Welcome to Trifuel. Very interesting first post. I won't pretend to be an artistic person, so take it for what it's worth. The "human struggle" through art is what comes to my mind. Many of us are inspired to compete against ourselves to see how far we can take our bodies and minds. The theme is timeless.

Nature through the eyes of an endurance athlete also comes to mind. How does our perception of the landscape change from pre-race to post race.

I don't consider how I approach training as an art form. It is scientific and can be spiritual.

Maybe, the way some athletes are able to shape their bodies to make them almost perfect for endurance can be considered art.

Probably not much help, but it made me think.

I'm a commercial artist and I consider tris to be a welcome escape from the craft. The two worlds intersect on those long training days where your mind can be imaginative but mainly, it helps me take a step away from art - and that time away is necessary for me to be continue being a happy artist. Jumping back and forth between art and tris is an exercise in cross training in a broader sense that prevents burnout in either.

Welcome to Trifuel. What an interesting first post!

For me, training is a place of quietness where the creativity of my mind opens up. So that's where triathlon and art intersect for me. My creative outlets are in photography and writing. Writing especially benefits from long training days, and my husband is very much used to me bolting back into the house from a run and sitting down to write it all out before I forget what bubbled up in mu head.

Sometimes there's the frustration of the fact that my longest and most remote bike training days take me to places where I would dearly love to have my good camera, tripod, and big lenses - not really practical to carry on my tri bike though! I have seen things that I can only take a picture of in my mind - one day I biked past this wooded hollow filled with swirling fog, and in the middle of it a wrecked airplane with wings seeming to be among the clouds one final time. Of course I could take my camera back to that palce with my car but I could never capture that particular moment.

So sometimes the artist's eye can be a problem when training, sometimes training enables creativity. I also don't particularly approach training with the logical and scientific zeal that many triathletes do, so for me it is also more of a free-flowing artistic endeavor, a dance between my body and my mind.

I used to be a professional photographer and there were many things I did besides photography that influenced my creative direction.

I would have to say that when I am out for a run, or swimming or cycling I don't view that as 'artistic' but I think it opens up my mind to think creatively and let my mind wander a bit so I suppose they could be inter related.

1. At the risk of sounding lame, I do see sport as art. Its moving, powerful and created by applying learned and innate skills. Art is truly based on perception and in my mind art is what is created for to form aesthetic or emotional response. I would argue that competition is art pitting masters of the sport against each other. Plus there are few emotions you'll feel as intensely as that of success/winning, especially when it can be shared or transmitted to a crowd. Is training an art? By the definition I think of, yes. Maybe only if the intent is to alter your appearance? If I work out just to be able to do something, maybe. If I work out to have a six pack - that is skill working to change an appearance and encourage an emotional response from my self or others, even if it is vanity.

2. Absolutely. Music by far most frequently. I love music and find it moves me, or helps keep me moving. There's something primal about running in sync with a good drum beat and using the energy of the music to help get that rush of adrenaline needed in the later miles. From a creationist standpoint, I wish I was skilled enough to mix tracks by beat so I could design it for my own training.

3. I dunno. I'm really new to tris but I think there is something to be said about this or any sport as an art.

You might want to google search for an artist (I think in the UK) that just had an installation consisting of runners sprinting the length of a hallway in this art museum. Using the human form and kinetics as the medium. Some articles nicely capture his take on it. I think in summary, saying he felt the human body as tuned by an athlete was a thing of beauty, as was using it for something like running.

I guess it depends what you call an "art" some things that you see in museums today are called "art" but when you look at it you could say it looks like garbage.
I think "art" is different to every person, I look at "art" as a way to express oneself, express their feelings, thoughts, anger, love, passion, desire, mood, .... i could probably go on forever.
Artists are usually lonely people by nature, won't you agree? Triathlon is a lonely sport. And even though most artists go to school to learn to paint and sculpt and to learn to express themselves. But in the end the peaces of art that are stuck in our memory are created by someone siting alone and painting in the attic, or sculpting somethng only they can imagine alone. Spending endless hours perfecting it.

So do triathletes, we go to swim classes, we do group rides and runs and enjoy all the group activities, we have lots of support and lots of friends, but to many, triathlon is just another "art" form to express themselves, to express how they feel, to leave it all not on canvas but on the road. Maybe we don't see it that way, but this could be a parallel between the two.

I don't know how to paint, but i know how to swim (barely), bike and run, and i am willing to spend 6 hours on the bike or couple hours in the pool perfecting my techniques day in and day out, or i love a good 2-3 hour run, and during that time i can be alone with myself and nature, alone with the rode, alone with my bike, just like an artist could spend long hours next to canvas trying to make smallest detail perfect.
I don't even listen to music on my rides nor runs, because i feel that it interferes with my senses and would let me fully enjoy what was given to me, with which i am able to express myself.
So for me i guess you can say that i choose the "art" of triathlon to express myself.

Hummm....
First : I think Mom's post above deserves it's own thread...Why you can't judge an athlete by how tight their spandix is or how little body fat they have...or their age.
Second: When people start trying to justify what they do by calling it "art" It's time to run away!
These are just random thoughts.
How are we defining art here? Art as mastery of a skill like a plumber, carpenter or the guy who welded your bike frame? The monk who toiled under a tree at Lyndesfarne copying a book wasn't an artist. He was a worker bee. But his book, seen 1,200 years later, is a work of art. My wife is a calligrapher...she sees her art as work...but I see it as beautiful art. Does the ability to master the skill set necessary for Tri's or Ultras fit in this category?
You cannot define if what you do is art. That can only be done by others.
Are we thinking that art is , as, Gombrich (sp?) said "...a special faculty of the human mind to be classified with religion and science." If that's the case, what you do isn't art but how it's perceived is. Art is in the head. Like stated above, one man's garbage is another man's art. Again, the perception of something, by someone other than the artist is art. I heard once, there is only one place in the world where sport and religion are on the same level. Australia. If it were like that everywhere we could solve some nasty conflicts with a nice Oly!
Finally, I come to Leo Tolstoy. He defined art as and indirect means to communicate from one person to another. Does your running speak to others? Does doing an IM evoke emotion in others? If it does ...what does it say to them? What does your observation of this sort of thing say to you?
I got into a piton hammer fight at Camp Four in Yosemite Valley once over this topic...People standing around trying to justify their lives as climbers by defining it as art...they got pissed when I said it wasn't art... it was just rock climbing.
Triathlon...any athletic undertaking really, is just what it is. When you start looking for deeper meaning things get messed up. It makes it easy to overlook bad things if people perceive them as art.
Oh..my favorite art related quote, though I can't remember who said it:
"Never apologize for your art!"

Wow, wow, wow…Thank you all so much for your honest responses. Please keep the discussion going! I learn so much about myself when listening to how others view the world we athletes live in.
But before I weigh in on the issue again let me give you a bit more my background and the art I make.
I have been living and working in New York for the past 8 years and have been involved in the “Contemporary Art” world (see Art Forum magazine) during most of that time. I see and have seen any & all kinds of “art”, both bad and good, but mostly bad. Don’t get me wrong I’m an “art” fan, however there is so much stuff out there, sometimes it is hard to find anything in an art gallery that truly moves you.
What do I think is art? Well…anything and/or everything. In this day an age I think that depends on your point of view. It’s like asking, what is beautiful? Depending on who is looking at it, when they are looking, aesthetic taste and general likes and don’ts determine the answer to that question. There have been tons of theory and books written about this subject and I take solace in the belief that the sky is the limit with art, however you define it and whatever that may entail. But…I think some of your views on what art is or isn’t are, GOLDEN!
Ironmom: “so for me it is also more of a free-flowing artistic endeavor, a dance between my body and my mind.”
-beautifully insightful
tri-ac: “performance art interested in sport may have the opportunities to create art, but the pursuit of sport itself is not art
so, what is art?
art is intentionally creative and communicative, and it is a discovery of experiences realized in various physical, temporal. and ephemeral media. its purpose is its own discovery.”
-awesome! but did you go to art school?

While having this opinion on what art is, coupled with my experience in the art world, and living here in New York I often find that yes, Triathlon (racing and training) is a way to escape, quiet my mind and allow my creativity to be refocused. I do feel that living life is an “art”. Learning to achieve balance in ones life (and triathlon) while integrating knowledge from your life’s experience requires a lot of improvisation, intuition, and faith. Yes there are laws of nature that I feel act as guidelines or parameters for us to work within, but they are not the ultimate determining factor of the results. Example: Every year we all read the hype about who “could” win the big race in Kona, and we have all seen that even with all the science and or technical support and planning in the world, nothing can guarantee anyone the win. It always comes down to the intangibles, things beyond our understanding. Call it, god, luck, timing whatever.

So believing that anything is possible and any idea is wide open I try to ask myself and my viewer really off the wall questions that draw on so many different aspects of life and popular culture,
For example in my current work TheDorothyProject: I have asked “What if Dorothy (from the Wizard of Oz) returned to Oz as a disgruntled construction, who wanted to become a official witch? I know crazy, right.

Now I’m trying to come up with a project that can combine both the reckless spontaneity of my creativity and the excessively planned controlled approach to triathlon training. Like …what would happen if I tried to have a samurai, triathlete, and Jimmy Page struggle to achieve balance with each other within the confines of a power triangle?

With the responses you all have offered up so generously I do have hope that yes, by combining the aspects of both art and triathlon I can come up with something new that evokes the same kind of response this post did.
While I will be chiming in again and posting more often, I would love if you all would visit my blog and website to see how this project takes shape after the race.

Ironmom,

You point is very well taken, but could it be that you are just a better athlete than him? Maybe he is performing at 100% of his potential. And on a somewhat rhetorical note, what if you 'fueled' and 'trained' like a machine... would you increase your performance? I do agree that one's mental game is critical (if not the most important aspect) to fulfilling potential and that "love of the game" can carry you, but noone can operate at 110%.

That is where I question how any part of this is an Art? It could very well be though! This thread sparked an office wide discussion of whether top athletes are 'artistic' (in all contexts), and one guy known for his artistic ability stated that artistry is not a quantifiable object. It is composed of the intangibles that set somebody apart. Maybe the way someone sees the canvas, or the way an athlete strikes a ball or shoots a basket (I continued to disagree ;-)), but I got the point.

Good Talk

architecture school :) we learned how to talk there