CONFESSIONS OF AN AGE-GROUPER

BY HOLLY BENNETT

IMAGINE THAT
56 SEPTEMBER 2012

VISUALIZE WHAT YOU WANT TO MAKE IT REAL

A few years ago, I sent an e-mail to The Voice. Not the recently launched reality show; I emailed Mike Reilly, aka The Voice of Ironman. My message went something like this: Im training for an Ironman, and I want to thank you for being there during each of my long training runs. I always finish along a particular path ending near my house. Each time I hit that final stretch, your voice fills my ears, calling me home. You might assume I was training for my first Ironman, with the innocent and eager glow of your average virgin. In fact, it was my fourth. In my e-mail to Mike, I fessed up to being an emotional dork, endlessly motivated by his famous finishers phrase. On my runs I would blast the music on my iPod as though it were blaring from the Ironman grandstands, while laying down a few additional tracks of my own: the screaming crowds, the whop-whopwhop of cheer sticks banging against the baracades

HUNTER KING

and, best of all, The Voice, calling out my accomplishment in the waning daylight. I would time his mythical manifesto to coincide precisely with the end of the path, the place I strung an imaginary nishers tape. Holly Bennett, bellowed my minds version of Mike Reilly, YOU ARE AN IRONMAN! Looking back to my rst Ironman (long before I had Mikes e-mail address), even then I relied on pre-race visualization. Perhaps it was more accurately superstition, but I awoke in the pre-dawn of race day, xed a mug of coee and crawled back in bed, allowing myself 20 minutes to rehearse every detail of what lay ahead. I feared that if I forgot a single check box on my mental to-do list, Id also ub that step in the actual race. Of course, some things are still a matter of real-life trial and error and adjusting to the conditions at hand. (For example, I failed to imagine that the temperature inside the Porta-Potty I ducked into on the run course would reach a broiling 10,000 degrees, a virtual oven of excrement baking in the hot summer sun.) In many ways, we do control our experiences, crafting our real lives to t our dreams. This is not a secret limited to endurance athletes. Great visionaries through the ages have articulated this truth in a variety of ways: Everything you can imagine is real. -Pablo Picasso; Nothing happens unless rst a dream. -Carl Sandburg And of course this bottom-line basic: Perception is everything. -Anonymous Its not only in racing that visualization proves paramount. Ive used similar techniques in all aspects of life. Shopping is one example. Since I was a teen Ive had an uncanny ability to predetermine my fashion nds. The other day I went in search of an orange-hued halter sundress. I simply imagined it, and it appearedon the sale rack, no less. Hows that for conjuring my own reality? In my early 20s I spent four months mountain-bike touring o-the-beatenpath parts of Central America, my thenboyfriend my sole companion in my rst true test of endurance. I often relied on visualization to soften the hard edges of roughing it in a foreign land. During one particularly desolate stretch of inland Belize, we went days without nding fresh produce save for a few potatoes, an occasional onion and a single lucky carrot on the local market shelves. It was bizarre, biking through the lush tropics yet being so remote that fruit was an unobtainable luxury. There was one thing we could count on in ample inventory though: Fan58 SEPTEMBER 2012

ta Orange soda. We downed bottles of the stu, its near-neon hue highlighting the connection to the orange juice I imagined, savoring every sip. Throughout that trip we encountered more than our share of adventurous obstacles. I adopted the philosophy of imagining seductive solutions to every situation, and it paid o. Take our campsite in Costa Ricas tropical dry forest, where the only potable water source was an uphill ride, 10K away. I suggested to my boyfriend that fellow campers might arrive carrying excess uids, saving us the haul. Enter a crazy jeep-driving German carting endless gallons of water, as well as equal amounts of rum, Coke and questionably tasteful stories to share. On one particularly grueling day, small signs along many miles of dusty, rutted backroads lured us with the words Iguana Azul, accompanied only by an arrow. With no idea of the signs purpose, I proclaimed them to be an omen of something wonderful ahead. Just before reaching our evenings destinationa beach on which we intended to camp my tire suered a at. Too drained to make the repair, we wheeled our pannierladen bikes the nal yards to the beach, where a quartet of expats drank beers at a bar and eyed us with curiosity. Moments later they invited us to join their table, and while we sucked down the rst of several bottles of Imperial, they summoned a truck with a bright blue iguana emblazoned on the side. Following happy hour, they toted us and our gear to the luxury resort they happened to own, hosting us free of charge while we lazed in the pool, stued ourselves on gourmet fare and slept like royalty. The message is this: Put out to the world what you want. If it's that bike youve been eyeingbut are unable to aordimagine it appearing at a bargain price on eBay. Or, envision yourself cycling smoother and stronger than ever before. If it happens long enough in your brain, your body cant help but follow. Imagine silencing your screaming quads as they beg to stop; then imagine slicing 30 seconds per mile o your run pace. Sure, at times my imagination is lightyears ahead of my reality (i.e. I think Im faster than I am). Aim big or put away your weapon, I say. Which is why heretofore I will visualize myself swimming as sleekly as Andy Potts, cycling as fast as Julie Dibens and running as awlessly as Mirinda Carfrae. In my own mind, my true talent is waiting to be unleashed. The Voice is calling.