Athletes in Motion

Athletes in Motion Podcast - EP 024 Abby Groeneweg

July 19, 2022 Tom Regal and Kenny Bailey Season 2 Episode 24
Athletes in Motion
Athletes in Motion Podcast - EP 024 Abby Groeneweg
Show Notes Transcript

What’s next?  

That has been Abby Groeneweg’s mantra since we first met her.  Abby shared her journey with us during Episode 15 and, when we asked about her next challenge, she said she wanted to try to complete a sprint triathlon.  

Spoiler Alert…she did it!  

In this episode, we catch up with Abby right after her first triathlon, talk about the work it took to get to the line, the support she received from her friends and family, and that feeling of accomplishment when you achieve a goal.  The only question left is….what’s next?

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Narrator:

Welcome to the Athletes in Motion Podcast from race to recovery. With your hosts, Tom Regal, and Kenny Bailey.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Hey, Tom, how are you?

Tom Regal:

I'm great. Kenny, how are you today?

Kenny Bailey<br>:

I'm doing fantastic. Thank you for asking. We have back with us. Abby Groeneweg

Tom Regal:

Back by popular demand back by talking to man. Thank you. Yeah.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Thank you. Abby is the operations manager for burn bootcamp. That is correct. Now, you were here last November. And we were talking about 75 Hard and you were talking about challenges you were facing. And it was one of our most popular programs, because you were really speaking truth to words about how you wanted to make sure to make a change in your life, and wanted to just do something that was going to be uncomfortable outside of yourself. And then at the end of the program, we asked a quick little question on what are you going to do next? And you had a thought in your head, this little idea, a nugget kernel? And you knew, gosh, do I want to say this? And there was a pause. And you were asking yourself? Do I want to say this out loud? Because if I say it out loud, it becomes real. If I say it out loud, other people are going to hear that and they're going to start asking me questions about it. What is the thing that you said?

Abby Groeneweg:

That I would do a triathlon.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

And what did you do?

Abby Groeneweg:

I did the dang thing?

Tom Regal:

Yes,

Kenny Bailey<br>:

yes, you did.

Tom Regal:

We have another triathlete in the house Triathlete in the house. So

Abby Groeneweg:

this also means I get to blame you two for this. obsession. Absolutely. And

Tom Regal:

you knew if you said it, we were going to hold you to actually for sure.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

So I know there was a pause, you're like, do I say it? Do I say it? Do I say it and then you said it out loud. And now now you are triathlete. So after we got off the program, and you decided, oh crap, what did I just do? What was your thought process on sort of, okay, now I'm going to do this what what were you feeling? How did you start? How did you start your program and you decide to triathlon was the thing to do? What did you start first?

Abby Groeneweg:

So I will be honest, I said it out loud with you, two. And then thought and thought out, but only because I had already signed up for the Disney Princess half marathon. That's right. And that was my main focus, like, what I've realized about myself is I want to do all these things. But I put too much pressure on myself. So did the Disney Princess half, came back still was twiddling with the idea of doing a triathlon. And it wasn't till I think the New Year challenge with Team Clairborne that I finally did an I am statement. It's part of the challenge. And I said, I am a triathlete. And then that very night, I signed up for Team Magic's. Music City tri

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Very good. Very good. So well, let's back up for a second. Why

Tom Regal:

did you choose that? Yeah,

Abby Groeneweg:

I had heard a lot of good feedback. One of my members at Franklin is a volunteer for Team Magic. And he had told me a lot about it. Plus, it was local. So my first one I wanted to be able to actually go scope things out beforehand and make sure like, I fully knew what I was getting myself into. And I did do that. I mean, I went and drove Ellington knew where the elevations were, kind of scoped out the Cumberland and kind of hadn't made sure I had my bearings going into it.

Tom Regal:

Yeah. That's that's the way to do it. If you can do it locally. Yeah, for sure to be able to see that that helps you process and deals with anxiety and helps set your training up.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

So when you when you were thinking about triathlon, and which part of it was a scary part, which part were was was holding you back? Was it the combination of all three things was the swim, was it I haven't rode a bike and forever? What was all the above?

Abby Groeneweg:

No, not all the above, which is so awkward because if y'all remember also on that first podcast, I was like, I hate running. I'm not a runner, but obviously, you know, training for a half marathon prior to the half marathon. I did a 15k in Nashville. So I had felt like at that point, like oh runnings in the bag, like it's now my strength out of these three, you know, things but I really thought biking would be the hardest. Biking is what I was a little scared of I thought the swimming I could grasp because I did swimming when I was little. I was on a competitive you know, neighborhood team. But Swimming was the hardest thing for me.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

So thinking going into it biking was going to be the thing. But that ended up just being more of learning just relearning how to ride a bike kind of right.

Abby Groeneweg:

Yeah, just getting myself I was every other day taking, you know, adding just miles and miles and miles, obviously, you know, being in the fitness industry, I know you can't just go like, hop on a bike and bike 12 miles and you've got it. So I started with three or four miles one day, and then like two days later would add another mile, and I just kept progressing through that. And the biking is what I love the most

Kenny Bailey<br>:

interesting. Yeah, yeah. And I think well, that's, that warms my heart. So when it came to the swim, you were you knew it was gonna be like, Oh, I've done it before I'm able to do it. You're looking at your watch. I think it was like five weeks before the race.

Abby Groeneweg:

It was six weeks before the race. So I was I got a membership to the Brentwood indoor sports complex. And I had been going like early mornings before burn swimming a few laps. And I had reached out to my friend Drew, who also is part of the whole, let's, you should just do this triathlon. And he met me at the pool one day, he was going to try to help me, you know, show me freestyle. And I love Drew, he is amazing, PT. But he was like, you just do this. And I was like, but I feel like I'm doing this. And I'm not really doing this. And I walked away that day, like, got in my car and was in tears. And I was like, What the heck have I signed myself up for? So it was six weeks out? I message this man to my left. And I was like, Tom, I need your help. I can't do that. So we met, we did a zoom. There talked for a little bit. And we met at the at the pool, I think the very next day. Yeah, we're Yeah, I mean, like we had to get on it real quick. So we met two times a week, every week. Yeah, up until actually, that Thursday, right before the triathlon was our last session.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Okay, so what was the plan for that? I mean, we don't I would assume you don't recommend six weeks prior

Tom Regal:

No, no, no. And let me say that there's very few to? people that can pull that kind of thing off, right. So I do a swim assessment with everybody. First, we sit we, we go to the pool, and I watch you swim. And I look at it. And then we talk about things that I'm seeing. And then I give you some direction to kind of work on things, how you process that direction. And how you go through that tells me our learning curve, like how quickly we can do things we can go through knowing that we had a very short amount of time. You were able to if I told you to turn your hand like this, you turned your hand like that. I was like, Huh, that's interesting, because usually, you do a couple of laps and then it's like, all figuring it out. But you were like, oh, no, do this, do this. So we broke the stroke down to how you needed to learn and went from that. I gotta tell you, I wouldn't have taken on anybody to do that if you hadn't been able to focus on those small parts right away. Like that said, okay, we can get here. It might not be pretty, but it's gonna get done. And we kind of progressed from that point. And she did the homework. I mean, you did everything I asked you to do. And we sat there and we just beat it into you.

Abby Groeneweg:

I am a good student.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah. Yeah. So it's the Thursday before the race what what was your game plan when you

Tom Regal:

so back up a little bit before that talk about like, we got, we got four weeks and have to two times a week in the pool. And then we went to open water? Oh, yeah. Because it was like and that was actually your suggestion that we do more than once because I do it at least once and we were able to get in two sessions. The weather held up for us it was perfect. It was what was your What was your reaction when we got in the water and swam that first time out in open water and it was kind of choppy that day? It wasn't too bad. But it was actually it wasn't like our second day was great because it's glass and but the first day we had some current we had a little bit of chop. What was your

Abby Groeneweg:

so Tom got in first I was walking behind him and I was like, Ooh, this is cold.

Tom Regal:

Yeah, it was probably about 70 degrees I think Yeah.

Abby Groeneweg:

And I am very much so a southern girl you can ask my daddy when we go to his pool I'm like, is it at least at like 80? above is good swimming, you know? Yeah, temperature, but I feel like at that moment I had the the WTF like what did I sign myself up? In my eyes, there was

Tom Regal:

a panic behind her goggles I went

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Being in the pool is one thing when you when you now look around and there's like ducks and currant and when wind and you know, the water is not behaving like a you know, there's not a black line but

Abby Groeneweg:

that was the biggest thing. And I'm not gonna lie like I was joking with My friends on this side, because everybody if you live in Nashville, you know about Percy priests and Cumberland. And so I was like joking with my friends. I'm like, I see dead people.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah, it's just you got to avoid that.

Tom Regal:

Stay close to the shore further,

Abby Groeneweg:

but it is it is very different. I feel like I mean, Tom may say, different. I feel like I truly had mastered freestyle swim in the pool. Like, before Tom was even pushing me sometimes I would push myself. I'd be like, I have this great idea. I'm gonna go 100 Yeah. And he was like, okay, cool. That was what's next. Anyways, like, I knew what he was going to push me to do next. Yeah. As his shirt says, Good. Now do it again. I just got used to it. So now I told him, I'm gonna give you a shirt. And you don't even have to tell anybody. It's just point. Yeah, um, but it really like swimming in open water, when you can't see a thing. That is the biggest fear. So my suggestion to anybody who wants to do a triathlon in open water is get your bearings way ahead of time. Obviously, like Tom said, he told me up front, and he was like, I would never do this with anybody else. Like, try to cram all this. So don't call

Tom Regal:

me two weeks before you to call me. I'm 12 months out, you know.

Abby Groeneweg:

But, I mean, get your bearings. And and there's finally so we did Tuesday, Thursday, in open water. And I think Tom knew I just didn't feel 100% and I'm one of those, like, if I don't feel 100%, I'm going to psychologically sit there and freak myself out. So he actually invited me you two are going open water swim through Friday. And he actually invited me to join y'all. And out. And I thought about it. And then I was like, No, I just need to go get myself right. And open water. So that Friday had my husband up bright and early. I told y'all last podcast, my husband's one of the most supportive people. That's fantastic. So bright and early. We drive out to Percy priest and he literally just sits on the shore just safety measures, obviously because I want to go by yourself. Well, I knew when you and I were out there other than Mr. Looking for gold in the water. Like nobody else was out there. So my husband literally sat on the shore and sat there and watched me for about an hour. And I worked on you know, my freestyle swim but it was also like, Okay, if we get into an O poop moment, like what are you going to do? So it was practicing all the things that Tom and taught me so that I didn't just stop and freeze in the water. I kept progressing and kept moving forward no matter what.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah, and I think you know, the things that actually we have a friend of ours that posts on Franklin Road Runners and his post is Forward is a pace Yeah, right. And I love that that's that's great. Ford is a pace you just need to go for if it's crawl, walk, if it's you know, doggy paddle breaststroke, you know, turn upside down and, and, you know, yeah, backstroke your way, just just keep progressing forward. That's, that's what you need to do.

Tom Regal:

One of the things that we work on in the pool, and in the open water was basically I call them safety measures, like life saving measures of treading water, doing breaststroke doing things, what are you going to do when you need to regroup, you're going to roll on your back, or you're going to just you know, and it's that same thing. I call it relentless. forward progress, right, keep, keep moving forward, keep whatever you're doing, catch your breath, gather yourself. But don't stop, don't stay stationary. Because it is a race, there is a time limit, there is things that you need to do, and you want to keep moving forward. The beauty of the Cumberland is that it is a river and it does have a current. So if you just pop up and you do a little bit of stroke, you're still gonna keep moving, which is great. It's kind of kind of nice that way. So we always worked on some of that stuff. And then it was the, okay, if everything goes to plan. We're good, right? What happens when it doesn't? Right? What are we going to do next? And that's the thought process I was trying to get in your head, as we were talking about it was like, it might not go well what are you gonna do? Right? And then if that doesn't work, where are you going to do? Let's think about the situational awareness of what could happen and not to panic. So it's very true. I think good, good. So now take us to race day.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah, so you're there. You're right before race day, thinking to yourself, what's your mindset going into this?

Abby Groeneweg:

Um, I feel I feel like after dropping my bike Friday, you know, hearing some of that stuff for the newbies and honestly being with my team, because there are several team Claiborne members who came into town to watch like I felt very calm and collected. I actually wasn't really nervous on race day. Good. Let's think helps. Um, Yeah, and I think I purposely did things so that the nervous energy was gone on Saturday. First, going into race day with it. I mean, I'm not gonna lie, it's still a little bit of nerves, obviously, for sure doing that it's natural. Yeah. But I don't feel like I was anxious as some other people who are

Kenny Bailey<br>:

funny, you can feel it. It almost it sounds terrible to say, but you kind of feel better when other people are feeling worse to a certain extent on that. Right? Like, you know, like, or you're like, should I be panicking? Yeah, just like going yeah, like,

Tom Regal:

right, then you start worrying about it. Yeah. And

Abby Groeneweg:

it was nice, though, because I was with a whole. So the

Tom Regal:

crew. You had a crew with it. Oh, I

Abby Groeneweg:

did. So but even like, we can get into that, because that is one of my biggest things about this is you need a support system, but waiting on the dock, because you wait there for forever. Yeah. And so they set it up by time categories. And I was like, I'm not labeling myself. Like, I'll just go towards the end. And it is what it is. I was with four other people who were bred like this was their first triathlon. And so that was really nice. Because the 30 minutes we sat there we were all talking. Yeah. Which was nice. And with swimming being where I felt like I struggled the most. Especially because I chose to be at the end of the dock. By the time I jumped into the water. There were so many more people around me at that point, like the Olympic swimmers had all made their way up, but it was kind of just sitting there like, Don't get nervous. Don't freak out. Like the things that Tom taught me like, just keep moving. Yeah. But it was nice, like being able to meet some newbies who were also they're feeling the same. Yeah. And I don't like I said, I didn't feel like overly anxious but I think we all kind of felt the same jumping into that water.

Tom Regal:

When you're jumping off a perfectly good dog and the water then you're just kind of like with everyone else chopping around. Yeah, yeah.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

So how did the swim portion go?

Abby Groeneweg:

It went well, didn't have a freakout moment. I kept telling Tom I was I knew I was just going to end up doing backstroke never once rolled on my back. Yeah, it was a mixture of freestyle swim and breaststroke. That's what I did.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

last race that I did there, I did freestyle stroke a little bit. Yeah, at the same thing well on

Abby Groeneweg:

the breaststroke came in because like I said, like, by the time I jumped in, there was still a bunch of, you know, sprints, people jumping off, but then the Olympic had made it and like all of a sudden started feeling really crowded, when you made that

Tom Regal:

you were in a pocket of a lot of people and like for people who don't know the race, the Olympic distance athletes get on a perfectly good boat and go up river a little bit further, and they jump off that perfectly good boat, yeah. And they swim down and the sprint distance actually starts off of a doc that's a little closer. So the Olympic distance eventually catches up to the faster Olympic rate racers catch up to the the sprint distance racers, and then you have, you know, a whole cluster of people going down the side of the river, which is kind of kind of there's

Kenny Bailey<br>:

the irony, right, you have folks that are waiting on the sprint, because they're not very good swimmers getting caught with guys that are just like, you know, doing$1, you know, minute 20. But the

Tom Regal:

beautiful, the beauty of this race, that the thing that I liked about the swim portion of it was that there's slight banking on the inside portion of it. So if you really were one of those swimmers that were challenged and having an issue, like you could get to a point you get past the dock and you get you know, about halfway, you can stand up, you can come close to shore, and basically, you know, stand up, catch your breath, and get back in there and go again. And of course, they did a great job with with a lot of the kayakers out there. And I saw a few people were hanging on the front end of the kayak the guy themselves and then heading off being able to do that. You didn't have to do any of that, which is awesome. You sat right out in the middle where the current was better. And you you pushed your way on down and it was great. You just kept going,

Abby Groeneweg:

man must be that really good swim coach. It's good. No, but it was like sitting on the dock and seeing people who just jumped off already grabbing the dock and I was like, Oh, yeah. Oh, poor thing.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Well, yeah. I think you're what's what's interesting is and what I what I love about talking to you is there's a there's a mentality there of Yeah, it's scary. Yeah, I may not know it, but I'm just going to continue to push through. And a lot of including myself, by the way, a lot of what happens I think with water is is it's a mental you psych yourself out mentally right? And because you're not you're most of your bodies in the water. It's not like on a bike we can look around and see it's not like on the road where you can kind of see what's going on. You're you're kind of I slated by yourself, you hear a lot of splashing around you, you don't know if you're making progress or how you're doing and, and things become overwhelming. And so the fact that you were able to just be able to say, you know, I know my capability, I know what I need to do if something goes wrong, and I'm just going to kind of push forward. That's that's a huge monumental sort of mental hurdle you jumped. It's not just a physical Hey, I finished the swim. It's, you took something six weeks prior, where you had an O ship moment, right, and you're like, Mote you know, some people were like, Okay, this was this is bigger than, than me, I shouldn't have done this. You know, now what I'm going to do, you know, I'll do do Athlon I won't do the triathlon or something like that. Let me get you thought about that.

Tom Regal:

It's like, wow, we just don't cancel this. Yeah.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

So I think I think pushing through that is a big deal. I mean, that's a that's a, that's something, irrespective of what the time or whatever you did, you know,

Tom Regal:

I don't want to say that stepping up to the line is a big deal as well. Had you not completed the swim, it wouldn't have been for lack of trying. And that would have been fine. Right? That's still okay. That's, that's perfectly fine. So you didn't complete the goal that you were looking for? Don't let that stop you from attempting it. Right, getting out there. And actually getting off the couch making the effort putting in the time and work. And then should you fail, whatever the word fail means to you. So what? exactly. Get back up and do it again. Right. Yep. Or go. It's not for me and walk away from it's fine. But you gave it the effort. You went through it. You were able to go through and push through and complete the whole thing, which was fantastic. I mean, so

Kenny Bailey<br>:

yeah. All right, now that we're out of the water. So you're coming off, you're going up the ramp, you're like what was it like thank God, Dry land like,

Abby Groeneweg:

it kind of it really was like I actually did, because that was my biggest thing. Like you were saying, like, I just like, I didn't want to put a time cap on myself. I didn't I just wanted to finish. And that was my main goal. And that's why I think I was so successful this first time.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah. And,

Tom Regal:

and that's how your first anyone's first tri should be it should be to get through and learn the process. You can practice it all you want. But until you get to a point where you put the whole three together on race day, it's like, Oh, I could have done this differently. I understand this flow better and then you can go back and then you can set some times, like set a baseline and then go from there.

Abby Groeneweg:

Okay, so out of the water on the bike up a steep hill. You got to leave out that

Tom Regal:

steep hill was legit, steep hill. It's switchbacks. Right. You can't go straight over. You have to switch back up and

Abby Groeneweg:

zag. What is this? Yeah. I was really worried because Tom had told me like when you come out your adrenaline's going, you may feel like you are drunk, like so just get your bearings. I think I did that. I think I walked a little bit. And then I took off. I was like, All right. Yeah. Oh, look, we're sponsored by Comcast.

Tom Regal:

Yeah, but what and one other thing that we that I had to do was, we did a transition clinic for the beat Team. Yes. And that was one of the things that I was doing the transition clinics was after we walked through the whole process, and actually run, you know, kind of run through it once. Then we have you do a whole bunch of jumping jacks, we didn't do burpees where we did jumping jacks, and sometimes we'll spray down with water to make you spin around with your eyes closed and get really dizzy, and then go like hammer off, because that's sort of how you're gonna feel we've done it. I've done it more drastic where your head is on a baseball bat, and you're really spinning and you're almost gonna puke. And it's like, that's what it feels like coming out of the water. Are you just trying to be nice to me? I was trying not to scare you away completely. Because that was only a couple of weeks before the race. So we were trying to get through all of that. Two weeks before the race. Yeah, I think it was two weeks. Yeah.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Okay, so you went through this exact got on the bike? Did every transition turnout is nice and clean was it

Abby Groeneweg:

transition did go pretty well. Um, the only thing I probably would have done differently is I didn't probably dry myself off as well as I could have said by the time I sat on my bike, all that water went down into my shoes. Yeah. But really, I was just focused on you know, the setup and learning like my, this, this this so as soon as I got into transition, I'm like, glasses, helmet chips.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yep, yeah, I do. Head Shoulders, Knees and toes. I literally sing to my head, shoulders, knees and toes. Yes, socks and shoes.

Abby Groeneweg:

Yeah, so that is what Tom was like. This is how you need to do it. Yep. And all week I practiced it. Like literally everything was sitting on my dining room table. I was like, glasses, helmet, socks, shoes. Directly turn OCD,

Kenny Bailey<br>:

totally people,

Tom Regal:

process oriented people if you're in operations of any kind, you love triathlon because it's a process and it has to go and then you can make it more efficient. Yep. Then you Is the socks and you realize why I'm on a shorter distance races, all that water dumps down and you just go screw the socks on the bike. I'll just put them on for the run. There

Kenny Bailey<br>:

they go. I still like socks. Thank you. I love. I like socks, love socks, but I probably

Abby Groeneweg:

should have dried myself off a little bit more because then I was like, should I change my socks?

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Well, it's kind of funny how

Tom Regal:

well then you have the merino wool ones that actually pull away. Water. So you find the socks that work for what you're doing it just it's a it's a process.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah. And with it's what's funny is what you would normally do during training, if you're like, oh, my gosh, I'm wet. So you'd stop and you dry yourself off. And then during the race, it's like you're, you know, you got snot coming out. Yeah. I'll deal with saltwater

Tom Regal:

Ocean swims are brutal, because you're just it's complete nasal drain as you're on a bike. And if you're in aero position, there's no stopping it. Yes. And you're just out there and no one. We don't talk about this much. But it just, it just drains out. That's why you clean your bike. Well, exactly.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

So it's like, Look, I just got to finish the race. I'll clean up later. Yeah, so you're on the bike. How you hopefully you left that transition and in a good orderly fashion. You didn't try to blast it right at the beginning?

Abby Groeneweg:

No, I will say thanks to you know, Tom's transition clinic. He was like, there's gonna be a line where you can mount your bike go further. And that was I literally was crossed that line. And everybody stopped. I'm like, What are you doing? This

Tom Regal:

drives me crazy.

Abby Groeneweg:

I can't move forward. So like, zigzag through and then hopped on? Yeah, yeah, go. But I'm like, That's just rude.

Tom Regal:

Yeah. Everyone queues up nicely behind and wait, like you do realize it's a race, right? There's a time but yeah, just keep going.

Abby Groeneweg:

And they're literally it was like a line of people mounting their bikes right there. I'm like, Yeah,

Kenny Bailey<br>:

that's a line. The line has to be here. So halfway through the bike, you're feeling pretty good. Was it longer than you expected? Was it the turnaround? It's, I think it's a mountain back, right. It's fairly lumpy, not lumpy, Lumpy, but it's got a few got some rolling rollers.

Abby Groeneweg:

Wellington is a little sneaky. But I was forewarned about that. And like I said, I drove it so well, my husband drove it and I sat in the car.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

copious notes. Yeah. Okay.

Abby Groeneweg:

So it really wasn't that bad. The bike is we're kind of the Sun was really starting to beam and it was getting a little toasty. But the bike was great. And I knew the mileage going into it. So that's ultimately the last two weeks. That's the mileage I was cycling every

Kenny Bailey<br>:

day. Okay. So I'm pretty uneventful in a good way. Yeah, right. Okay, so your entity to transition. Sun's out now. Okay, fours, that water? Water. And it's not cold water now.

Abby Groeneweg:

And no, that's when I was like, do I waste 30 seconds and change my socks? But I was like, no, no, it's gonna go for

Kenny Bailey<br>:

it. So and you've been, like you said you did a half marathon before. So 5k was going to be something that is well within your wheelhouse. But you just got another water that disease. There's one you just got off a bike, it was one thing to run a 5k There's a completely different thing to run a 5k after you've done to other disciplines. How did you feel as you started to run? Was it like when you went Oh, crap, triathlons are real hard.

Abby Groeneweg:

Yeah. So I did not practice running much. Yeah, in my training, because I was like, I've done a 15k I've done a half. I've done all these five K's like, I'm not going to focus on that. And Tom did kept like kept telling me like, days you're on your bike. As soon as you get off, you at least need to run a little bit so your legs get used to it. And I did not do that enough. So I got off the bike. So my last 5k time was like 34 minutes. I did this one and like 40

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Well, it's not a it's a different wrecks on concrete. Buildings.

Tom Regal:

There's not a lot of shade. No,

Kenny Bailey<br>:

there was no shade at all. You have an overpass and that's it.

Tom Regal:

And we had relatively good weather that weekend. But that was Sunday, Saturday was perfect. Sunday, the humidity was kicking up. And the temperature was kicking out we were going into a huge heat spell and humidity spell and that was yeah, it was starting to take its toll on people. I mean, you're in a bowl of concrete. radiating heat is something so

Kenny Bailey<br>:

you get to the turnaround you're thinking thank God I'm at the turnaround in my mind. Like I've done this like thank you Jesus turnaround I'll have to do is just bring it home. You brought it home. You saw the finish line. What are your thoughts when you're when you saw that?

Abby Groeneweg:

I ran my booty. I'm not gonna lie part of that. 5k I walked because my whole body was just like, No, ma'am. No, ma'am. Yeah. But what's really cool, daring The run is because it was my first triathlon team magic gives you green bands to, like other athletes can shout you out, and it was really cool on the run. There are other runners who were like, Let's go 757 And like shouting me out. I was like, okay, I can finish this. So like that gave me life to keep going.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah. And I think that's what's really cool about any community runners do the same thing triathletes do the same thing. If you know, somebody that's doing something cool. If they're, you know, like you said, the green band. I think it signifies that this is your first one. That's what the green bands for. Right and the community is, is cheering you on everybody. They don't care about your time, your age, you know, whatever. They just, they want to see people succeed, and whatever that means, but it's like, yeah, that's the funnest thing there. We've got this you got this

Tom Regal:

was someone that came over from I've heard it on a couple of occasions now. But there was one aspect that came across from cycling into triathlon. And he said, he's in the race, and he's going along, and he passes somebody on the bike. And it was the weirdest thing that they cheered them on. He was like, but I'm racing you what? And they're like, go get them all right. And he was like, that was the hardest thing that they had to deal with. Because they weren't used to that. And cycling and Kurt racing, any of that type type stuff. They're just kind of like it's Doggy Dog. Right? Go out there. And traveling. I've been past people where I've passed them on the hills, and I've passed me on the downhills, and we just keep cheering each other on it was like, oh, there's no more hills. I'll see you later. Bye. You know? It's like, and that's what I love about the sport. Yeah, it's the communities.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah, I used to race road races did criteriums did time trials. And the whole mentality is I'm going to crush you. I'm not going to just crush you. I'm going to rip your school off

Tom Regal:

to victory and obtain your soul. Yeah, exactly. My pocket and sit on. Literally during

Kenny Bailey<br>:

the race. If you're doing like a multi like you would do a 50 mile road race. And you would do multiple loops. And on the last loop, you're trying to determine whether the person next to you has anything left. Yeah. And so you'd look at him and you would be the most common you're just dying. Right? But you'd look at him go hey, man, how's it going? I'm doing good. And then you turn the other way, you know, at the end, it's gonna be a sprint. And yeah, and when you when you beat them, it's like that Euro trash sorted. And then you go to travel and I was like, great job. work. Good work. What are you talking about? Stop that. Stop that. I don't want to be nice. Yeah. So yeah, I think that's a neat, it's a neat community. Right. It's a neat. So you got done. Your, your your squad, your crew, everyone's there

Tom Regal:

and your crew was following you around because we were we were, we were running down the river side cheering you on like, all of a sudden I found all your peeps, we found you. And there's like a dozen people standing there screaming at one person out of like, 100 go Abby go through this. And everyone was just kind of looking at us. Like, like, why she's got a lot of people here.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

So it takes a village. I do.

Abby Groeneweg:

I had a very supportive crew. So I was fortunate to have Kenny and sandy clay born come down from Kentucky. Well back it up. Josh, who is part of Team Clairborne also as soon as he knew I signed up for this race joined and he did the Olympic distance so it was great to have him like obviously he doesn't live here but we would chat back and forth about training and all and then he he stayed with me at my house with Aaron and I so it was kind of nice because I had somebody because obviously errand sees the work I'm doing but he's not experiencing it. So it was nice those last few days up into the race like having Josh there seemed like we could call them each other's nerves when you know it's out there. But so I had Kenny and Sandy Clairborne come down I had the Brewers who are is another couple on Team Claiborne's come down. I had some of my best friends so Nicole Sanchez who fell remembers the one who got me all started on this whole team Claiborne fitness journey. One of my best friends Tina was there. My husband was there. My niece was there. My bosses were there. Wow. It was I showed her an Ironman and I got nothing. I mean, they were all there to support me. So it was it was really awesome. And this is gonna sound like such a child thing. But having my dad and my stepmom they really meant the world to me. That's

Tom Regal:

how Yeah, yeah, yeah. I

Kenny Bailey<br>:

mean, you're doing something that's, that's like you said, it's, this is completely outside of your comfort zone. Right. And I know you've done stuff outside your comfort zone. But I mean, water can be a scary thing. Right? You know what I mean? I mean, that's that's kind of fell into your point. You're not seeing anything, you don't know what's going on. So conquering that, I think is, you know, and having a support system to be able to do that was fantastic. So you had November when you said I'm going to do this thing, and then you went through the training. You went through all this sort of stuff you get across the line. Was it what you thought it was going to be? Was it harder? Was it when you look back on it? Was it? Yeah, this is the challenge I want to do. I'm really glad I did that. Or that was fun. So great.

Abby Groeneweg:

Well, that's cute. Now I'm done. Yeah, no, I literally ran through that line. And as soon as I turned the corner, like, fell to my knees, I was like, holy bananas. That's overweight. Yeah. And then comes the parade of supporters. My, my, my friend, my best friend, Nicole, like literally skipping over to me like and Joanne like she was super excited for me, though. So it was 100% out of support, but I literally was like, trying just not like holding back the tears because it is like, once you say you're gonna do something, and then you conquer it. There's just such an overwhelming feeling emotion, but then it's like, that's kind of that day, you know, was in the whole excitement of it. And then it became the what's next? Yeah, I'm gonna be honest. I'm still on the what's next? Yeah.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Well, I think there's a there's a very real thing that they talk about when you do big races like that. And then afterwards, you have that sort of you're done training. You're done. There's a

Tom Regal:

there's a post post race down. Yeah, it was a depression and depression kind of

Kenny Bailey<br>:

thing. You've been spending months defining yourself on, you know, workouts and everything was structured, everything was great. All the mental readiness to get ready, the excitement, the nervousness, everything else, you do the big thing, and then two days later, you're sitting around going well, okay, I don't have this beautiful water. Around

Abby Groeneweg:

my husband Sunday night, basically said that, that same thing, who's like, do you have like, it's okay, so it's over. Like, do you have that like, depression now that? I was like, no, no, no. But then literally, I spent the next week like I told Kenny, I felt like a bubble just flying around. Yeah. I'm very goal oriented. I'm very driven. I need things to accomplish. And I don't always know how to just be like, I feel like you too. Definitely can probably understand.

Tom Regal:

Yeah, it's, it's rough.

Abby Groeneweg:

And so Kenny, and I actually, this week, I sent him my my usual check in and he was like, I think we need to talk. Like, you sound like a damsel in distress, like, but I'm really not. It's just kind of like, I feel like I need big coals. And I probably really don't, but like, psychologically, in my head, that's where it's like, I need something to work towards.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah. And there's not I mean, so I think you and I are the same in that way. Right? I, I say I need stuff to that slightly scares the shit out of me, in order to get up in the morning. Like, there's something that's gonna force me to like, if it's like, oh, I just want to feel better about myself, or oh, I want to be in better shape. I usually it's easy to skip stuff. If I've got, oh, I've got to race in three weeks. And if I don't get my butt out of bed and into the pool, that race is going to be not fun. So if there's not something there for me, I have to do that. It just it's I found out I'm comfortable with that I'm comfortable with knowing that that's just how I operate that I need something to scare the crap out of myself in order to do something. And it's okay to be that. Yeah, so maybe that's just a, that's an okay, it doesn't make a huge every time. But it really is something

Tom Regal:

that's taking all of that energy, like the type a energy that we have going through, and just being able to focus it a little bit like we're just pointing the beam a little bit, instead of having it scattered all over the place. I think the biggest thing to take away from this is don't let those goals define you. Like, that's where we get lost. And I think that's where people have challenges later on. Because they spend their whole life doing this. And they're focused on these things. And that's what they define themselves on, whether they're a triathlete or wherever it is, and then get lost on that. And then you stay on that because then when you don't have that big goal, you're lost your loss loss like it falls off a cliff type of thing. And if you can't find that next goal to scare you, and to go through with that maybe you don't do what I'm doing. No, no, you just you butchered don't define yourself as yeah goal, right. That's, that's that's the point to take away, keep having those goals, have them, maybe push them out a little bit further, maybe stretch that instead of going through, I used to have a three year goal. Every year, I created a new three year goal. While I was completing the goal from three years ago, while I was working on the goal for the next year, that was two years from back and I would go through that thanks. So I spent most of my life like really hitting myself hard for a long period of time and every year I was I was accomplishing maybe two really big goals and was not enjoying them. Like I wasn't I wasn't taking the time to go back and and really think about what I accomplished how I did it. thank the people who worked with me who helped me my community. Go through that because I crossed the finish line and I was there already onto, like, I'm two years into this goal. And I'm one year into the three year goal. And I'm already three years into the three year goal. And it's like, and it's nonstop crazy. And, and it's not already lost me. It's not it's not healthy. And and, and I struggled with that I struggle with that when I tried to slow down and get off the bus, basically. And it was, it was a hard time for me to make that change, and get through that. So I think that's the thing to think about, it's okay to have that goal and to be driven that way and kind of go through, give yourself a little bit of space. Yeah, sit back and think about it, don't jump onto the next one right away. Enjoy what you accomplished. Really think about go through what you did, what you did to get through it, how you dealt with it, and then just appreciate the effort and the accomplishment itself? And then start to think about okay, what do we want to do next? Maybe slow the pace down. That's my, that's my, my gift to everybody is that, like I didn't, and it was rough. So it's one of those things where I'm still doing that. But I'm, I'm a little bit rudderless at one point, and getting through some stuff and trying to figure out how I want to accomplish these next big goals. And I'm trying to pace them out a little bit more. That's all I can say.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

So for one of the things I think and I believe you are our top downloaded podcast, by the way. So I think the reason why is because I think a lot of people see themselves in you, right? And a lot of people are looking at ways in which to be motivated. And I think you are very motivational in the fact that what we've been saying is that you look at something difficult and say how okay, how am I going to get through it rather than it's difficult? I'm not going to do it. It's how do I get through it? So for those folks out there that you've now kind of said okay, triathlons, a thing I did. If they're, if they're have that little voice in their head, if if they were where were you where you were in November? What would what would you let them know about, just get up and start doing it, what's the sign up for something first, what would be your sort of way in which you would recommend they, they go about it,

Abby Groeneweg:

I would definitely say get up and get doing it. Like if you have that thought, to do something. And if it even if it, as we've said scares the shit out of you. If the thought crosses your mind, it means you're actively thinking about it. And it doesn't mean you have to sign up right then and there. Like, as we discussed, I didn't sign up for a triathlon till three or four months later. But get up and give it a try. Especially with a triathlon, there's so much that's needed for it. And you've got, you've got to prepare yourself for that. But I would say, try out each of the sports first see where your comfort level is see, you know what you can do on your own. And then one of the best things I did was reach out to Tom. So if you need the assistance, if you need the help, if you need a coach, don't wait too long. And do that. Because it's like, I've probably in my head felt not let down because I couldn't figure it out on my own. But just very frustrated. And I probably waited way too long. And let the frustration build to the point. I was like, why am I doing this?

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah, and I think that's an incredibly important thing to think about is you can only do so much at some point. I mean, I I finished Ironman competitions and half Iron Man's and I still went to Tom for swim. Because I was even though I was doing the distance, I was doing it the hard way, I guess we did this way. So I was in the water. I wasn't slipping in the water. I was actually like a barge and it was killing my shoulder. And I was you know, so my form was using shoulders rather than lats. And so I'd get out of the water. And yeah, I finished it. But I was a wreck when I got out. You know, being able to get somebody that to help you understand just simple stuff. And it doesn't have to be a full commitment of you know, like, I'm gonna hire a coach at, you know, they're gonna monitor me two days a week, kind of thing. It just can be like, to your point, whatever your comfort level is get some course correction gets somebody that can look at you independently in a third party sort of way and say, Okay, here's the things you need to work on. Let's work on those. It just makes for a better experience as a whole that you can pull that kind of nervousness out of your mind and work on the other things.

Tom Regal:

And don't post up on forums where you get 1000 random answers all over the map where it just makes it more anxiety ridden. That is very true. Find a trusted source.

Abby Groeneweg:

I joined triathlon for beginners on Facebook. Just reading these comments was like, I'm not ever going to post here. Yeah.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Well, I mean, even when I was getting ready for Ironman California, there, there is a Facebook post specifically for Ironman California that people are on. And there was this giant conversation about E. coli I, you know, and it was absolutely, you know, everyone's spun themselves around on this like, oh my gosh, you know, the encampments for the homeless community. There's a lot of homeless camps, you know, near the river and, and, you know, they're going to the bathroom. And and there's a huge Colet wasn't it was never an issue. But the community went online kind of spun itself around. So yeah, start talking to people actually know something about what's going on, talk to talk to folks. So I think there's also a second thing that especially I think when you when you go out to the open water, there's there's a, there's an approach that that you can go at, which is okay, I'm scared of something, I'm going to do everything I can to avoid it, or I'm scared of something. And I need to figure out sort of how to be unscared. Was that something that I mean? Are you have you been doing that? It seems like through your 75 heart and through your half, half? marathon training is, you don't seem to let that slow you down? How do you how do you set a mindset that was relatively new? Or would? Would you? Is it something you developed recently? Or is that just something you've always been sort of with? And how would you talk to folks that do like would go to the water, look around and go, Yep, I'm done.

Abby Groeneweg:

It's not anything that's new, I'm actually a very competitive person, which probably is not healthy. Yeah. I get that from my family. Um, but if I, I would say I'm very true to my word. So if I say I'm gonna do something, no matter if it's business, sports, fitness, like no matter what it is, if I say, I'm going to do something, I'm going to do it. And that doesn't mean like, if I tell Tom, I'm going to do something, it's more like, if I tell myself, I'm gonna do something, I'm gonna do it. I mean, yes, if I tell Tom, I'm going to do something, I would do it. But it's more of having. Having that. Again, I feel like I said this last time, like the conversations with yourself to get over those fears and to conquer it. I mean, you can do anything you set your mind to? A lot of it is your mind will talk you out of it. Exactly. So it's learning how to get over that challenge to where you're like, I can do a triathlon? Like, where are my challenges? And how do I break through those challenges?

Tom Regal:

What's the saying? Whether you think you can or think you can't? You are correct?

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Well, I think that's I mean, our conversation in the last program, like you said, in the conversation on this program is, is you're physically able to do things. I mean, and you've shown that and so what stops you is sort of when it gets hard, your mind can do one or two things say, Well, this is too hard. I guess I'm done. Or this is hard. I got to figure out how to make it less hard.

Abby Groeneweg:

Or under percent. I mean, everything we do, I mean, in life is hard. You just have to keep progressing. And you have to keep challenging yourself. And don't let your mind tell you. You can't. I mean, we all can do something. If we set our mind to it. It's just like getting over that fear getting over. You know, the mental angst you have with yourself about it.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah. And I think that's fantastic. Yeah. So exclusive here first.

Abby Groeneweg:

You're not doing this again.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

You have something floating in your head. Yeah. You haven't said it out loud yet.

Abby Groeneweg:

Actually, the only thing floating in my head was I was like, What do I do now? Maybe I'll do another round of 75. Hard. And then Tom just said what he said. And I was like, Alright, I feel like that was my assurance. I don't really need to do that. Just to have a goal. The goal? No, Kenny and I already talked about it earlier this week. He was like, Why do you want to do 75? Hard again, I'm like, I feel like I need to be doing something. Yeah. And he was like, but are you just doing it to do it? And it's like, probably he's like, then what's the point of doing? Exactly? You've already done 75 hard you've already proven

Tom Regal:

a couple times can do it. Right? Because you do it more than once.

Abby Groeneweg:

I started a second round. But I quit because it was summertime and I was like, let's go get Mexican and margaritas. And I was like, you know, that really sounds really good.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Well, I think in all seriousness, I think that's what you're saying is absolutely true that if your your your heart is an Intuit I mean, if you're just doing it because you think you should be doing something

Abby Groeneweg:

about it. And that's hard. I feel like you're you're a little whether you knew it or not. Your statement was like speak to me like why am I gonna Why am I going to put myself through that? Especially because when I told Kenny the other day a it is hot outside and Tennessee do not know. So do I want to do a second workout outside every day? Yeah. Yeah. But then I was like, the other day I didn't get home till eight o'clock at night. I was exhausted because most days I get up at 5am or earlier and it was like, there is no way I was going to do a second workout like so. I think it's just because I know that is a hard challenge. And it's well worth it but it's like Why do I need to do it again,

Tom Regal:

you want to give it your all to you want to you want 100% to the next challenge that you do if you're going to choose one just to have something, and then you're not going to put 100% effort into it, it just doesn't make you don't have to feel good

Kenny Bailey<br>:

about it. It's your why that gets you through the why what's your worm, you the hot days when you don't want to do something, then you're when it goes away. And I think what's interesting when you think when you were going through sort of, you know the goal and doing a goal or not doing a goal. One of the things also is it doesn't have to be physically taxing or like I've read, you know, I've done this, this amount. And now if I do a greater amount somehow it's better. Like it could just be taking on a new interesting thing. For example, you know, I've done marathons, half marathons done races, but what I've never raced before never put a bib number on was a trail run. And I said, Well, I know I can do the distance or it's a 25k trail run. That's highly technical, that's going to take a different set of brain power for me. Okay, how am I How am I going to pay attention to this? What do you do on a trail run? It's different than a road race. How am I going to train differently? Not that it's a greater physical challenge for me, it's more of a hey, I've never done that before. Those are really cool. Why not go out and try that and see what happens and have fun with something have like, wow, okay, I'll start running in different areas rather than just concrete. It again, it's not a physical. Oh my gosh. And because I've never trail run, I have no expectations what my time is, right? It's not like a road race where I know what my times are before, so therefore I need to be faster. Those are the kinds of challenges that can be fun, too. It doesn't have to be something where, you know, oh my gosh, I turned myself inside out again. It could just be Hey, I've never I've done a Tough Mudder before right? I've never done a you know, I've never done a kayak. Race before. I want to try that or something. I don't know. Work with

Tom Regal:

kayak. Oh my god. multisport is yeah, actually you can go up to Bend Oregon and you can do the pole peddle paddle where they start on Alpine skis and then they jump on cross country skis and jump on a mountain bike and then I think you kayak part of the river and then you finish with a run. He looks fantastic. It actually looks fantastic. It's just it's so nice. To fit that in there. Have to figure that in. Yeah, we're I was looking at that we were looking up in the in the Bend area at one point and I tripped across that rice and it's just kind of like, Hey, this looks

Kenny Bailey<br>:

upon it. So I guess my point is your gold doesn't necessarily have to be you know, and I know we were teasing you offline about Ironman because I sent her an Ironman. This is what's the next wrap? Yeah.

Abby Groeneweg:

I mean, I would definitely love to do a few more like Sprint's and then get into the Olympic and but for right now I haven't. So I did turn my one day membership into a year for USA Triathlon. So I do have plans to do another one. I don't know when I have signed up for another half marathon because I haven't ran one since Disney princess. So I'm doing the Music City. But other than that, like, I think what I've really decided is I need to my goal right now needs to just be like refocusing on me nutrition. Because I did put on a little weight training for the triathlon because it does it taxing to your body. Yeah. So even though I was still hitting my macros, that's a lot to put your body through. And most days, I was still trying to do burn every day. So it wasn't until like the last

Tom Regal:

couple of sessions where I was like, Why did cardio this morning? It was like, Oh, this is really gonna suck. Because

Abby Groeneweg:

Tom was like, Can you please stop doing burn and then coming to swim? Like if you want to do burn, swim? Wait a few hours I go deeper, then go do which I started to I'm I'm a good student. Oh, speaking of speaking of good students. Here's the question. So,

Tom Regal:

Tom, not competitive at all.

Abby Groeneweg:

You've got to have your clients here. So the question is, can you guess Oh, who's the better student?

Kenny Bailey<br>:

I'll answer that one for you. 100% you? Yeah, I actually I texted a couple of friends of mine. And I said, Tom is gonna fire me. And they're like, What did you do? I said, Well, I have a calf issue. And he says, Look, I want you to bike on Saturday and Sunday. Don't do a run. Just bike on Saturday and Sunday. So what did I do? I woke up Saturday went to Harlem, sterile farm and ran. And about two and a half miles into it, my calf cramped up and then I moved my way back. And they're like, why did you do that? I said, I don't know. It felt good at the time. I felt fine. So you I'll concede that easily. You are 100% Better than I am. I am not a good student. I am impetuous.

Tom Regal:

Don't listen, you both have the same personality type of driven and want to set goals and challenge yourself and go through. Kenny just goes. Occasionally he'll be like, Man, I want to do that. differently. I just don't. It's like, yeah, it's like, no, I'm not feeling that today. Oh, really?

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Yeah, that's my honestly, I think the biggest challenge I have is, and this is in competitions, and everything else is, if it calls for, like, let's say, I have a two hour bike session. And if I can't go, if I don't feel I can go all the way on that, or like, hour and a half. Whatever, I'll, if I don't feel like I'm gonna be really good or compete at that, I'll just stop. Right? Well, I'm not I'm gonna miss my, I'm gonna miss my score, I miss my time. What does it matter, I'll live to fight another day. And then I'll go to sleep. So to me, I have to turn off that competitiveness just with myself. If I'm on a bike, and I'm averaging, you know, averaging just about 20 miles an hour, and I've got another 15 miles to go, guess what I'm going to do, I'm going to make sure I average at least 20 miles an hour. And I'll turn myself inside out, even though it's supposed to be a nice, you know, ride to read. Afterwards, I tried to do a base bill. And I'm going to turn myself inside out, because because I figured, well, if I met that number, I can probably be at the other number. And so if I don't do it, and I think it's a failure. And so I have a problem with myself of just I wish I had that. That thing to turn off to say I'm just going to trudge through it if I have to do a two hour run, for example. And if it's an hour run and an hour walk, but I gotta get the two hours done, I'll do the hour run. It's like, well, if I'm walking, then I'm not doing the runs. Why am I even doing this? Then I'll stop, which is what I need to not do. Yeah, so I have a tendency to do that a lot. So it's like, you got to finish the two hours, because in the race, it's going to be two hours and you may have to walk it. But if I start walking, I'm like, Well, I'm not going as fast as I'm supposed to be. This isn't what I'm supposed to do. So now I'm just going to be done. And so I just need to stop myself from that. So I'm a terrible student. You're telling me

Abby Groeneweg:

that my next tattoo should be an Iron Man. I'm telling you that right here on your arm. Yeah. What was it? We said? forward progress is still progress. Yeah,

Kenny Bailey<br>:

forward as a pace. forward as a pace. Can

Abby Groeneweg:

you get that tattooed? I'm

Kenny Bailey<br>:

gonna have to Yeah, because you're gonna have to Yeah, cuz I heard do

Abby Groeneweg:

I need to make you a shirt? Yeah, cuz the shirt.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

The running joke, I think for anybody, like when people ask you about like Iron Man, like, oh, you know, what's your goal for Iron Man? And I'm like, Well, I'm finishing is my goal, like always finishing my goal. And then a half a second my head, it's like, well, unless like any kind of like a 12 hours. And like, every single time, it's like, well finish it as a goal. But if I don't, if I go over six hours on the bike, I'm a disappointment, like, so you just that competitive thing sometimes is a detriment. And that's a part that that I'm trying to work on as a good student, because I'll simply just to Tom's point, I'm like, I don't wanna do it. And be like,

Tom Regal:

I gotta say, we're working with you on the swim last year, that's when we first started working together and was getting a swim going. You were definitely focused on that. Yeah. And you were really good. Because we had to get through a bunch of mental blocks and things on that. So we're just sitting in the middle of the we're sitting the middle of Percy priest Lake, just floating kind of sitting there as we're trying to talk through, like, what is your what are your mindset right now? What are you thinking about? What do you what are you telling yourself? How do we change that narrative to something else, and we would be out there for five minutes or more, and then we'd start swimming again. And then we'd stop and then we'd go through the same process again. So that was, that was a huge hurdles. But you've really focused because you wanted it. And you were willing to do what it took to get through that point. So and then your swim, the process worked, right? And then you trusted the process. And all of a sudden, your swim got better and better and better. So

Kenny Bailey<br>:

I ended up, like, finishing Ironman finished a couple of halves. And then I, for some reason, turned into panic attacks in the water. I have no idea why. I just started getting panic attacks. So even seasoned people Yeah, and, and I regressed back into a panic attack where I would get in the water. And especially during the race, I will be like this people around me, and I'm not going fast enough. And then my heart rate would crank up and that kind of thing. So I have to mentally get myself through. And the funny part about it, I'm going to pardon my French but we're out there and we're coming back and it's kind of about 1000 You we go 1000 out and 1000 back and we do that a couple of times, and I'm coming back and I'm getting tired, and I'm bobbing in the water. And I'm like, God, I don't if I can do this and Tom's like looks at me. He's like, Dude, you're a fucking Iron Man. Yeah. And then when he took that, it was like, yeah, so I've already done this. And that's what I envy about kind of the way that you approach things, right? I look at you as an inspiration because I need to be able to be able to push through those things that are hard and be able to do that and tell myself it's okay. To do that. Right. I like surrounding myself by people that that have that that have that capability to say I'm willing to put myself out there and I don't know what the outcome is going to be. But I'm going to try it. And if it's hard, yeah, it's hard, but let's push through it. So I mean,

Abby Groeneweg:

you don't know what you don't know till you give it a try. Yep. Yeah. And then

Kenny Bailey<br>:

just kind of be able to do it while this turned into the kidney therapy. But yeah, you're definitely. So to go back to your question. Yes, you're absolutely the students. 20 minute coaches. I go through a lot of coaches, because they're like, yeah.

Abby Groeneweg:

So I will say, when I signed up, I was like, I just want to finish. But then I had been talking to Kenny Clairborne. Because at that time, I was still like, working with him directly with like, nutrition. And that was my main goal, body composition. And I was like, do I want to sign up and do this as, like a weight class versus age group? Right? Yeah. And the weight class, I think it's a thena you have to at least weigh 165 And at the time, I weighed like, 172. And I was like, am I gonna lose weight during training? Am I not? And he was like, you just need to do age group. We don't know what your weights gonna be. And then I made the mistake once I finished and looked it up and had I done Athena, I would have placed third. I didn't I do that. Yeah. But you know,

Tom Regal:

cuz that didn't matter. Right? The goal was finishing,

Abby Groeneweg:

finishing, but then you look

Tom Regal:

on the podium is always better than on my first

Kenny Bailey<br>:

well, and that's, that's an motivation to you know, I finished a triathlon I think it'd be did waterfront and I finished and, and the guy in front of me was six seconds in front of me, you know, when when there's six seconds? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Six seconds. Like if I just want to get a minute

Tom Regal:

ketamine. Cool. So what's next? What do you what do you what do you got going on now? What's what's happening with burn? Anything else we need to cover? We covered a lot. It was a good one,

Abby Groeneweg:

we have covered a lot. Personally, what's next, it's just trucking along. Learning to get comfortable with not having big scary goals. I'm going to focus on macros and nutrition. Preparing for our team Claiborne day at first form. So once a year, Team Clairborne gets invited to first forms HQ. So there will be tons of us up there in August. Business wives burn is still offering seven day trials and I think you're to still both

Kenny Bailey<br>:

have to swim, bike and run. That's what I have to do.

Tom Regal:

He has some strength workouts on there too. But he just ignores. I know I do. You

Abby Groeneweg:

do know how important strength is to running. Swimming.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

PT is telling me that right? Reason why your calf hurts.

Abby Groeneweg:

You don't lift enough weight. I don't lift enough weights. Well, after this, I'm going to go do arm day at burn. Join me.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

Well look at the time.

Abby Groeneweg:

All of a sudden, you have to do something.

Kenny Bailey<br>:

I got a thing with a thing.

Abby Groeneweg:

You gotta open this business up. People want smoothies.

Tom Regal:

Nice. Well, thank you so much for coming on again. And sharing your story was awesome to work with you. That was That was fun. Really wise.

Abby Groeneweg:

I appreciate you taking on such a project.

Tom Regal:

We're all projects. We all have our own our own thing. So thank you, everybody for for watching, or listening. If you are just listening, we have a YouTube channel. You can see our beautiful faces. Hopefully, you know videos getting a little better. But you know, subscribe to the channel. Give us some feedback, thumbs up five stars, whatever it takes. And yeah, this helps the algorithm get out to more people and we can expand and get better at this whole thing. So thank you so much. We appreciate everybody. Thanks, Kenny. Thanks, Jeremy. Thank you and we'll catch you on the next one.