Triathlete Friends and Family Day!

That's right! They've put up with you all year. So why not make one of your New Year's resolutions to take the time out from your psycho training and recognize the people who keep you happy and strong. Even if it's only for an hour before you lift tonight.

Here are just some of the many things your closest buds have done for you time and again. They deserve something for their efforts. A foot massage? A home-cooked meal? A trip to the mall? You decide. Just make sure it isn't something like, say, a partner stretching session or something sneakily tri-training related.

• they nurse us when we're sick, even though they know we've been training through the sickness, and prolonging the phlegm and cough attacks. They still make us the extra vats of noodle soup and start buying Robitussin in bulk, though they know we've brought it on ourselves.


• They cheer wildly at all of our races, and run around for up to 17 hours straight, trying to document our athletic feats and photograph us at different angles in every section of the event.


• They console us when we get down about our day jobs cutting into valuable training time...even though we might have never even placed in our age group. They understand we're athletes at heart.


• They watch us eat extraordinary amounts of food and control the urge to comment on our gluttony.


• They recognize 4:30am as a viable time to wake up and don't mind the disturbance.


• They hold us accountable and keep us on track to reach our goals. Through sickness, bad weather, moodiness, and hurt feelings, they push us to achieve what we never though possible and keep us mentally sane.

So hug your biggest fans and make today about them. Without them, you'd be a lonely tri-geek, wandering into work in your spandex, having lost touch with the real world.