Fizkult-hello! This Soviet sports cry completely reflects my state of mind for the last year and a half. Triathlete and novice Ironman — it's all about me. I am — Alexander Shchedrov from the suburbs of Riga, I am 34 years old, the father of two small children.
Being a lighting specialist, about 10 years ago I opened a family business for electrical design and since then I have been slowly but surely moving in the direction of stress, nerves, fuss, unnecessary aggression. To say that I am a novice athlete would mean at least a slight inaccuracy in terms. From a very young age I was a fan of football and in the presence of a cottage by the sea for more than a dozen years in a row I spent the summer months kneading warm sand with my heels near the heads of vacationers.
At the age of fifteen, an arrow of Cupid pierced my fragile youthful heart..the Ican basketball genius Michael Jordan. I woke up only 5 years later with a meniscus injury in the doctor's office, claiming that it was a trivial matter and in 3-4 weeks I would be plowing three-point spaces from dreams. There will be no happy ending. It took a year to correct the words and actions of this specialist, who is very famous in Latvia, by the way, numerous pictures, rehabilitation, procedures and another operation. The world collapsed — it's about me at that time. A man who did not pay attention to the girls, but only, you know, dragged his bag in any weather on two transports across the city and back every day by seven in the evening for training. The verdict of the second smart doctor was harsh — you won't be able to do sports anymore, at least at the level at which you plan to...
It's been 12 years. Like a line from the credits in a movie. The time has not passed in vain. I directed the released time and energy into a sound channel. I studied in Riga, in Moscow, gained experience. Sometimes, in fits of rationalism, I am even glad that everything happened like this, because otherwise the best thing I could count on now is to sit on the “bank” in the top league or be a coach of Latvian regional hopeless basketball players on a global scale for 300 “rubles”.
I always weighed a lot before marriage — 85 kg with a height of 177cm and in family life I turned out to be the rule, not the exception. I quickly became a member of hundreds, but not of Forbes billionaires, but of electronic figures on scales that belonged to me. The muscles and ligaments of my left leg atrophied and ordinary life became a problem for me. Stairs, rain, getting up from the sofa, going for a walk somewhere — all this meant heaviness, pain, laziness, poor health. And then there is also a completely inappropriate specialist-manualist of the version “we treat one thing-we cripple another”, which was designed to eliminate the nerve clamp in the ribs. With my luck in the areas of health, you can not mention the acute pain and crunch of the shoulder at the moment of a jerk in a 15-degree room.
But there is a silver lining. After suffering with my shoulder for a year, I just stopped using it. The hand was clearly losing in size to its colleague. Yes, what is there in size. I couldn't even throw the ball into the ring from the shield in the yard. Until it's time to “STOP” — December 15, 2011. Swimming pool. The first 25 meters. Shortness. Kilometer. Two-piece. I realized, here it is, there are sports that I could do, I will like them, I just have to try, a little bit. Overcome yourself. Where are you, an active fellow? I know you're inside somewhere, I couldn't lose you, you're just sleeping. I have to wake you up!
On January 15, 2012, I began my crusade, as it would be convenient for anyone — or to a new elastic life or from my fat piece of myself — thanks to the SUPERSTAS from the Comedy Club for such precise, rapier-striking statements.
In this post, I will not touch on the details of this campaign, I will use the editing function again, as it is worthy of a separate series of posts about weight loss and nutrition. One thing I can say — from the jersey number of NHL legend Wayne Gretzky 99, I dropped 24 kilograms in a year! And, of course, one diet was not enough.
Enthusiastically engaged in swimming, I did not notice how spring came. And if everything was green, blue and yellow on the street, then the expanses of the Internet were filled with articles about a healthy lifestyle, sports and so on. And, as often happens, an essay about triathlon caught my eye. What's it? Can't be? After all, I've been driving to work on my old Start Highway for 2 years now… After all, it means… It was with such dots as a swarm of bees in the hive that another dangerous sports fan puzzle was going to be in my head. So I just have to learn how to run forward evenly? "Simple." Well, yes, it's simple.
To be continued.
UPDATE: Alexander finished the full IRONMAN distance in Barcelona on October 5, 2014 in an excellent 10 hours, 43 minutes and 2 seconds for an amateur.
