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Going the distance Iron-distance triathlon tests colonel's mettle

  • Published
  • By Kimberly L. Wright
  • Air University Public Affairs
MAXWELL AIR FORCE BASE, Ala. --  "I never thought of it as being crazy," said Lt. Col. James Barber, commander of the 42nd Medical Support Squadron, of his recent completion of his first iron-distance triathlon, a combination of running, swimming and biking for 140.6 miles of endurance-challenging sport.

Colonel Barber took up the challenge at the Beach2Battleship Full and One-half Iron Distance Triathlon Nov. 7 in Wilmington and Wrightsville Beach, N.C. The event started at Wrightsville Beach, where swimmers took to the salty waters for a 2.4-mile course. The 112-mile bike course takes competitors from Wrightsville Beach, through Wilmington and then up towards White Lake in rural North Carolina. The last event, the run, was a 26-mile course that started and ended at the Battleship North Carolina.

Colonel Barber completed the triathlon despite facing many trials, the length of the course and the hazards within. The race started with a dip in the cold water off the Atlantic coast. "It was 36 degrees at the swim start, and the water temperature was 65 degrees," he said. "So I froze. The swim took me about an hour and two minutes. So I was a Popsicle, basically, when I came out of the water. I had to stand in medical showers to warm up before I could feel any fingers or my feet to continue." The time in the shower cost him about 10 minutes.

Being a Good Samaritan cost Colonel Barber time on the bike course, as he spent approximately 15 minutes helping a fellow triathlete with a flat tire. "On the bike, one of the women's tires flatted out, and all of the guys were passing her," he said. "I figured, all I wanted to do was finish. I wasn't looking to win or anything like that."

The flat bug bit his bike next, with only seven miles left to go in the course. "When it pinch flatted, it blew the sidewall of the tire off," he said. "I couldn't change just the tube because now the tire was shot." He waited about 20-30 minutes for tech support to give him another tire. "It was definitely an interesting day, to say the least," he mused.

Determination helped Colonel Barber reach the finish line despite the setbacks he faced. "I guess I could've given up after I got out of the cold water, but I thought, I'd trained for this for almost a year, so there was no way I was giving up," he said. "And then when my tire flatted, I could have given up then. I could have said, 'Man, too much had gone on today. I'll come back next year,' but I didn't, and fortunately, tech support came up and brought me another tire."

Colonel Barber began participating in triathlons in 2005 while he was stationed at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa. "You can almost do a triathlon every weekend in Tampa," he said. An avid runner, he started feeling soreness in his knees if he ran too much, and so he branched out into running programs that featured cross-training. "You'd run a day and you'd bike the next day, he said. "I figured if I was cross-training I might as well put it to use, so I started doing triathlons."

His family's support and interest kept him motivated while training. "My wife does triathlons. My kids do triathlons," he said. "What's nice about it is it's a family thing. I don't get in trouble for going and training all the time. My family comes with me all the time when I do it."

Colonel Barber spent 24 weeks preparing for the triathlon, beginning back in May, with what is termed two-a-days in the sports world, or double training sessions." I swim and run the same day, and the next day I'll bike and lift weights," he said. "So I'd swim on base in the pool, and then, on the weekends I get my long run and try to get a long bike in on the weekends," he said.

Coming from a running background and having run in two marathons, he felt pretty prepared for the running portion of the triathlon. He prepared for the bike portion by taking part in two century rides, or rides of 100 miles, the 2009 Glassner Autumn Challenge century ride in rural Montgomery County and another century ride in Tennessee, his home state. "Those two long rides really prepped me," he said. "Fortunately, around here, believe it not, it's pretty hilly, so I got to ride a lot of hills, especially in Tennessee. Fortunately, the course for the race was pretty flat."

The swimming portion of the triathlon worried Colonel Barber the most. "I have a tendency to sink, and I don't come from a swimming background so the 10-year-olds at the Y have a tendency to pass me," he said.

Fortunately, the salinity of the ocean water worked in his favor. "Swimming in salt water is a lot more buoyant than swimming in the base pool," he said. "Because salt water is more dense, it makes you more buoyant, so you don't sink."

He encouraged anyone interested in endurance events to not let fear or self-doubt prevent them from working to achieve their goals. "Nothing is impossible if you train the body to do it," he said. "And not everybody who does Iron Man comes from the athletic mold. There were several people who did not have the athletic mold-type body that completed it."

The event is about 85-percent mental and 15-percent physical, said Colonel Barber. "After 14 hours, your mind plays some serious games on you. So as long as you have the mental aspect, don't give up. You just have to train for it and have the right mindset."

He advised potential endurance athletes to start small. "Do some of the shorter races and work your way up," said Colonel Barber. "Probably my biggest piece of advice would be anybody can do it if they dedicated the time to train for it. Everybody has God-given abilities. They just need the dedication to apply themselves."

Colonel Barber also advised fellow Airmen to embrace a variety of physical activities to keep physical training from becoming boring. "With the new PT standards now, if you have to stay in shape, you might as well stay in shape doing something fun," he said. "If all I did was run, pushups and situps, I think it would get old after a while. That's why I break it up a little bit. I run, do weights, bike when running gets boring. When running gets boring, I jump in the pool and swim."

Colonel Barber's next race is the of the more customary one-sport variety, the Country Music Marathon in Nashville, Tenn., in April. "Not sure I'd do another iron man anytime soon just because it took up so much of my time," he said. "But I'll continue to do the endurance events just to stay in shape. You only have so many endurance events in your body, so I figure I might as well do it while I'm young."