In boca al lupo

The much ballyhooed wood-fired, Italian pizza oven is in full-on production mode. I know that some of you will instantly wonder what the heck that has to do with training and racing, so I will explain thusly: Everything.

As in it's all connected (one way or another). We all know the value of rewards, the motivation necessary to succeed. The importance of the dangling carrot. Far too few of us have the athletic enlightenment to recognize that the training we do, indoors or out, early or late, with intensity or without, solo

or with a group, happy or not, IS THE GOAL. What happens after that is merely desert. The work to get there is truly the main course, il primo piatti.

Take teachers as another example. What is the goal? To get the students a diploma? No, it is reinforcing the

day-to-day understanding of the importance of learning, of building success upon success and keeping ever vigilant in the quest for knowledge. With any inspiration or motivation whatsoever, that knowledge will morph into wisdom. From knowing to doing. The goal of the teacher is not to create more students, the goal is to create more teachers. Same with coaches and the same with builders.

Hence the pizza. If I have to build an oven to fire organic, all local, home made morsels of motivation, as a reward for outstanding slices of effort, I will. Gladly.

There is nothing like sitting around the table in celebration, treating the body and soul to culinary goodness after a particularly gnarly workout or a high performance event. Or, like my buddy Dino Martini used to croon, "That's amore".

Train hard, eat well, laugh often.

Postscript: The plot has thickened (like dough) to include the goal of having the initial pie constructed from all local ingredients. Remember the farmer in PT who invited me to mill organic wheat on the stationary bike? Local mozzarella, pomodori, basilo, aglio, spinachi….all here. Anche pane e vino. If I can stay with it (back is a little tender this morning) target date is 4 July. In Italian, In boca al lupo (the mouth of the wolf) translates to good luck with that!