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Justin Daerr

My Mind Is My Strength

By InnerVoice

March 29^th, 2019

It's a privIlege

On May 26th, 1967, my father was serving in Vietnam as a Lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps when he was severely wounded. He was 22-years-old. He had to spend the remainder of that year in various hospitals undergoing multiple surgeries. He lost all flexion in one of his ankles, lost sight in one eye, lost part of his hearing, was covered in shrapnel and later in life suffered additional severe health issues. My father’s injuries and subsequent disability impacted me in a number of ways, from when I was just old enough to understand what they were to this very day. Every one of us can fall into the hole of taking our good health for granted, myself included, but I make a conscious effort to always remind myself of the good fortune I have. Having the opportunity to race and train at any level is a privilege, and I do my best to continuously remind myself of that fact.

It also affected me outside the parameters of sport. For example, I have always had an interest in history (my major in college), but my focus tends to shift towards the human experiences, narratives, and perspectives of historical events, as opposed to only the logistical specifics. I suppose a lot of this stems from wanting to know more about my own father’s experiences and trying to have a better understanding of what he went through. If you extrapolate that out even further, it’s an example of trying to see the world from someone else’s perspective, which is something I have always to strived to do.

Proud

My greatest accomplishment in triathlon, so far, was winning Ironman Boulder in 2014. Sometimes when racing, our results don’t always feel indicative with how we are actually racing and performing, but on this day I felt that my result matched my performance. I’ve had some great races where I know I was performing at a high level for me personally, but the final result wasn’t as great as I may have hoped for because other athletes had even better performances. On the flipside, I have had some surprisingly good results on days when I didn’t feel I performed at my best.

Even though I have finished in the top 5 at eighteen Ironmans, I have only been able to break the tape first once. Two of the race results that stand out to me aside from Boulder are Ironman Whistler and Ironman Mont Tremblant. In 2015, I raced Ironman Whistler and finished 3rd, then three weeks later I raced Ironman Mont Tremblant and finished 2nd. In the spring of that year, I was preparing for Ironman Texas, but developed pneumonia two weeks out from the race and had to pull out. I was pretty devastated at the time, and the corresponding illness took a lot out of me, both physically and mentally. Having the ability to bounce back and race well later in the summer was something I could not have imagined at the time.

Additionally, the weather conditions in those two Canadian races were on total ends of the spectrum. Whistler was rainy and cold (actually, the coldest race I’ve ever done) and Mont Tremblant was hot and humid. The ability to race well in either conditions, within three weeks, is something I took a lot of pride in.

A gateway to the world

I grew up in Houston, Texas. I don’t recall ever really wanting to grow up and be something in particular, but one thing that does stand out is that I always wanted to live on a boat. I thought if you could live on a boat, you had it made, but the boat had to be on the ocean. I always saw the ocean as the gateway to the rest of the world. I would stand on the docks of Port Aransas, Texas and think that from this very spot you could set out to anywhere in the world. For some reason, that seemed highly appealing to me. I still have a dream to live on a boat one day, even if only for a temporary period of time.

We lived near Rice University, which has a nice 2.9-mile dirt running loop around its perimeter, but I never really ran much farther than that. Even then, I wasn’t consistent with it - I might have run there several times per week for a month, and then not at all for another month. At the end of my senior year in high school, I decided to ride the MS150 from Houston to Austin with my dad in 1999. I managed to get through the two days (100 miles the first day, 75-80 the second), but I was so bonked on day two that I was sitting under a tree five miles out from the finish pounding cookies by the handful.

When I decided to sign up for Ironman California in 2001, I was sitting in a computer lab at Texas A&M, likely procrastinating. By that time I had run a standalone marathon and ridden the MS150, but I doubt I had ever swam more than 2000 yards in one session. I didn’t really know how to train for the event, but I managed to do enough over the next 5-6 months and I finished IM California in 12:55 (my goal was to break 13 hours). That race really transformed me. I can remember Tim and Tony Deboom finishing the marathon just as I was starting it and it was the first real insight into how quickly someone could actually go in one of these races. I didn’t race another Ironman until November of 2003, about 30 months since my first. In my second race at Ironman Florida, I finished in 9:20, knocking off 3.5 hours from my previous Ironman, won my age group and qualified for Worlds in Kona.

“My tribe consists of highly driven people, whether training partners or otherwise, but all of them know how to laugh. There is a time and a place to be extremely focused, but there is also a time, and I think if you’re all business all the time you’re on a crash course for burnout.”

I'm forever grateful

In the summer of 2009, I traveled out to race Vineman 70.3 in California. The night before the race I got food poisoning and ended up not starting. That was certainly frustrating, but it got worse. On the way back to my friend’s house in the South Bay Area, we stopped in the city. My race gear was in the back of a Suburban with tinted windows, but when we got back to the car, the rear window had been smashed, and my bike, race gear, and backpack were all stolen. It was the only bike I had at the time, and I was about 6-7 weeks out from Ironman Canada which had been my entire season’s focus.

When I got home, I filed a claim with our renters’ insurance, but they eventually refused to cover the loss because of a loophole in the policy. I managed to do some training on a borrowed TT bike (thanks Joe) and eventually had a bike ready by race day. I went to Ironman Canada, and around mile 100, near Yellow Lake, I just pulled off the course and out of the race. I had no mental fight left in me. That evening I was sitting with my family at dinner, and I apologized to all of them for letting them down. When I did that, I broke into tears.

Everyone had always been so supportive of me, and I felt like I had not done right by them. When I started to break down, they all stood up from their chairs and gathered around me in a group hug sort of way. A couple hours later I was sitting with my wife, Brooke, and I told her that this was going to have to be a deciding moment for me: either quit now or pull it together and get back out there. Two weeks later I went to Ironman Wisconsin and finished the race in 6th place. I don’t know what my future in the sport would have been if my family hadn’t stood up from their chairs that night and surrounded me with their love and support. But they did, and I’m forever grateful for that.

FOcus on the process

When things get tough I try, but don’t always succeed, to stay process-oriented. Focusing on how I’m feeling doesn’t help much, but I can focus on what I’m actually doing. If I’m racing, I start by telling myself the exact location of where I am on the course: “Justin, you are on mile 7 of the run.” I do this to help me remain present and to remember what I need to be doing in that moment. When you feel lousy, it’s easy to assume that it will never get better and that your day may very well be done. I’m fortunate to have enough experience to know that bad (and good) feelings come and go, so it’s important to remain present and work yourself through those dark moments.

Ultimately, it’s about patience. The world has a lot of instant gratification, and many things can be done very easily and very quickly, but sometimes the world slows down and gets complicated. I believe sport has led me to handle those moments better. I tend to get less frustrated and remain calmer than I might be if I wasn’t an athlete.

Except with Houston traffic, that shit is insane.

“My sporting bucket list doesn’t involve more competition. I’d like to spend more time snowboarding and riding my bike all around the world. And live on a boat.”

Brooke is my inspiration

My biggest inspiration is my wife, Brooke. I could write pages and pages as to the reasons why, but I’ll stick to a couple:

Children and animals gravitate towards her. Anywhere we go, if there are children or pets, they will eventually make their way towards Brooke. To me, this is the ultimate sign that people (and animals) feel her kindness, empathy, and compassion from the moment they meet her.

She does the right thing, even when it’s hard. Brooke has been a teacher and a middle school administrator since I met her. Throughout that entire time, she has always stated that she will do whatever is best for kids and their education. At times, she’s been faced with making some difficult decisions, but she never waivers from making hard decisions if it serves the better needs of the children in her school. Standing up for something is easy, until it’s not. Watching her do it every day reminds me to do the same.

Give your body the time it needs

These days, I hardly give a thought to a bad training day. In fact, I often joke that I’m glad I felt horrible on a training day so hopefully it won’t happen on race day. I do give a little more thought to a series of continuously bad training days. When poor training happens day after day, it can be easy to push even harder, but it has often been my experience that backing off and having a more laid back approach yields better results. I believe the body periodically goes into “absorption mode” which means it starts to reject more training load in order to try to adapt and heal to the work that’s already been done. Many people can relate to this feeling when you taper: feeling flat and totally off. You’ll always come out better on the other end, but you have to give your body (and mind) the time it needs.

Bad races are a little different. With experience comes perspective and the knowledge that a bad race isn’t the end of the world, but if I’m being honest, sometimes when a race is a high priority, and I race poorly, it can hit me hard. Bad races can have long term upside because they often lead me to rethink my approach and improve on my preparation, but the short term disappointment still exists.

My mind is my strength

I’m paraphrasing here, but I once heard another athlete at a pro panel say that he expects to have to suffer in every race he does, and if he doesn’t, then that’s a bonus. In the early years of racing, I definitely underestimated how challenging it would be to try and succeed in triathlon. Now, I think I have the opposite mentality. I now assume that success in anything will likely be even more difficult than I might initially imagine or anticipate. Prior to triathlon, I seemed to back away from things that would take a lot of work to be good at. When I started training and racing triathlons, I left this mindset behind. I never really had an end goal in sight, but I constantly strived to get better, and I didn’t mind that it took a whole lot of time and effort to do it.

I can remember when I was talking to a group of youth triathletes in Houston, and they asked me what my strength was, presumably either swim, bike or run. When I answered “my mind,” I think they all were a bit surprised. It doesn’t matter if it’s sport or otherwise, our belief in what we are doing has to be there for success.

Footnotes

Words by Justin Daerr, Cover photo by Janosch Abel, photos as attributed, edited by Cody Royle, Published by Travis McKenzie, Copyright NTSQ Sports Group Inc.

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FootNotes

Words by Justin Daerr, Cover photo by Janosch Abel, photos as attributed, edited by Cody Royle, Published by Travis McKenzie, Copyright NTSQ Sports Group Inc.

Colin O'Brady

Justin Daerr

My Mind Is My Strength

FootNotes

No Human is Limited

I'm Here To Win

The Humble Son

My Incredible Journey

The Most Interesting Man In The World

Season 3