I Wasn't Always This Woman

Why My Road to 65 Might Actually Be About You

Last week, I introduced something I'm calling my Road to 65.

For the next six months, leading up to my 65th birthday, I'm sharing what I'm doing to prepare my body for the next decade of my life.

The strength training.

The food.

The recovery.

The nervous system work.

The mobility.

The cardio.

The boring basics.

The good days and the days when real life gets in the way.

But after I shared it, I thought about something.

Why should you care about my Road to 65?

Seriously.

Why should another woman care that I'm turning 65 or what I'm doing to prepare for it?

And I realized there's something I need you to know.

I Wasn't Always This Woman

If you only know me as I am today, it would be easy to assume I've always been athletic.

I haven't.

I was overweight as a teenager.

I struggled with fad dieting, body image issues, and spent years believing that changing my body meant making it smaller, not healthier.

Then I became a mom.

And like so many women, my weight went up and down through different seasons.

Raising kids.

Working.

Taking care of everyone.

Trying different diets.

Starting again.

And trying to squeeze myself somewhere onto the list of people who needed taking care of.

Fitness wasn't always part of my identity.

Being an athlete certainly wasn't.

In fact, I didn't start doing triathlons until I was 47 years old.

That one decision eventually led to things the younger version of me never would have imagined.

Marathons.

Triathlons.

Spartan races.

An Ironman finish at 59.

Adventures across the country and around the world.

And perhaps most importantly, a level of trust in my body that I never had when I was younger.

But here's what I want you to understand:

The woman you see today wasn't hiding somewhere underneath waiting to be discovered.

I BUILT HER.

One Choice at a Time

There wasn't one transformation.

There wasn't a magic diet.

There wasn't a 30-day challenge that suddenly turned me into this version of myself.

It happened slowly.

One boring basic.

One workout.

One choice.

One hard season.

One "I'll try."

One "I'll start again."

At a time.

And there have been plenty of setbacks along the way.

I've missed goals.

I've had injuries.

I've had seasons when training went beautifully and seasons when life had completely different plans.

I've started over more times than I could count.

But maybe that's the point.

We don't become strong because life stops interrupting us.

We become strong because we learn how to keep coming back.

My Goals Don't Need to Be Your Goals

This is where my Road to 65 becomes less about me.

You don't need to do an Ironman.

You don't need to run a marathon.

You don't need to climb a Spartan obstacle.

And you definitely don't need to jump off a 20-inch box.

Those are some of the things I chose.

Your strong should look like your life.

Maybe you want to travel without worrying whether your body can keep up.

Maybe you want to get down on the floor with your grandchildren — and get back up without thinking about it.

Maybe you want to hike.

Garden.

Play pickleball.

Carry your own groceries,

or your granddaughter.

Lift your suitcase into the overhead bin.

Live independently.

Keep doing the work you love.

Have enough energy to care for the people you love without completely losing yourself.

Or simply say YES when someone asks:

"Want to go?"

Those goals count.

In fact, I think they're some of the most important goals we can train for.

Train It Here. Use It Out There.

That's become one of the biggest philosophies behind the way I train and coach.

I call it Train & Transfer.

The gym isn't the destination.

It's practice.

We squat so we can get up and down.

We carry weights so we can carry groceries, luggage and grandbabies.

We train balance because staying on our feet matters.

We build muscle because muscle helps us remain capable and independent as we age.

We work on our nervous system because strength isn't only about how much muscle we have. It's also about how well our brain and body communicate.

Train it here. Use it out there.

That's the transfer.

I don't train so I can carry heavier weights in the gym.

I train so I can carry my granddaughter through a garden on the other side of the world.

So Why Should You Care About My Road to 65?

Maybe you shouldn't.

Maybe my goals aren't remotely interesting to you.

That's okay.

But maybe watching me prepare for 65 will get you thinking differently about preparing for your next decade.

That's why I'm sharing this.

Not so you'll copy my workouts.

Not so you'll eat exactly what I eat.

Not so you'll chase my goals.

I want you to see that it isn't that hard, take more time, or complicated.

I want you to start asking better questions about your own life.

What do I want my body to still be able to do five years from now?

Ten years from now?

Twenty?

And what can I do today to give myself the best possible chance of being that woman?

Because I'm not spending the next six months fighting getting older.

I'm training for it.

And I'm definitely not training for a smaller body.

I'm training for a bigger life.

Maybe somewhere along my Road to 65, you'll start thinking about your road, too.

Because wherever you're starting from…

Strong Starts Now. ❤️