NYAC Awards Banquet
October 30, 2009

It is an honour to be asked to come and speak at the NYAC banquet this year.

When I was twelve years old, and first started swimming with NYAC, I would have never imagined that I would one day be standing here in front of you, speaking about pursuing athletic goals. I was never the fastest swimmer, or the most talented athlete but In triathlons I found a challenge I could not walk away from. A challenge that tested me over and over, crushed me a few times, and also rewarded me. Along the way I have been constantly reminded that if you work hard enough, long enough and believe enough you can surprise everyone, including yourself.

When I started swimming at age twelve I could only swim a little bit of front crawl and head up breastroke the way my mom swam it without getting her hair wet. It was tough trying to catch up to those who had been swimming since age 6 or 7, who knew how to do flip turns, or were more talented. I was not a natural swimmer, while it took my brother about two weeks to learn how to swim butterfly, it took me half a year. When I moved up to a faster swim group I didn't make a single pace time for about a year. I just swam back and forth, never making a pace time.

I am still a swimmer, or kind of. I am a triathlete, which is swimming, biking and running. After graduating from university, I very seriously pursued the Olympic dream in triathlons. I spent years traveling, racing around the world collecting points in a World cup series to try and qualify for the Olympics. I trained, traveled, tried to fit in part time jobs somewhere to get enough money for the next race, and repeated that year after year. I was broke, tired, often injured, and living out of a suitcase. But when the Olympic year rolled around, I was one point short of making the team. One point, all those years, all that training, and racing and one point was missing. It was very difficult, not just for me, but for my family, and friends. They had watched and sacrificed along with me, and now had to stand by while I was disappointed, and unsure why I had failed at my goal. But deep down I think I knew. I never believed. I never truly, honestly believed I was good enough or deserved to do anything as amazing as go to the Olympics. I was crushed, but somehow knew that although I had committed to the training, and to traveling, and racing, I did not fully commit to succeeding. I didn't unconditionally believe that I could do it.

So what changed eventually? Well, I knew that I had not achieved all I could in triathlon; I knew that I could not be happy with myself leaving unfinished business. And that is part of what makes sport so amazing, and integral to our society. It is not about being a tenth of a second faster than someone else. It is about what it took to get to be faster. About the commitment, sacrifice, and pursuing your best that makes it special. Today so many things are easy, and instant. The world is speeding up. We don't wait for dial up internet. We don't wait longer than two minutes to heat our food in a microwave. We don't want to wait for success. We want instant results. But in sports there are no shortcuts. Each athlete has a different path, some are easier, have fewer obstacles, fewer injuries or may look more effortless from the outside, but each of us has challenges. We can each find only our own success, not someone else's.

I used to think it was very unfair when I would swim faster in workouts than someone else, and then they would kick my butt in a race. Isn't swimming supposed to be fair? It wasn't and sports are not fair. Someone will always have more talent, or better opportunities, or be taller, but that's OK. Sports are about bringing what you have to the table, challenging yourself and finding your strength, and then showing up on that starting line or starting block, ready to battle to the best of your abilities even when it gets hard, even when it is much harder than you think you can handle.

I now compete in ironman triathlons. They are about four times longer than an Olympic distance race. The swim is 3,800 meters in open water; it can be in oceans, lakes, rivers, clean and dirty, with or without jellyfish. It takes about 50 minutes to swim that distance in a race. The bike takes much longer, over 5 hours usually, it is 180 km, so like driving from here to London, Ontario, or going to Buffalo, New York, and back again. And finally the run is a marathon, which is 42.2 km, or like running 105 times around a running track. You do all this continuously, no breaks, no rest. When I won Ironman Canada this year it took me 9 hours and 11 minutes. If I think about it as racing for 9 hours it seems crazy, and too hard to do, but I just break it down into small little pieces. I am thinking about just the next 5 minutes at a time, and when that gets too difficult I just think about the next 4 steps, or getting to the next water station. It is pretty much like breaking up a long swim set into smaller parts. Swimming 100x100 meters may not seem possible, but swimming just 5 at a time is easy, and then you repeat it 20 times.

Last month I attained a goal I have had for a very long time, more than 5 years. That goal was to go the Ironman World Championships in Hawaii and place in the top 10. That is pretty similar to going to the Olympics and making a final in swimming. I have spent this year training harder then ever before. I risked a lot more, changed things that I knew were not working, and listened to my coach even when things were not going so easily. I trusted him, and learned that my limits were far, far beyond what I had thought. IM Hawaii is famous for being tough, it is incredibly windy, some years it is so windy people get blown off their bikes. It is also hot, over 35 degrees Celsius, with no shade and just lava fields with black rock everywhere. It is completely crazy if you really think about it. But so is swimming thousands of meters day after day, staring at a black line at the bottom of the pool, just to race for 1 or 2 minutes, and go a few tenths of a second faster. This year, after 5 years of racing ironmans, and over 10 years of doing triathlons I let my training, and my mind take me to the finish line faster, and better than ever before. I finished 4th in Hawaii, better than my goal of being top 10. So now I must make a new goal, and a new challenge.

But it is not about the seconds on the clock, it is about the self-challenge, willing to look at yourself and see what you wish to achieve, and than planning and pursuing how to go about it. Very few people these days challenge themselves, really and truly challenge themselves. But we have the opportunity to do that each and every day. Some days the challenges is simply to get out of bed when you are really tired, or stay positive when you are having a rough day. Other days it is to swim your best time, or win your heat at a meet.

I am lucky to have found something that challenges me physically and mentally each and every day. And I hope that each of you finds that also, whether it is swimming, or academics, or something creative.

See Tereza's coach's profile here...