Part of me wanted to be an athlete.
A secret part of me.
I didn’t dare say it too loudly because people would laugh, people would most surely laugh. I was the girl who injured herself playing miniature golf. I was the girl who described herself with a perpetual weight problem and physical inadequacies. I wasn’t coordinated. I wasn’t on a team. I wasn’t going to win anything. Competition of any kind made me so nervous I wanted to roll up into a ball, plug my ears, and forget the whole damn thing.

I was not an athlete.
And yet . . .
And yet there was something inside of me that whispered I was. Ridiculous, right?
I’m not an athlete. I mean, I exercise to stay healthy and lose weight.

But I’m not an athlete, even as I write this book. And yet . . .

And yet, I ran and swam and biked and trained. And yet, I raced in triathlons and Ironmans and marathons. And yet, I wrote the book. “I Thought You’d Be Faster: The Quest To Be An Athlete” is the memoir of my life as an adult-onset athlete. Sports have always played a big role in my life, from a childhood where I heard stories about the golden days of baseball from my grandmother to my career as a sportswriter. But I was always an observer, always on the outside. Until I could no longer ignore this calling to participate, to try to be an athlete.

But even as I ran marathons and completed an Ironman, I still had doubts about whether I could call myself an athlete. The more I talked to other people, especially other women, the more I found out I was not alone. “I Thought You’d Be Faster” explores this idea of identity and what it what means to call yourself an athlete. (Hint: You don’t have to be fast or “good” to be an athlete by my definition.)

The book is now available at Amazon in both paperback and Kindle versions! I’d love to hear what you think!

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