What You Missed This Week: Earth Day, Burn Out, and the Olympics

This week, our the news and notes from around the tri world featured revelations from Daniela Ryf on evaluating happiness and honesty over the last year, and an Olympic Trials swim from Lucy Charles-Barclay.

But we don’t just pay attention to triathlon news. We also pay attention to everything happening in the endurance world, training, and the outdoors. Here were some of the things you might have missed and some of our favorites from the swim-bike-run-sports science-outdoors world this week.

From around the web

• I’ve spent a lot of time lately reading and thinking about burnout, professionally (as so many of us are struggling with it right now) but also how it affects athletes. We’ve seen a lot of athletes re-evaluating things in the last year. I appreciated this practical piece from the Harvard Business Review on what does and doesn’t work at a company level to address individual burnout.
• And relatedly, but not completely related, I also appreciated this insight from The Growth Equation on creating productive activity in training through close paying attention (not mindlessness)—which includes this poem from Mary Oliver:

Instructions for living a life.
Pay attention.
Be Astonished.
Tell About it.

• I also paid a lot of attention this week to some of the confusion and discussion on social around the Pro Triathletes Organization’s rankings—and the Witsup explanation of how it works. (Instagram, Witsup)
• And the news that Simone Biles left Nike to move to Athleta. Gymnastics isn’t generally considered an endurance sport, and I know almost nothing about it, but Biles is one of the greatest athletes of all time and between her and Allyson Felix, Nike has lost some big Olympics names going into the Olympics. (Wall Street Journal, Youtube)
• There are lots of Youtube videos and channels of triathletes doing triathlete things. (One of our favorites, of course, is That Triathlon Life, which comes out on Sundays and follows pro tri couple Eric Lagerstrom and Paula Findlay.) This, though, is a fun new one of an everyday athlete tackling the Grand Teton Triathlon—a made-up event designed to challenge and push himself. (Youtube)
• We all could use these photos of rescued farm animals. (Nat Geo)

From the Outside network—our sibling brands

• On Earth Day, we highlighted the campaign we’ve partnered with Soles4Souls on to give you a way to recycle your old shoes instead of throwing them away. But Women’s Running has a bunch more recycling programs listed here.
• PodiumRunner also has an in-depth look at what goes into making sustainable shoes.
• Backpacker and Outside have the gripping and terrifying story of a group of hikers targeted by a murderer on the Appalachian Trail.
• Have you built fatigue resistance? (Outside)
• And if you haven’t watched the International Swimming League, then you’ve been missing one of the most exciting things in sports in the last year. You’ve also missed out on a complicated plan to bring down the Olympics and the political power behind it. (Outside)

For our Outside+ members

• As racing (and training) gets going again, we’re all getting a little sore. Yoga Journal has stretches for cyclists and ten exercises to help mother runners strengthen those key muscles.
• Did you know who Toni St. Pierre is? Me either. In 1972, as a teenager, she sued the state of Minnesota to be allowed to compete in cross-country—which, at the time, was only a boys’ sport. (PodiumRunner)

Fun fact: In various research and tests, when asked to solve problems, we almost never take things away. We always want to add things instead. Don’t fall into this trap, especially in sports. (Ars Technica)