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For thirteen years, Endorphin Fitness has seen fitness and endurance sports be a catalyst for positive change in individuals. Though our core products are coaching and retail, our heart rest in the impact these services have on people’s lives. With this heart, we have always had a stirring to expand this mission and reach more people through fitness.

Our athletes raced hard this weekend in what many of you know was a very cold weekend of early season races. Big congrats to everyone who braved the weather and gave it their all this weekend.

A proper warm up is key to your next triathlon though often ignored. For some reason, athletes often ignore a warm up before a race though they would never do this before a practice. A proper warm up raises your core body temperature, improves muscle performance (faster contractions), primes several physiological systems to withstand intensity efficiently, and decreases your risk of injury. If you want to race your best, you will place a priority on your warm up. Now, how is it done? Below, I will give a short course triathlon warm up for someone who is comfortable completing the race distance but then go into detail on exceptions (including long course) to this below that. It is important to note that this is a general recommendation and that your warm up should be individualized to what you find works best for you.

Congratulations to everyone who raced this weekend! We have many races to report on, including the Spring Thaw mountain bike race, the NASA Elite Showcase invitational meet, the Chris Hind’s Sunshine Crit, a sprint triathlon in Bermuda, and numerous middle school track meets.

I don’t consider myself a masochist, but then again, I have been training (hard) for endurance sports for over 25 years. Endurance sports demand you to establish a certain comfort with pain in a way that not all sports demand. To reach the top of the sport, you must embrace this pain at a level reached by few. With that said, there are many middle-of-the-pack athletes who can embrace pain at the same level as the best. Pain connects us as endurance athletes – from the first finisher to the last – as we all experience it and learn to push through.