Sylvia Greer - Sister, Socks, and Swollen Knees
What started with a text message saying yes to the EcoChallenge (with zero experience in adventure racing) turned out to be this lifetime opportunity that Sylvia Greer will remember forever – swollen knees, messy hair, and all!
Sylvia is part of the Team Sundance Kids that competed in the World's Toughest Race EcoChallenge: Fiji. She’s an ultra runner and does very long-distance trail runs (think about 100 and 200-mile races) – but she has never experienced a race of this magnitude!
Here are some of the life lessons that she took from such an amazing experience:
1. You can’t take gear management for granted.
Everyone has a first time dealing with Amazon and dealing with the race production which was very thorough. There was a lot of mandatory gear and things to read and things to get back to them. Everything can be so overwhelming so it helps to keep everything organized. Have a list of all the gears you need to make sure you’ve got everything covered.
2. Being capable does not require that you have to think that you're capable every day.
It ebbs and it flows. It's a journey and a process that you have to continue showing up for. Then eventually, inside yourself, you will find this new limit that you put out there that’s incredibly empowering. If you can put your mind to something emotionally, you can get through those hard things. And sometimes, all you need to do is just cry it out then move on to the next section.
3. Your team can only go as fast as your slowest team member.
When you’re in a team, you have to work as a team. Especially among athletes, there’s this mentality that you have to fend for yourself. But being a part of a team means you have to really pull together as a team and help each other out.
If you want to learn more about Sylvia’s experiences on the World’s Toughest Race, check out the Tales of Toughness Podcast on https://gosonja.com/podcast and get access to more resources on my community https://www.patreon.com/GoSonja.