Marathon and Triathlon: Taylor Sparks

March 16, 2005

EnduranceRadio.com

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “Welcome back to EnduranceRadio.com.  Thanks for joining us for another interview today.  We’re going to be speaking with Taylor Sparks.  She’s a new triathlete and has done one marathon and one triathlon, so we’re going to get an opinion from a newer triathlete and find out what got her into the sport and how’s she training and how’s she’s trying to improve and what she actually gets out of participating in these endurance events.

First things first, the Race of the Day today is the Riverwood Golf and Athletic Club Triathlon.  It’s on Saturday, April 16, 2005.  You can find out more about this race by clicking on the Race of the Day Link right below the link to this audio.

So we’re going to be right back to speak with newbie triathlete Taylor Sparks in about 30 seconds.”

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<<Tim Bourquin>>: “Taylor thanks very much for talking with us today, I appreciate you taking the time.”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “Thank you very much for having me, I’m excited to be here.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “What got you into the sport of triathlon and into endurance sports?”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “Well it was something really simple, it was just a postcard in the mail from Team in Training about getting involved in and trying to complete a marathon or a triathlon and they were going to coach me how to do it, and I’ve thought of doing one, but this sounded like it would be something I might enjoy doing so I kind of took a stab at it and it wasn’t that bad.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “So tell us about the first triathlon you did, what was that experience like?”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “I did the marathon first, which was the Disney Marathon.  We had five months of training and it was hard, it was tough.  I didn’t even run at all when I first started the training.  I couldn’t even complete one mile without having to stop, huff and puff and breathe.  I mean I’m in my early 40’s and I never did kind of endurance event.  They trained me and coached me and I did my first Disney Marathon in January and that was exciting.  It was 25, 000 people, it was cold but I did it and I finished it and of course it took me six hours and 45 minutes to finish as a newbie and the winner, I think, was done like in two hours and 19 minutes and had enough time to go home, eat, shower, shave, watch a movie and come back and go, ‘Yeah, Taylor!’ as I came across the finish line, but as I have learned endurance events its all about the hardware and t-shirts.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “How did it feel when you crossed the finish line?”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “I was so excited; I could not believe I had actually put my body through this.  I couldn’t believe I had actually done it.  I cried a little bit, you know, I got a little girly for a moment, but it was thrilling.  I did it for a couple of good reasons; not only to get myself in shape but also to raise money for Team in Training for Leukemia Society, so it was great for both reasons.  I accomplished two things at the same time so it was really thrilling.  Then I opted, six months later, to do the triathlon and I also decided to stick with Team in Training because the coaching was so good, and I thought, ‘Well how much training could there possibly be for my triathlon,’ and then I got the training schedule, with three days of running, three days of biking and three days of swimming and I was like, ‘Isn’t that nine days?  There aren’t nine days in a week are there?”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “But it didn’t dissuade I guess from continuing?”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “No, no.  I did it, I did that again.  It wasn’t as hard as the marathon actually.  I think people think the triathlon is harder, but I really found it not to be as hard.  I found the marathon to be a lot harder.  I did the sprint distance, which was a 750 yard swim, 19 mile bike ride with a 3.1 mile run, and fortunately it was the good training that I had.  Training is so essential, you just can’t get out there and do these things without having the proper coaching, and whether that coaching comes through Team in Training or you get out with a club that have coaches, it is so important.  But I did it, that was a lot of fun.  I was just kind of afraid about the swimming portion and being out there in the middle of the lake because, here again; I took a challenge to do something I hadn’t done before.  I had never swam that far before.  I’d biked that far and I’ve that far, of course, when I did the marathon, but the swimming was the challenge for me.  I was afraid that I just wasn’t going to make it around the mileage and back, but I did and again it was a lot of fun.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “So when you finished the triathlon did you think, ‘I want to continue on with triathlons,’ or are you going to go back and do some other marathons?  Which was your favorite?”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “Well I like them both for different reasons.  I don’t know if I’m going to do another triathlon because I kind of made a pact with God that if he didn’t let me drown I would never do this again, but since that time has come I actually am going to participate in another event this year.  I’ve already signed on to do the Nike Women’s Marathon in October and I’m probably going to try to do a triathlon here in North Carolina some time round July.  So I have to decide which one, theres a few different things that are coming up, but I’m going to do them both again.  Now I don’t know why I’m doing them because first it was all about Team in Training and we’re going to raise the money, but now I guess it’s the bragging rights.  There are lots of people that do it, but so many I know just don’t do anything.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “Were you athletic before this or were you a couch potato and said, ‘I need to do something, I need to get out there and make some changes.’?”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “I used to be active and then I got married and had them babies and that slowed me down tremendously only because I slowed me down.  I was so busy focused on the family and my husband, the kids and I was working full time and had a business on the side.  I had become a couch potato, but self-imposed.  My family didn’t say, ‘Don’t you ever go do anything for yourself again.’  I did this to myself, so I had to say, ‘You know what, I’m going to make some changes in my life right now by making some changes, so I’m going to get out here and do this thing because I need to be healthy not only for myself but I need to be healthy for my family.’  We have young children and I want to be around for my kids a long time, so the best thing for me to do was to get involved again and be active again.  So I got my kids involved and everybody’s got bikes now and I bought my husband a bike and we hit the trails here in North Carolina and it’s just better for the whole family all around, so it’s been a good impact on the family.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “Now I think a lot of people when they first start out they wonder not only how they’re just going to complete the race itself, but how they’re going to fit in the time for the training because theres never enough hours in the day it seems.  How did you balance your training time and the children and life in general?”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “The first thing for me was making the decision that I was going to do it.  The schedule that we got, a lot of the time the training was on my own and the first thing I found out, for me, six o’clock in the morning is the best time to run, for me, and I know some people that run at six o’clock in the evening, that’s the best time to run for them.  We all have the same 24 hours in a day; no one has any more time than anybody else.  You have to make the decision; my husband would go to work early some days and I would say, ‘No, these are the days that I need to workout and train so don’t go in extra early just because you want to go in extra early.  You need to be here and get the kids off to school some mornings because this is what I want to do right now.’  So we compromised, not that anybody wanted to get early Saturday morning anyway in my house, so I left the house just fine on Saturday morning and by the time I got back from training they were just getting out of bed.  So it was just a decision that I was going to do this.  Some people won’t make that decision, some people are like, ‘I’m not getting a half an hour early to workout,’ and I said, ‘Well your belly will always sit in your lap if you do that, but I’m going to do it,’ and it wasn’t that hard.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “Yes, just a matter of deciding that you were going to do it and making it happen; you’ve got some discipline obviously.”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “Oh gosh yes.  I did; and it’s cold now even.  I’m here in North Carolina, its cold, and although my marathon is not until October I decided to start training early, I’ve been going out with the team early and training with the Spring session already, but it was 19 degrees here a couple of Saturday mornings ago and I did not want to get out of bed and I’m like, ‘If I don’t get out this bed I’m not going to ever get out this bed any other day during the week, even when it gets warmer,’  So its even harder to get out when its colder, but you just have to.  Thirty minutes is no time to get out for a quick run and once a week do a long run, and I’m a slow runner so for me to get out and do 12 miles or so I’m out there almost three hours, but I do it early, I get it out the way and I feel much better, much better for it.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “For some people, who don’t know, talk about Team in Training works and how they raise money and how they train together and that sort of thing.”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “Well Team in Training is the largest endurance sports training program in the country, if not probably the world, and it is the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and what they do is they train and coach people, over 35% of the people that come on board with them are new to endurance sports, to complete a marathon, half marathon, century ride or triathlon.  In exchange for the training and the coaching you raise money for the Society and every session has different events that you can pick from and each event, depending on where you are in the country, has a certain monetary amount that has to be raised; 80% of the money that you raise in the city that you’re in goes to local patients that are suffering and having issues with Leukemia and Lymphoma, which is a blood cancer.  Twenty per cent of the money that you raise pays your airfare, your hotel, your entry fee and your pre and post parties and meals.  Its one of the best ways to get from one event to the next without spending a lot of money and you are helping to find a cure and help people who need assistance with blood cancer, you can’t beat it.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “Are you doing mostly those local races that are around you or are you traveling to do some of these as well?”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “Most of them you travel from wherever you are because Team in Training has slots in most of the national races and theres some that may be close to your state, but a lot of the races are pretty much national races.  For example, I going to be a mentor at Team in Training this session to help mentor the new people that are coming on board and I’m going to do the Nike Women’s Marathon which is in San Francisco.  Now my triathlon actually happened to be in Charlotte, so I’m right outside of Raleigh, so that was a close event but I also did the Disney Marathon.  There are people of course in Massachusetts and Massachusetts chapters can do the Boston Marathon, so each chapter and each state has certain distances that they go and depending on how large the event will dictate how many Team in Training members can actually come to that.  So something like Disney, I think, almost every chapter in the state participates in because it holds 25,000 people, but the Boston Marathon does not, so we had 2,500 people that actually went to Disneyworld from all across the country for Team in Training.  They raised, I think, over $1 million for just that session alone.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “You mentioned before that you made a compromise in terms of schedule about your husband’s work and that sort of thing.  What kind of suggestions would you make for somebody who is trying to balance life and training that way?  Obviously having the support of your spouse has got to be really important.”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “Oh my gosh, it is very important.  And when I say that, with regards to compromise with his work, I don’t mean that he went into work late, I just meant that if I typically getting up early and getting the kids out to school, those mornings that I went out to train, he got up and got the kids out to school.  I would be back by the time he needed to get off to go to work.  But I’ve been a single parent as well, and when you’re a single parent, that’s when you’ve got to buy the jogger and you’ve got to wrap the baby up and you have to take the baby with you, if you’ve just got one child.  You know there is a way to get it done.  You may not do it five and six days a week, you may only be able to train three and four days a week because you need to have somebody watch your kids, or you have to wrap the kids up or get them out to school first, or you may be able only to do it in the evening, but it can be done and you have to reach out and get support from friends and family so that you can make sure that you are in the best of health for yourself and especially if you have children; you’ve got to do it for you for them.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “Taylor, wrapping this up now, we’re just about out of time, what’s ahead for you?  What are your goals, what do you want to accomplish this year and beyond?”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “Well definitely for this year I want to accomplish that Nike Women’s Marathon in San Francisco, that’s my biggest goal, and I’m going to work with Team in Training again as a mentor and to help other be able to accomplish their goals.  For me, working with them, and even when I joined Team in Training I didn’t even know anyone that had Leukemia, and I just did it because I believed in what they do.  I want to help people help them to meet their goals this year for their health and to get involved in endurance training sports because it’s a wonderful thing.”

<<Tim Bourquin>>: “Thanks Taylor very much for talking with us, and we’ll be linking to the Team in Training site below the link to this audio.  Taylor thanks very much for your time, I appreciate it.”

<<Taylor Sparks>>: “Thank you Tim, I appreciate your time.”

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