Murphy's Law of Triathlon

Recognize this feeling? It's the final week before a triathlon. Your one goal switches from training hard to avoiding a freak injury or getting sick. Household hazards appear out of nowhere. Strangers appear to turn in your direction and cough. Someone wants you to help them lift a heavy object and move it "over there". This is the plight of the triathlete and I suspect it happens to professional athletes, too.

So, Jessica Rose has come down with a virus and has been sick all week. Our nightly "tuck in bed and kiss goodnight" have turned into loud "good night" admonitions from the door. At work. a guy who works for me has been hacking up a lung all week. I won't let him in my office and I've been using a paper towel in my hand before opening any doors around the office. Then, last night, I took Mike W. down to Annapolis for the Sterling dinner and he announces as we pull away from my house that he's had a cold all week! I'm in a car with the windows up, recycling air with a guy who has the sniffles and is coughing!

Evidently, I am destined to come down with something. Normally the way this works is that the night before the race, the sore throat will start with a little sniffle, and then I'll wake up race morning and be achy all over. Great.

The week before Eagleman 2005, I got a sinus infection from swimming in Reston Lake at the Jim McDonnell Lake Swim and was not feeling well at all on race day. Ironman Florida 2006 found me with a crick in my neck. The kind where if you turn your head in one direction, it is uncomfortable and you look funny. Always a joy riding a bike 112 miles with a crick in your neck. And the swim! Of course the position of the sun dictated that I turn my head in the direction of the crick. The Thursday before Columbia 2007, Jessica Rose ran down the steps and jumped on me at the bottom, full force. Her leg jammed into my quad giving me a charlie horse that didn't go away until about three days after the race.

So, today is Thursday. I feel good now but I have a wary eye on events around me. Murphy's Law of Triathlon dictates that what can do wrong, will go wrong. Motorcycle ride, anyone?