And so it begins ...

8:00 am on a cold (low 30's) Saturday morning usually finds most of us sleeping in bed or at least thinking its way too cold to get out of bed. But the better way to spend an early cold Saturday morning is to join all of your friends for a leisurely jog through Central Park as we begin our training for the Capital of Texas, St Anthony's and Gulf Coast Triathlons.

That's right yesterday was our very first GTS or Group Training Session. From now, until the race, I will start off Saturday early in the morning with a GTS. Either a run or a bike or a bike/run combo known as a BRick. Today's training was a social run (with some squats and walking lunges thrown in for good measure) although many of my friends may find it to be an oxymoron to include social and run together. The purpose of this run was to get to know our new teammates and to begin to acclimate our bodies to the training that we will be doing for the next six months.

The other thing that happens at the beginning of most of the group training sessions is the mission moment. This is where different member of the team speak about their personal connections to the cause or why they are training. Many people on the team have very personal connections where parents, children, siblings, other family members or loved ones have been personally affected by leukemia, lymphoma or other blood cancers. One of the things I learned last year when I did my first triathlon with Team in Training was how many people I know had personal connections.

At yesterday's GTS, one of the honored teammates gave the mission moment. The honored teammates are cancer survivors who are training with us for these events. He spoke about during his chemotherapy treatments, when the doctors would ask how he was doing, his response would be "Can't Stop Now." During this season, if a run get hard or our legs get tired during the bike, or we feel we can't swim another stroke, the little voice that says "You're tired, why not take a break" is replaced by a new voice, "Can't Stop Now".