I have had this video finished for over a year now and finally published it. This is a short look into what goes on behind the scenes to make our 60 second trips down the hill possible. If you read this blog regularly, you already know everything I'm about to tell you, but it still amazes me every time I think how much work we put into this sport for roughly 18 minutes of competition time each year that no one even notices until Olympic year. That's 18 minutes if you get to compete in all the races. This year I was allowed to compete in 4 races, for a total of 8 minutes of competition. I roughly estimate I spent 460 hours in the gym and 350 hours at the track this year for 8 minutes of competition. Goodness...I've never done that calculation before. It's a little painful to think about.
Before we ever jump in the sled, hours are spent sitting in meetings, analyzing film, watching POV and doing mind runs. The more mentally prepared you are before you get to the track, the better off you will be when you're on ice.
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| Pre-practice track walks. Nothing like climbing a mile uphill on ice to warm you up. |
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| Riding in the back of a truck all over the mountain |
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| Putting our sleds to bed for the night. As you can see, sometimes we don't even have a garage to do sledwork. |
I knew absolutely nothing about bobsleds or being a mechanic before starting this sport. Now, I'm surrounded by men who have spent a lifetime tinkering under car hoods and working in garages. They have taught me a checklist of things I look over everyday. If anything more is required, I call in the experts. There's a great sense of pride when I learn how to fix something on my sled and can do it myself. To crawl down into the nose of my sled with wrench in hand, tighten a loose bolt and wriggle my way back to freedom makes me feel like I have conquered the world. Now, we both know I only tightened a bolt, but let me paint a mental picture for you. You're confined in a very small space laying flat on your stomach with a headlamp on and a metal bar digging into your hips. Your arms are pinned above your head, and you grunt as you stretch your arm to the limit to reach that elusive bolt only to cut your hand on something sharp while dropping your wrench. The cranny it has fallen into makes the wrench almost irretrievable, but somehow you manage to twist into a even more awkward position and snatch it back with just 2 fingers. Now you are sweating and bleeding; your hips hurt and the bolt is still loose. With your procured wrench and more grunts, you tighten the bolt and sag with relief that this seemingly simple, yet monumental task, is now complete, only to realize there are three more bolts that need tightened.
Wah. Wah. And that my friends, is why I feel such pride in accomplishing any amount of sled work.
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| That dark abyss you can't see into. That's where those bolts await you. |
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| This is a view from that pesky bolt that causes you such pain. Get ready to dive in and maneuver around those ropes. |
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| Why can nothing about bobsled ever be easy? |
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| Fiberglass lessons from the masters |
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| Aligning runners can be quite time consuming. |
Aside from all those hours spent at the track, we train continually. It's a year-round ordeal with only a few weeks break after finishing the season. I train about 2 hours a day, 5 days a week, 46 weeks a year. That's roughly 460 hours of training a year aside from actual practice time in a sled. This includes everything from lifting weights, going through sprint form drills, doing plyometrics, running on "The Beast" and enduring long ab session at the gym to sprinting at the track or working on starts at the push track.
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| Getting creative without sanding stands. |
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| Race runners shined up and ready to fly. |
Aside from all this time at the track, garage, weight room or push track, we spend hours recovering from all this strenuous activity. Our bodies have to work in overdrive to keep up with all that we're pushing them to do and recover before we demand more. This involves lots of ice, cold tubs, compression pants, foam rollers and sleep. Until I make it to the big times, all treatments are self administered.
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| I've spent many a day alone in this cold tub. |
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| But it's so much better to suffer with friends. |
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| Sometimes you can't find a cold tub, so you just pack on the bags of snow. |
We are pretty exhausted after a full day of everything bobsled requires. It can be hard to stay awake when you're that tired.
As you can see, bobsled requires SO MUCH time and energy for our very short moment in the spotlight. It also requires dedication, precision, courage, speed, effort, motivation, focus, strength, ambition, confidence, sacrifice, power, commitment, pride, concentration, risk, perseverance and teamwork. You wouldn't invest all this time and energy if not for all those factors driving you to accomplish your goals. I am continually being stretched to grow in all these areas, and I know I'll come out of my this season of my life a different person. You can't be tested in so many areas and remain the same.
This last week was rough. Work was super busy, and I was sore from Monday to Saturday. Each workout pushed me to my limits. I was dragging my butt home every night and crawling into bed. I was thinking of all the money I need to raise for next season and the fundraisers I need to put together. I was getting bogged down in the pain and details and process of reaching my goals. I was getting overwhelmed thinking about all the things I just wrote about in this post. All the time and energy I already have and will invest, and I had to stop and ask myself WHY? Why do it all? What is the purpose? What are your goals? Does all this work still line up with what you want to accomplish? As I was thinking about my WHY, I found this poem.
It so perfectly summed up my week and reminded me of my WHY. I love sports. They're a big part of my life. I'm not defined by them, but they are part of who I am. I have been given the gift of athleticism, and I don't plan on wasting such a precious gift. Bobsled is the current sport in my life. I'm willing to invest my time, money and talent into becoming the best bobsledder I can possibly be.
I'll leave you with one of my favorite movie scenes that I repeat to myself often when I need to remember how much I love sports. I'm not the huge baseball fan, but I really like this movie. The Rookie tells the story of Jimmy Morris, a Texas baseball coach who makes the major league after agreeing to try out if his high school team made the playoffs. He has dreamed of being a major league pitcher since he was a boy. At this point in the movie, he is pitching cleanup for a minor league team and missing his family so much it hurts. He is by far the oldest player on his team and struggling to remember why he is putting himself and his family through so much. He's talked himself out of ever accomplishing his dream because it seems too impossible. He sees a news piece done on his story that reminds him how much he loves to play baseball. He remembers his WHY.
Whatever you're going through to reach your goals, don't forget to focus on your WHY. First, you must take time to figure out what your WHY is. Once you know, remind yourself why you are pursuing this dream whenever it seems too difficult or overwhelming to continue. It's important to regularly re-evaluate the steps you're taking and change if your process and habits aren't taking you closer to achieving those goals. It's not easy, but it's always necessary. You can do it! I believe in you!
