Whether someone is a recreational or elite athlete or just a regular person with interest in improving fitness, he or she must be able to read the signs of pain being registered on the body.

A lot of times people or athletes choose to ignore or misunderstand the signs or signals that the body gives. They tend to neglect warm-up or cool down before or after exercise or avoid recovering their bodies correctly after strenuous exercise programs. This happens due to ignorance or due to time constraints placed on everyday lives.

Pain threshold varies amongst people and gender and the same goes with athletes and non-athletes. Different studies will back-up or reject the above statements, although in general latest research demonstrates the ability of athletes to handle pain better than ordinary people.
People doing triathlon like us, are considered as abnormal or out of their mind because they put themselves through hard training sessions and out of the ordinary training hours and competitions.
Whether we are mental or not, can be explained by a recent study published by the Journal of Pain, which indicated that triathletes have higher pain tolerance than recreational athletes. This study was part of an ongoing research which evaluated the factors that can help in reducing or regulating the pain of those suffering daily chronic pain.