud of myself for it," she says.
The first race
The day before her first triathlon, Sparks went to the park to see the transition area where the racers would set up their bikes. "It was so big," she says. "It really sunk in that this thing was really happening."
That night, she was surprisingly calm. She slept until 4 a.m., then woke up and panicked. When she looked in the mirror, a ghostly white reflection stared back. "I broke into a sweat, thinking, 'Oh my God, this thing is today.' " She read her affirmations, then calmed down.
The skies were dark when she got to the site. She placed her helmet and shoes on a towel next to her bike, and set out hand-written instructions to remind her what to do during each transition. Then she gathered with the other women in her age group and waited for the starting gun.
"I am ready for the race."
When it was time, she waded into the lake. The water was warm and relaxing. She swam confidently, walked up the path to the transition area and faced what she had been dreading for weeks: the hilly, 12-mile bike ride. She started pedaling.
"At one point I stopped on a corner and took a couple of minutes," she says. "I had a Gu (energy gel) and got my head together."
More than an hour later, she rolled into the transition area knowing the toughest part was behind her. This was something she wanted to remember. She tucked a disposable camera into a pocket so she could carry it on the run. She asked volunteers along the way to snap pictures of her. She began to walk, and she made steady progress.
"I am joyfully crossing the finish line."
As she crossed beneath the banner, an announcer called her name. She finished in 3 hours and 7 minutes, 2,600th out of 2,724. Race volunteers hung a finisher's medal around her neck. The words engraved on it said, "The woman who starts the race is not the same woman who finishes the race." Her husband was almost moved to tears. Back at the car, he gave her a bouquet of roses.
"The Danskin is such an empowering event for anybody, but especially for someone like Lynn, who was absolutely convinced she could never finish the bike ride, much less the swim, bike and run," Ed Sparks says. "It was amazing — hands raised, just absolutely triumphant . . . Now she sees herself as a triathlete, which is a very special thing."
The next day, Sparks wore her Danskin medal to work.
"It was awesome, overwhelmingly awesome. It was such an example of something I truly believed I couldn't do, but I kept taking the steps toward it," she says. "I look at myself now and think, 'How did this happen?' "
Her inner athlete knows.
A triathlete is born
With this year's race just a few days away, Sparks flips through the photo albums she made to commemorate her first two triathlons.
"I traveled 16 miles under my own power for this," reads a caption under a picture of her holding her finisher's medal. It still makes her emotional.
The confidence she's gained from doing the triathlon is huge. "It's affected my work, my relationships. I feel better in my late 40s than I ever did in my 30s," she says.
She did the Danskin again in 2004, improving her time by 10 minutes. Last year, she did a triathlon in Louisiana, and one in Burnet as part of a relay.
She still has the list of affirmations she wrote three years ago, to motivate herself through training.
"Now I read them and every one of them is true," she says. "They're not things I can't do anymore."
"I am a triathlete."
Kelly West/AMERICAN-STATESMAN (enlarge photo) To prepare for the race, Sparks participated in Team Danskin Training, an 8-week training program.
Monday, June 06, 2005
Lynn Sparks couldn't do it. No way she could swim half a mile, bike 12 miles and run another 3.1 miles.
But something made her sign up for the Danskin Women's Triathlon anyway. Her trainer suggested it. Her husband encouraged her. And deep down inside, her inner athlete piped in with a few positive words.
"I am strong and able to swim, ride and walk longer and farther than I need to accomplish the Danskin," it said.
She wrote that down, along with 11 other things that voice told her. She posted them at home and on her computer at KVUE, where she works as a creative services producer. She read them aloud, over and over.
They weren't true back then, three years ago. But maybe, she told herself then, maybe someday they would be.
"I was overweight, out of shape, I had a lot of 'I can't do it' issues," Sparks says. "And the numbers were inconceivable to me at the time. I was, 'Oh my God, I'm not going to be able to do this race.'"
Still, she signed up for a group training program called Team Danskin Training and set her sights on the beginner-friendly, super-supportive triathlon. She didn't care how long the race would take. All she wanted to do was cross the finish line. "Just sustaining, getting through the entire three subjects — it was very daunting to me," she says.
This Sunday, at age 49, Sparks will compete in her third Danskin triathlon.
"I trust in myself and I will triumph on race day."
Climbing the hill
In October 2002, Sparks began training for the 2003 Danskin.
Unlike many new triathletes, who fear the churning chaos of swimming in open water with hundreds of other racers, Sparks felt most confident in the lake. It was the bike ride she worried about — and the hills she'd have to face. Once that was over, she knew she could always walk the 5K.
"The hardest part was keeping the doubts out, accepting they were there but going on anyway," Sparks says. "I was afraid of being hurt, of not being able to accomplish it. It was doing something I had never imagined doing before."
Sparks credits Team Danskin Training with giving her the confidence and experience to make it through that first triathlon. And the second. And, this weekend, the third. The program provides two coached workouts per week for eight weeks.
The Danskin caters to women like Sparks, who might question, at first, their ability. But the sprint-distance triathlon, organizers say, is a race that almost anyone can do — as long as they have the right physical and mental preparation. That's where group training programs come in.
"Women, especially of our generation, have not been brought up to be athletic," says Team Danskin Training head coach Tracy Nelson. "Many women have never done anything athletic or played a sport, and this may be their first foray into that. So when you do cross the finish line having faced that, it's a big deal."
For Sparks, the training program offered a family of support that kept her trying.
"(Lynn) shoves her doubts way way down until she can't hear them anymore, and just keeps plugging," Nelson says.
Besides the group training, Sparks worked with her longtime personal trainer, Maurine Sullivan at Body Business Health and Fitness Club. "The first time Mo had me on a stationary bike, she had me do five miles. I literally cried because I thought that was an impossible thing to do," Sparks says.
Sparks remembers the first time she tried to ride the Danskin bike course, which meanders around Walter E. Long Lake. She quit, and her husband, Ed, had to pick her up in the car. Closer to the race, she tried again, with Ed alongside her.
"That bike ride has always been a monster in my head," she says. "But we made it through the course. That was the moment I knew I'd be able to do (the triathlon)."
That first year, Sparks practiced her transitions between legs of the race. She stood in the shower until she was dripping wet, then ran into the living room to practice pulling on her socks and gloves for the switch from swimming to biking. She figured out how to arrange her gear for the quickest change.
For Sparks, the weeks of preparation — not the triathlon itself — became the real race. Danskin day was just a celebration of how far she'd come.
"This is the race — all the doubts, all the fears, all the triumphs — it's now," she says. "It's so about life lessons."
So why do it again? "It's just such a life-altering quest," Sparks says. "And it's very different the third time because the fear is not there. That sense of wanting to achieve is."
Her goal this year is simply to do each leg of the race well. "I'm not so focused on time, although I'd like to get a little faster, to know I'm stronger."
Training
It's a warm spring morning, and Team Danskin has gathered on the track at Murchison Middle School. Nelson, the head coach, is demonstrating proper running style, moving back and forth in front of 50 or so women who are studying her form.
"Relax your hands," she tells them. "Like you're holding eggs or grapes."
She offers more tips: Take smaller, faster steps. Pretend you're running on hot coals. Swing those elbows.
One of the women, mesmerized, says, "I've never been taught to run."
Nelson asks them to run a mile — four laps at whatever pace they feel most comfortable. Sparks mostly walks, but on the straightaways, she runs. For her, it's a milestone.
A few days later, the group meets at Williamson County Regional Park for bike practice. They talk about the importance of wearing helmets and how to ride in traffic. Nelson arranges sponges in a row in the parking lot, and the women maneuver their cycles around them.
A week later, the team stands on the deck at a neighborhood pool east of Cedar Park. After 30 minutes of drills, they practice sighting — holding their heads out of the water every 10 strokes and looking at something in the distance so they can swim straight toward it.
Sparks says her confidence is growing, but doubts still creep in. Even with two Danskins behind her, she's afraid that she'll "run out of go." She has to remind herself that she doesn't have to keep up with everyone in her training group.
"On race day I get to set my own pace . . . even if there does seem to be an undercurrent of 'beat your last time.' I just want to finish and be proud of myself for it," she says.
The first race
The day before her first triathlon, Sparks went to the park to see the transition area where the racers would set up their bikes. "It was so big," she says. "It really sunk in that this thing was really happening."
That night, she was surprisingly calm. She slept until 4 a.m., then woke up and panicked. When she looked in the mirror, a ghostly white reflection stared back. "I broke into a sweat, thinking, 'Oh my God, this thing is today.' " She read her affirmations, then calmed down.
The skies were dark when she got to the site. She placed her helmet and shoes on a towel next to her bike, and set out hand-written instructions to remind her what to do during each transition. Then she gathered with the other women in her age group and waited for the starting gun.
"I am ready for the race."
When it was time, she waded into the lake. The water was warm and relaxing. She swam confidently, walked up the path to the transition area and faced what she had been dreading for weeks: the hilly, 12-mile bike ride. She started pedaling.
"At one point I stopped on a corner and took a couple of minutes," she says. "I had a Gu (energy gel) and got my head together."
More than an hour later, she rolled into the transition area knowing the toughest part was behind her. This was something she wanted to remember. She tucked a disposable camera into a pocket so she could carry it on the run. She asked volunteers along the way to snap pictures of her. She began to walk, and she made steady progress.
"I am joyfully crossing the finish line."
As she crossed beneath the banner, an announcer called her name. She finished in 3 hours and 7 minutes, 2,600th out of 2,724. Race volunteers hung a finisher's medal around her neck. The words engraved on it said, "The woman who starts the race is not the same woman who finishes the race." Her husband was almost moved to tears. Back at the car, he gave her a bouquet of roses.
"The Danskin is such an empowering event for anybody, but especially for someone like Lynn, who was absolutely convinced she could never finish the bike ride, much less the swim, bike and run," Ed Sparks says. "It was amazing — hands raised, just absolutely triumphant . . . Now she sees herself as a triathlete, which is a very special thing."
The next day, Sparks wore her Danskin medal to work.
"It was awesome, overwhelmingly awesome. It was such an example of something I truly believed I couldn't do, but I kept taking the steps toward it," she says. "I look at myself now and think, 'How did this happen?' "
Her inner athlete knows.
A triathlete is born
With this year's race just a few days away, Sparks flips through the photo albums she made to commemorate her first two triathlons.
"I traveled 16 miles under my own power for this," reads a caption under a picture of her holding her finisher's medal. It still makes her emotional.
The confidence she's gained from doing the triathlon is huge. "It's affected my work, my relationships. I feel better in my late 40s than I ever did in my 30s," she says.
She did the Danskin again in 2004, improving her time by 10 minutes. Last year, she did a triathlon in Louisiana, and one in Burnet as part of a relay.
She still has the list of affirmations she wrote three years ago, to motivate herself through training.
"Now I read them and every one of them is true," she says. "They're not things I can't do anymore."
"I am a triathlete."