228: The rise of the hybrid athlete: ironman lessons & limitations | Anca Platon Trifan

But none of that race went exactly according to plan.

And to be honest, no surprise there.

I am still to talk to someone that has raced not just the triathlon, but an ultra marathoner, a marathon runner, a cyclist or whatever the race might be even.

a bodybuilding competition, a Spartan race, where they will tell you that everything went according to plan.

That's very rare to hear something like that.

So before we get into what happened at Lucky Peak, why my quads eventually turned into cement for a very long time and why I spent the first five miles of that half marathon wondering whether I was going to crawl.

to the finish line, I want to go back to why I signed up for this thing in the first place.

I think one of the easiest stories to tell about doing an Ironman is that I wanted to prove I could do something really hard.

Now.

I think there's no need to prove that.

I've already proven it so many times before.

But to myself, sometimes I feel like I have to prove it again, maybe in a different decade.

And I always do something hard in every decade that I live.

For example, in my 20s, I decided to move to U.S. with nothing in my pocket and make a life for myself away from family, away from everyone that I knew.

Then in my 30s, I decided to get married and have kids.

That in itself is a hard thing, especially for someone that has never really saw herself or dreamt of being married or having kids.

That really wasn't part of my dream.

life planning, and that's one of the main reasons why I escaped Romania and the plans that others have made for me.

And then in my 40s, I am competing in bodybuilding for the first time, and I am training for triathlons, all those things that I feel like I put myself through not to prove to anyone else but myself.

that I can do hard things.

And let me tell you, bodybuilding is hard.

I've competed several times.

I have gone seasons where bulking sounds fun, but you still have to be very disciplined just because you can eat a lot.

It doesn't mean that you can let that go to waste.

So you have to put it towards something.