If you are looking for an inspirational story for your own postpartum exercise comeback, with a pinch of reality then this is for you….
Meredith Kesler is 44 year old American professional triathlete. In March ’23, she made her postpartum comeback at Ironman Taupo (3.8k swim, 180k bike, 42.2k run) at just 6 months postpartum with her second child.
There were plenty of headlines about it and I was inundated with messages with people very keen to discuss how she managed it. The idea of an early comeback seemed to polarize people into two camps, the “Wow this is so inspiring” camp or the “Oh man this is so far away from my reality” camp and I have to say that I sat in the second of the two.
When you read a headline like that, even though you know you shouldn’t you naturally just compare. The biggest problem with comparing yourself to a headline is there is no context around it and therefore completely pointless to compare when you don’t know the details.
So I reached out to Meredith, and not in a million years did I think a pro athlete would get back to me. But she did! And she spent almost an hour answering my questions to fill in the blanks of this story. I knew that she was a pretty great lady, but going to this much effort really did make me start to think she was a pretty incredible woman.
I was expecting that after talking to Meredith I would be able to reassure other women that you can only achieve a crazy feat like this IF you have certain things in place….. a full time support system, a good sleeper, bottle fed baby, a medical team on tap etc etc. I didn’t think it would be easy, but assumed as a pro athlete you would have things that us “normal” mums wouldnt and hence make it easier.
I was to be proven quite wrong and my love for Meredith was about to sky rocket……
Pregnancy:
Meredith explained that she was very sick in this pregnancy (as well as her first) but used exercise as a way to deal with it. She trained throughout her pregnancy, averaging 17-20 hours a week in her third trimester. She was very focused on strength training at least twice per week and working with a “pelvic floor specialist”. She ran until 36 weeks pregnant but a large amount of that was on a treadmill as she was concerned about being “judged running outside” as there is still a stigma of heavily pregnant ladies exercising (even though in certain circumstances it can be totally safe). Even though lots of the time she didn’t feel like training, her mantra was “remember what you feel like after” and this really worked for her.
Birth of Baby Crew:
Her first baby 5 years ago was born via an emergency c-section following a long labour and hence baby Crew was born by elective c-section. She was on a lot of medication and quite sore for the first 10 days but otherwise recovered well and found it to be a positive experience.
Training:
Compared to her first baby she took the initial recovery pretty slow and “only walked for the first 5-6 weeks”. Then she was back on the bike and in the pool and progressing into running. She attributes her smooth ride back due to the early rest, strength and pelvic floor work she did more religiously second time around.
In the lead up to Taupo she was training 20-22 hours per week. This was fitted around school drops off, baby naps, coaching commitments and normal mum duties of lunch boxes, washing, dinner etc. Her husband works full time from home and she has minimal external childcare. She kept referring to her “village” describing situations like lifeguards watching her son to fit in a swim, or swapping a bit of childcare for a training program etc. It is very much a juggle and fitting training in as and when and certainly not a structured affair as I was expecting.
She also has minimal sleep. Baby Crew is currently waking up every 1hr 45mins and yet she is still cracking out this training. She talks of every day being different and just getting the juggle done as best she can.
Taupo Ironman:
For Meredith, Taupo was a bit of a pipe dream. She knew that she would not be race ready “physically or technically yet emotionally” she was ready to take the risk. She was also trying to capitalize on the small window of opportunity of time in this support so was prepared to take the risk. Her mantra being “we can never let success get to our heads nor failure to our hearts” and this ability to try no matter what the outcome if admirable.
She made the call to head to Taupo from the states to race for 9 days without the kids. She says that she never really understood the phrase “without sacrifice, there can be no victory” until this moment. Leaving the kids at home was a huge deal for her. She was still breastfeeding through this period and so pumped in Taupo and donated milk to a kiwi woman – how amazing. She felt “blessed that Crew would take a bottle”. Her first son would not take a bottle and in her first race back with him a friend breastfed him while she was out on course – another incredible story!
She had a great race in Taupo and despite not making the podium is was a huge “victory” for her.
Listening to her, what is clear is that she loves all that she does – loves being a mum, loves being a triathlete. And she is able to make it work. But what I really loved was her honest approach to it. She was happy to say it wasn’t easy and some days don’t work out. It is refreshing to hear the honesty, the juggle, the highs and lows. Too often in “comeback” stories, we don’t get to hear the reality and hence it actually becomes less inspiring when women aren’t honest.
I feel so privileged that despite her time poor life, she made time to answer my questions and I feel the learnings will help so many others….
- Don’t compare yourself to anyone, but if you really need to, do it like for like. She is a pro athlete and has been training and racing triathlons for 20 plus years, she is a different physical place to most of us. It is also her job. She trains 20 hours a week like most of us work. It would be a different story if we were trying to fit that training in on top of another job. It is important to remember all this as we look for inspiration.
- Be honest. Huge respect that she is very open that it isn’t easy. If anyone tells you motherhood is easy, always fun and says that can easily do everything they want to do, they are not being honest.
- “Remember what it feels like after”. This is such a good way of looking at it and so relevant, you never regret a workout.
- “Without sacrifice, there can be no victory”. This doesn’t mean winning ironmans. This means whatever you choose to put at the top of your priority list, there will always be something that has to go underneath it. You can do ANYTHING but not EVERYTHING.
Photo Credit: Meredith Kessler