Athletes in Motion
Athletes in Motion
Jordon Shaw Check In #3 - Athletes in Motion Podcast - The Triathletes Journey Ep 050
Triathlon is not just about balancing three sports but balancing how to fit it into your life. In this episode of A Triathlete’s Journey, we talk to Jordon about choices you have to make when trying to balance both training for a major event and still maintaining a work/home life. Jordon is at a precipice of deciding to forgo his current planned race and push it to a different one later in the year in the hopes of keeping that balance. A challenge all of us face, no matter the sport
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Welcome to the athletes in motion podcast from race to recovery. With your hosts, Tom Regal, and Kenny Bailey.
Tom Regal:Hey, Kenny, how you doing today?
Kenny Bailey<br>:I'm doing fantastic, Tom, how are you?
Tom Regal:I'm fantastic as well, we are checking back in with Jordan. Jordan, welcome back to the program.
Jordon Shaw:Thank you. Glad to be here.
Tom Regal:awesome to have you back on again. We're, you know, sitting on the edge of our seats, waiting to hear the news. What's what's coming up. So first of all, how many? First of all, let me jump in and say, Hey, thanks, everybody, for for checking it out. Subscribe. I want to make sure I get this on the front end of the thing. I really appreciate all your comments, and, and feedback. And make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel, there will be a subscribe button someplace floating around. Make sure you hit that so you stay up to date, because we've been catching up with Jordan a little bit more. And then afterwards, and we've got Elizabeth and a bunch of other great stuff coming up. So make sure you do that. So that business set aside Jordan, we are how many weeks out now.
Jordon Shaw:So we're eight weeks out eight runs the one I'm scheduled for. And I say that because you know life in general. things pop up. So fortunately, I signed up for the Iron Man that wretched for early. So I have a guarantee that I could swap to any other one the year if I want to have a reschedule? I haven't fully determined that yet or not. But okay. Currently with the schedule was eight weeks out.
Kenny Bailey<br>:So what this is, this is a new development. Last time we left our hero he was midnight bike riding. So you're right. What's going on that? What was the nugget that started to say, Hey, I may not be able to do six weeks out or maybe I should go to another one. Or maybe this isn't the right one
Jordon Shaw:really is schedule some my daughter is a competitive cheerleader and just by school and they're actually as a cheer competition that weekend of the Ironman. So if I did it, I'd have to go alone. And not really having that support system with me is really making me think I'm don't want to do that. But okay.
Tom Regal:And that's tough, right? Because I know, I've got a couple of friends that like they do their race is separate from their families. I don't know how they do it. They just they just they get into their mode, they do their thing. Yeah, you do. What do you do with support? You do?
Kenny Bailey<br>:Go back to my wife shows up at either crash or DNF. So she's not allowed to tell me that.
Tom Regal:Yeah, it's interesting, you know, because I'm used to having my wife at. I think she's been at 98 or 99% of all my events. So it's it's kind of nice having that support system there.
Kenny Bailey<br>:With with that, are there others that you're contemplating later in the year? What and what is your criteria for figuring out what you want to do?
Jordon Shaw:Really is just date. So I'm looking at all the others and the rest of the year. The only one that could potentially work is the Haines City, Florida, Ironman 70.3, Florida, which is in December actually, so give me a little bit longer to continue to prepare and get out but it doesn't have a river swim. It's actually a unique Lake swim. It's in an M shape. So yeah, it's the LM shake.
Kenny Bailey<br>:I think I saw that. Those are enjoying that nice. The championship racing. Nice is that same way?
Tom Regal:It's the same way. Yeah. Okay. I guess it's in a lake in Florida, Florida event safe?
Jordon Shaw:Well, that's a good question.
Tom Regal:All the lakes that I've swam in in Florida, which is one one had been in a while the do not swim, and kind of read a picture of a reptile on it. We still swam and did the race, but it it made me think twice. So well. There's an
Kenny Bailey<br>:article that came out also, I think, Georgia Lake some guy got some brain eating amoeba. So they're all going to do that. When it comes to swim, are you specifically do you feel strong in it in that you don't really care what body of water is or doesn't make a big deal because you really did one of that turnover?
Jordon Shaw:So I feel stronger and swim and I do my run. However, they compile on each other. So if I have a shorter swim, that gives me more time for my run in the end. Yeah. Yeah. So that's kind of what I'm thinking. Whereas with the river, I would have the current. And even though I feel okay with my swim that would help out to give me more time at the end from Iran.
Tom Regal:Okay. Okay, that makes
Kenny Bailey<br>:sense. You have a longer training time, would that help sort of offset that? So you can you? That's the other thing. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And weather also in December in Florida, you know, you're gonna have a much, hopefully knock on wood, I don't know, the way the climate is working, it's still probably be 100 to
Jordon Shaw:102 or 45. One of them.
Kenny Bailey<br>:There's no in between on this. It's sort of like the Sacramento you get a bomb cyclone or 100 degrees, you know, pick one, right? It's just sort of
Tom Regal:so So with that, how's the training coming, then?
Jordon Shaw:I mean, overall, is going well, still struggling with, you know, just life in general, between schedules and work, and I had to do some traveling work. So then go to a city that I don't know, where it pulls at, or various things like that, you know, just just life in general. And it's just, you know, always a challenge everyday is a struggle to make sure I'm continuing with the program and trying to keep my coach from class anatomy.
Tom Regal:Good luck with that. Yeah.
Kenny Bailey<br>:Do you find that one of the things to try to do and I tried to do this, and I don't do it well, all the time. So if you're on business travel, but the idea is that you sort of like maybe my, if I can't do anything, at least I can try to eat better, or try to do some level of thing. Like if I can't do something physical, maybe you know, not order, you know, if it's on the company dime more than you know, you can get a drink, you can grab a dessert, maybe just not do that. If you do try to compensate in some ways, or is it? You just allow yourself to say, look, these three days are gonna be garbage and kind of reset.
Jordon Shaw:Depends on the trip. I've done both routes. The closer I get, the more I'm restricting myself just overall in general, whether I'll travel or not, but
Kenny Bailey<br>:yeah.
Tom Regal:So how did you handle this last business trip? What were you what were some of the things that you did to offset the training or to make up the training? At that point?
Jordon Shaw:It was really, just as Kenny was saying, he watched what I was eating. In the trip before that, I did not do that at all. It was it was bad. But yeah, this last one I wasn't able to work out. But I did get to watch what I eat. didn't, didn't eat over didn't have the desserts didn't didn't have the bad drinks and things like that. But
Tom Regal:But wasn't wasn't able to get the training and wasn't able to get the training. Okay. Okay. That's, that's always been a struggle for business travel. I mean, sometimes you get lucky in the hotel has a half decent fitness center or something that you can at least get some treadmill work in or something like that. But then sometimes schedules just you need sleep. You still need sleep and probably for breakfast and get some sleep all day. So late. So probably sleeps probably more important than trying to stuff a workout in there.
Jordon Shaw:Yeah, and that's the other thing is I have a large conference. I'm going to the week before I say. Two weeks out from the event, not really my really last strong training week. I wouldn't be at a conference all week in San Francisco.
Kenny Bailey<br>:Outstanding. Yeah. So it sounds like if, if we were just to say it sounds like you may be moving to sink to December.
Jordon Shaw:I'm leaning towards that way. Yeah. Sounds like
Kenny Bailey<br>:the hard the hard thing. I think I guess that the thing that I can see would be difficult is if you haven't fully made that decision yet. And you're trying to there's a there's a beautiful kind of pressure to your point when you're eight weeks out, right? It's like you don't skip things, right? To your point, you're like, hey, I better eat appropriately. I need to do my midnight, you know, if it's gotta be midnight, it's got to do that. So you have the foot on your pedal around the gas pedal trying to get to that thing, when you know, like, hey, there's that there's that Inkling I may have to move this, I might have to do this. Is it difficult to keep that foot on the gas pedal to say, well, I need to keep going until until I get that fork in the road until I make that decision. Do you feel like you're sort of in no man's land? Where do you feel that pressure? Or is it is it sometimes difficult to go? Well, you know, yeah,
Jordon Shaw:I mean, I'm still trying to keep him back online then. The one I'm rushing towards when I'm doing it is you know, it's okay, how do I continue this and then you have various projects come up and so it like I said every day is a struggle. You know, I think I mentioned in the last one it's not you sign up for an Ironman and all of a sudden your schedules clear and you get to just have to figure out where to do it and how to prioritize and it's it's a challenge. Oh, yeah.
Kenny Bailey<br>:Yeah. And I think the difference between you know, you're stepping up, you know, from Olympic distance to a half Ironman, right? That's, to a certain extent, you can't hide on some of these things, right? It's gonna be a long day, you know, it's either, you know, it's gonna be eight hours, right? It's, you know, it's gonna be a day. And to try to hide from that, sometimes it's difficult to do it. But if you can do an Olympic, you know, yeah, you need to train for it. But like you said, you know, you can miss a couple of days here, you miss couple days there, it may be a struggle, but it's not going to be this is going to be, you know, in the water at seven, you're not going to be done till you know, three. Right? So there's no hiding. How? How are you? What is going to be your final sort of trigger? When you say, Okay, this, is it, at what point do you give yourself? Is there a time? Like, if I don't feel better by the end of this month? That's it, I'm going to do it? Or are you is it to your point, my daughter's got a thing, I have a business meeting, it's starting to stack, what what, what's gonna be your final sort of,
Jordon Shaw:I actually set a goal for myself to to make the decision by the end of this week. So I can just the mindset of which one I'm doing, because then at that point seven weeks out, I need to be working out every day, and increasing that workout. So it, the end of this week, is what I'm getting it for. And, you know, I think I said before, if I get a DNF, and I give me an F, however, I've put so much time energy money effort into this, it would be extremely disappointing. And it's not the end of the world. There's always another one, but it would be disappointed. So yeah,
Tom Regal:for sure. Well, I
Kenny Bailey<br>:think part of you, I think you're making the right call, right, which is you're trying to balance family, you're trying to balance work, you can try to balance, you know those things. And yes, this is important to you. But at the same time, you know, family, we're, you know, everything else, right. So, hopefully, you know, don't make work. We're gonna assume you're nice. And it's family. We're a
Tom Regal:family. Right? Yeah.
Kenny Bailey<br>:So I think I think they've been I think we should, you know, we'll check back with you next week, obviously, because we want to know what that decision is. And then the question becomes, okay, so if you're, if you're past like you officially call it, you probably need to let off the throttle a little because your training is going to be delayed, not terribly let off the throttle. But you don't need to do the 75 mile bike ride, you know, or the 60 mile bike ride this weekend, you may have to do it. Do you have a sense does your work? You know, family's gonna be family because your family is going to start being headlined, like your kids are gonna be in school and there's gonna be a bunch of cheerleading camps coming up and a lot of stuff going on after September. Does your work have a cyclical nature to it that you feel like it's that that part of your life will allow you to have a little bit more latitude to train or is it going to be a crapshoot?
Jordon Shaw:Yeah, okay. I don't think work could change at all.
Kenny Bailey<br>:How does your How does your your family react to that stuff? Do they support you no matter what or is it is there? I don't want to get you in trouble. Like, are they making you do the cheerleading camp? blink twice?
Jordon Shaw:No, they absolutely my my wife told me it was probably my decision. I want to I want to that's good. Yeah. So and and she's disappointed that she wouldn't be able to come to be there to support me if I did stay with Augusta.
Kenny Bailey<br>:Yeah. So Well, I think on that note, Tom, we should we should get this out. And then we'll do a quick follow up with you and then figure out what we're gonna do. Is that a Jurassic Park cup? You just drink out of it? Absolutely. All right.
Tom Regal:He's very large coffee cup.
Kenny Bailey<br>:Yeah, it is. It has water or coffee. And he has days,
Jordon Shaw:though. Tomorrow, I have an appointment with my doctor and I get to tell him I only drink two cups of coffee a day. That equates to a full picture full pot. But
Kenny Bailey<br>:yeah, I found out our Yeti cups can hold a whole bottle of wine, which is terrible. So just having one Yeti cup of wine. That's it, just having
Tom Regal:a cup of wine.
Kenny Bailey<br>:That's just a cup of wine. So Well, Jordan, we we appreciate you being honest about this. I mean, you're living the struggle that I think most professionals live, right, which is, you know, I've got a life I've got I've got responsibilities, I have things I need to do somehow I got to fit this thing in because I know, we've talked about this before, right? These are you know, when you get across a line, there's nothing like that feeling getting across a line. There's that sense of accomplishment. There's but the same time you got to figure out how to balance that and, you know, I think the last time we talked when you were doing midnight rides, I was like, dang, that's that's some commitment. I know, you probably didn't want to do that, but that's what you needed to do. So you know, we're we're anticipating or anxious about how that decision gets made. And if you do make that decision, you know, how does it change? What do you do? What is your Coach, have you know that you need to change? How are those things going to do? And how can, you know is, again, figure out those creative ways to try to get get this stuff? You know, we live in two worlds at the same time. How do I do a full time job a full time parent and a part time? Workout? Right? Right. So,
Jordon Shaw:so and if I did change, I would try to get scheduled for some local events, because I really need more open water experience. I know, the Anderson beach on a Friday is a big thing. But I'm in Spring Hill. So to get there on Friday morning is just not possible. Yeah, I've got to get some more open water experience, especially if I'm going to swim I am and I like
Kenny Bailey<br>:where we just move your house. So we're just take some always nice this time of year. So you're thinking the wrong way. I need you to a lake
Jordon Shaw:way of thinking yes.
Tom Regal:I like that. So awesome. So we'll be we'll be checking in this will probably post up next week. So that'll be technically seven weeks out, you will have made your decision at that point. But we're not going to be leaking it to everybody. Because then we'll catch up with you a couple weeks after that. And, and we'll get the we'll get the lowdown on what's happening, where you're at all that fun stuff. So make sure everybody's subscribed so you can follow along. We appreciate all your feedback. All your thoughts, all your questions, keep them coming. Let us know. And Jordan, thank you so much. We appreciate you sharing your story with us. We're having a good time following along. So for and for everybody. We'll catch you next time