One and done risk at Ironman qualifiers
A SKINNY kid named Marshall Mathers from Detroit once said: “You only get one shot”. When it comes to the trials for the Nutri-grain Ironman series, this notion is agonisingly true.
This weekend, every ironman and woman across the country has the opportunity to realise their childhood dream – to qualify for the Nutri-grain Ironman Series.
While there will be a total of three races held at Tugun to determine who will be racing in the series this summer, it can all come down to a single moment.
You miss a wave: You’re out. You mistime your run through the break: you’re out. You step off your board a fraction too late before the final sprint: Sorry, you’re out. Try again next year.
These little moments have enormous ramifications: Another long year of waiting; another long, gruelling offseason; another long year of watching other people live out your dreams.
This feeling is all too familiar for me. My first year attempting the Nutri-grain trial I was a pale skinned 19year-old from Tasmania who was ecstatic with a last place on the final day.
The next year, I knew I deserved a spot, I trained and improved rapidly and I was ready to capitalise on my one shot and join my heroes on the pro-circuit that summer.
It wasn’t to be. After starting strongly, I went the wrong side of a buoy and got disqualified. Learning from mistakes hurt.
The bigger the mistake the more it hurts learning, and watching my rivals live out my dreams was the most pain I’ve had to endure in my career.
Looking back, it’s pain like this that makes you appreciate every moment moving forward, mistakes like that helped me to train even harder, to really excel when I finally made it in the next year.
To those racing this weekend, good luck sleeping the night before.
Unfortunately, in our sport you can’t plan out every single move in advance. They call it the “beauty of surf sports” – that is the amount of variables outside of your control.
The question on everyone’s lips is who will make it? Who will capitalise on those little moments? Me, personally, I’m hoping for someone like the skinny kid from Detroit: An underdog. The kid they said was never good enough. The kid who will stand at the finish line with their hands on their head, blank-faced, unable to believe what they have just done.
THE ACQUA REPORT