Mental aspect tougher than the physical wear and tear

Prior to competing in the Ironman Arizona triathlon, Ben Borcher and Reanne Wolff had endured everything necessary to prepare — physically.

Then came the freezing water, 20 mile-per-hour headwinds and a run that never seemed to end.

For most of the annual 140-mile swim, cycle and run held in Tempe, Ariz., Borcher and Wolff found themselves battling their brains to the finish line, not their bodies.

“Physically I felt ready for this race ... but I never gave any mental clout to the race,” Borcher said.

“Nothing we had done during training prepared you for what the triathlon does to you mentally,” Wolff added.

When the spring weather replaced winter for good in April, Borcher, 33, and Wolff, 38, both of Powell, began training for long marathons. Hours of swimming, biking and running, paired with a strict diet (which was agreed upon with a contract signing), encompassed the two athletes as they readied themselves for Tempe.

Borcher and Wolff were so gung ho about competing that they decided to contribute to a good cause in the process. They signed up for the triathlon under the charity Smile Train, an organization that raises money for corrective surgeries for children born with cleft lips and palates.

The athletes were required to raise $5,000 each through fundraisers and donations, but instead brought in over $14,000 in total to the charity. The two competitors were helped by their families and friends, and shortly after, traveled to Arizona for the Nov. 15 race.

“After going through all of the training, and raising the money ... and after everything our families had put up with over the past seven months, with the training and fundraising and all that, it was a relief to finally get going,” Borcher said. “And once we started, we knew we had to finish no matter what.”

It wasn’t going to be easy. Starting temperatures sat around 50 degrees as the nearly 3,000 athletes took to the open water course for the swim at 7 a.m. Borcher and Wolff said the water was cold, but the effects weren’t fully felt until they took to their bikes 2.4 miles later.

“You get out of the water, and you’re freezing cold,” Wolff said. “And then you get on your bike for this 37-mile loop, and these 20-mile-an-hour headwinds are just blasting you, and you’re freezing even more because you’re soaking wet.”

Borcher and Wolff said that later reports described winds reaching speeds of 25 miles-per-hour with gusts hitting 35. And if the headwinds weren’t bad enough, when the thousands of bikers, all cramped together on one path, reached the halfway point of the loop, headwinds became tailwinds that created trouble for overzealous cyclists.

“You’d look around and people were crashing, there were ambulances coming and going, it was getting pretty dangerous if you didn’t know how to handle yourself,” Borcher said. “It was such a mind game just to stay focused on the task at hand.”

That task was finishing, and to stay focused, Borcher admitted that amongst thousands of other bikers, he began praying and even singing out loud, encouraging himself to keep going.

“I did whatever it took to stay on track,” Borcher said. “Reanne and I trained in the wind, we trained in the rain ... but it was nothing like [Arizona]. That was just brutal.”

Both Borcher and Wolff said that the biggest motivator to finish was the support and commitment they saw from their families over the long haul prior to the race. Borcher joked that had his involvement in the triathlon been on “my own dime,” he may have dropped out before the finish line.

Instead, Borcher finished the race in 14:55:08, taking 155th place in the men’s 30-34 age division out of the 185 racers that finished. Wolff, competing in the 35-39 women’s division, finished 73rd out of 120 finishers in a time of 14:41:11. Just finishing had both Borcher and Wolff gushing with relief, as hundreds of competitors never saw the end.

“When I finished, that was such a weight off my shoulders,” Wolff said. “I felt terrible when it was finally over, I hugged my family and had to sit down immediately. I don’t even think I ate a real meal for three or four days afterward. It was such a toll on my body.”

Borcher felt the effects hours later, when he went to the bathroom in his hotel room and fainted. He didn’t return to his normal workout routine until Nov. 24.

“It just did so much damage to my body ... I don’t think Reanne and I realized how much it was going to impact us physically,” Borcher said. “It took time to just feel normal again.”

But for all the wear and tear the triathlon put their minds and bodies through, Borcher and Wolff admitted they felt a sense of accomplishment finishing the grueling race, and even a slight urge to do it all over again.

“There’s nothing else really like it,” Wolff said. “To be able to say you got through that, when so many others didn’t ... to say you finished ... that’s pretty special.”

“It changes you. I definitely feel different after going through that,” Borcher added. “And would I do it again? Absolutely.”