Hi there! My name is Steph Clutterbuck and I am a British professional long distance triathlete. I am in my second year as a pro and started 2025 with so much excitement and anticipation for the year ahead. I'd finished 2024 on a high with an early 2025 World Champs qualification and was looking forward to making my mark on the international racing scene heading into Kona.

The universe (and my body) however, had other plans.  Hindsight is a truly wonderful thing and has given me the chance to pinpoint what went wrong, and when.

So strap in, I hope you're ready for a story.

A question that provides important context—I promise! I describe myself as a life-long athlete. I started racing in the pool when I was 7 and swimming was my whole life for the next 12 years. It taught me discipline but I also grew up needing to understand my body and the signals it was telling me—am I tired? Or can I just not be bothered? Is it an injury brewing or just a bit of tightness? How tired is the right amount of tired?

Answering these questions became baked into my DNA through my teenage years.

By the time I was 19, I'd had enough. Years had gone by staring at the black line at the bottom of the pool and I hadn't achieved anything close to what I'd wanted to. The love was dwindling and, quite frankly, I wanted to go to university without the pressure of training 12 times a week (HA—this really did not last long…).

My bags were packed and I left home to go and study and absolutely NOT do ANY high performance sport at all.

Within the first week of attending University I joined the rowing team. By week three I was hooked. By the end of semester one I was training with the senior squad and by the end of semester two I'd reached out to the GB (Great Britain) pathway coach back home to see if I could train with him.

This started a five year "career" in a boat, but one that was markedly different to swimming. Throughout my swimming career, I hadn't had any injuries, and I'd only had one virus that kept me out of the water for longer than two weeks. At the end of my first year rowing I'd herniated two discs in my back and displaced two nerves.

Pain became a daily occurrence. I needed to be flexible and agile with my training. I had to look after myself. Understanding the warning signs for back spasms became a non-negotiable. I had complete and total accountability for my training; every session was a conversation with my coach.

"Knowing my body was now my super power."  

Unsurprisingly, five years of daily pain took its toll mentally and again I left the sport not having achieved close to what I had wanted.

I wanted a challenge. To do something that terrified me. Something that I didn't actually think I could do.

An Ironman. Obviously.

The following four years were my journey to my first Ironman in 2019 (Copenhagen in 11 hours 18) to my first Age Group win in 2021 (Portugal in 9:50 something) and qualifying for my professional license in 2023 (Vitoria-Gasteiz in 9:10).

Training was tough, a challenge, but I loved it. I was thriving. Progressing. But something was starting to niggle. Something that only built as I worked through my first pro year and into my second.

THE WARNING SIGNS

I was finding it hard walking up stairs.

My heart rate was getting higher and higher and higher in training—with no sign of slowing down.

I was tired. So very, very tired.

Bags were growing under my eyes. My skin was getting paler. My stomach problems were getting ridiculous.
None of these things were what I expected, and certainly not from someone fit and healthy training 20+ hours a week.

I knew something was off, maybe it was age? Stress? Dehydration? Food intolerance?

I thought that it would settle. I was asking my body to do things it never had before and I knew I was taking care of it. I was sleeping very well. I was fuelling every session and eating like food would run out tomorrow.

Starting in September 2024, I have had 3 incidents of intense chest pain. The first saw me at the doctors and the 2nd and 3rd I went straight to hospital. Each getting worse.

By the 3rd, which was in the middle of May 2025, my heart rate was elevated above 120 for 5 minutes at rest, I was dizzy, and blood tests showed elevated stress hormone levels. Clearly something was very wrong.

I knew I needed answers and needed them quickly, so we sought out some of the best specialists in their fields who also had experience working with athletes to help us understand what was going on.

GETTING A DIAGNOSIS

The five weeks from May 15th felt close to endless. I did fly to Hamburg hoping I would be able to race but on waking up on race morning with a racing heart and mild pain, we made the call that I would not be starting, and thank goodness we did.

I had a heart stress test, echocardiogram, 7 day ECG monitoring and a Cardiac MRI (as well as multiple blood tests and I HATE needles, so I was stoked about that). The results of which showed myocarditis—inflammation in the myocardium or muscle around the heart.

An answer. And a clear path "back", physically.

But emotionally, the path was much less clear. I spent the first few weeks terrified my heart would just stop. Then, the pain would come back. No-one tells you how hard it is to regain the trust in your body to do the one thing it's hardwired to do: keep you alive.

The diagnosis didn't stop with myocarditis, however. There were symptoms that the cardiologist could not explain, so I was sent off to see two further specialists.

The first works extensively in respiratory disorders, which is where we came to a diagnosis for Exercise Induced Laryngeal Obstruction (EILO)—my voicebox was closing when I exercised causing an intense rattling sound when I breathed. A simpler fix; retrain my breathing pattern, strengthen my diaphragm and it should stop.

But this didn't explain everything.

Dysautonomia was suggested—a malfunction in my autonomic nervous system. The basic functions of my body were not doing what they were supposed to; this included breathing, digestion, heart rate, temperature control, swelling of my feet, fatigue, and blood sugar regulation. All of the things that had been gradually worsening year on year.

A name. A reason. I wasn't going mad. There really was something going on. And it was being made worse by myocarditis.

I had advocated hard for myself, believing there was something underlying that was wrong, and I was so very right.

The dysautonomia ended up being diagnosed as Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome; characterised specifically by a heart rate increase of 30+ beats per minute when going from lying to standing.

There isn't a "fix" but it is possible to manage and there is a strong likelihood my symptoms will ease as my body recovers from myocarditis.

THE IDENTITY CRSIS OF AN ATHLETE

It's now October, roughly three months on from each diagnosis. I've had time to process, recover, and pick apart what went wrong, when and what I could have done better.

I am also healthy again, which has had a huge impact on my well-being especially with Kona just around the corner.

But, there was a moment early on when I had to face the possibility that it would be over. Ending another career without achieving what I had wanted, but this time it would have been to protect my long term health.

I had the same conversations a few weeks later when we'd had the myocarditis diagnosis and I was trying to navigate the return to training with PoTS. I was having to nap after a 30 minute run. I was exhausted when I was running and nothing was making a dent on the "PoTSie-ness" of how I was feeling.

The only way I could recover was to accept that, maybe, I wouldn't be able to. Certainly not to get back to being a professional athlete.

Why?

Because if that was the goal, I ran the risk of ignoring all of the signs that my body couldn't. The spiralling of symptoms. Chest pain coming back. Fatigue that isn't solved by sleep and rest.

The goal HAD to be getting healthy again, and then if I could train—bonus.

How could I get myself back to a baseline of being able to live. Then I could tackle training. And then maybe I could let myself think about racing again.

Season plans were let go. Races passed with me listed as "DNS". I was constantly battling with myself—not feeling like an athlete and trying to be comfortable with that but not wanting to give up hope. I am a life-long athlete, could I really be okay with that ending for good this time?

I'm still not sure I have an answer to that question.

Patience became paramount, and the only path forwards. If I rushed the recovery, the myocarditis wouldn't heal. If I threw myself back into training without understanding my PoTS, my body would spiral and crash and I'd be bed bound and unable to train.

Once I'd had the all clear to exercise (not train) again, I started off with a session once every 48 hours. Then once every 24, with a day off after 2 days, then after 3. Double session days came in in late July, with one session always being swimming and the other rotating between cycling and running.

My first triple session day was 9th September.

Slowly. Session by session. Day by day.

I was coming back.

A MESSAGE TO OTHER ATHLETES

Here's what I wish someone had told me earlier: your body is not your enemy when it breaks down. It's trying to save you.

If you're reading this because something feels off, because you're exhausted in a way that sleep doesn't fix, because your heart rate is doing things it shouldn't, because training feels wrong—listen. Please, just listen.

I spent months explaining away symptoms. Age. Stress. Adaptation. I convinced myself that because I was fuelling well and sleeping well and doing all the "right" things, my body would catch up. That pushing through was what separated good athletes from great ones.

But pushing through nearly cost me everything.

The discipline that makes us good athletes—the ability to override discomfort, to push past perceived limits—can become dangerous when we can't distinguish between productive suffering and our body genuinely failing. I thought I was being tough. I was actually being reckless.

Ask for help. Not next week, not after one more race. Now. Find specialists who understand athletes, who won't dismiss your symptoms as "just overtraining" but who will also tell you the hard truths you don't want to hear. Advocate for yourself like your career depends on it, because it does.

And here's the thing no one talks about: taking time off doesn't make you weak. It doesn't make you less of an athlete. Continuing to race when your body is screaming at you to stop? That's not brave. That's just gambling with your future.

I know how terrifying it is to step back. To watch race day come and go without you. To see your competitors on start lines you should be on. To wonder if you'll ever get back.

But I promise you, the fear of stepping back is nothing compared to the fear of your heart stopping. Of waking up and genuinely not knowing if your body will keep you alive. Of realizing you've pushed so hard that the way back might not exist anymore.

Your health is not negotiable. Not for a podium. Not for a qualification. Not for proving something to yourself or anyone else.

Take the time. Do the work. Trust that the athlete in you will still be there when your body is ready.

And if it's not? If you have to walk away? You're still whole. You're still you. Your worth isn't measured in finish times.

LOOKING FORWARD

I'm writing this from a place I didn't think I'd get to. Not just physically able to train, but I genuinely am excited about it again.

Kona is days away. The race I thought I might never get to start. The one I had to accept I might never be healthy enough for.

But here I am.

I'm not the same athlete I was at the start of 2025. I'm learning to train with PoTS, to recognize when my body needs an extra rest day, to accept that some sessions just won't happen the way I want them to. My training looks different. Quieter. Considered.

And maybe that's exactly what I needed.

The truth is, stepping back saved my career. If I'd kept pushing through, kept ignoring the warning signs, I wouldn't be here. I'd have crashed so hard there'd be no coming back from it.

This year took everything I thought I knew about being an athlete and broke it apart. It forced me to rebuild from the ground up—not just my training, but my entire understanding of what it means to do this sport sustainably.

I used to think longevity in sport was about toughness. About who could endure the most. I know now it's about wisdom. About knowing when to push and when to protect. About having the courage to stop before your body makes the decision for you.

I don't know what the rest of my career looks like. I don't know if I'll achieve everything I want to. But I do know I'll have a career. I'll have a life beyond this sport. I'll have a body that trusts me to take care of it.

And right now, standing on the edge of Kona, that feels like more than enough.

This isn't the end of my story. It's just a different chapter than I expected to write. One about patience and perspective and learning that stepping back isn't giving up.

It's the only way to keep moving forward.

CLOSING THANKS AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This year would have broken me without the people who refused to let it.

To my medical team—the specialists who took me seriously, who dug deeper when answers weren't obvious, who treated me like a person first and an athlete second. You gave me my life back.

To my family, who watched me struggle and never once told me to just push through. Who held space for my fear and frustration and never made me feel like less for needing to stop.

To my sponsors, particularly Ventum Racing, for standing by me when I couldn't race, when I had no timeline for return, when all I could offer was uncertainty. That support meant everything.

And to anyone reading this who sees themselves in my story—please, take care of yourself. Not after this race. Not after this season. Now.

Check in with your body. Ask the hard questions. Get the tests. Take the rest.

Your future self is counting on you to make the brave choice today.

If you're struggling with similar symptoms or want to learn more about PoTS and dysautonomia, Dysautonomia International is an incredible resource. And if you ever need someone who gets it, my Instagram is always open.

Here's to health first. Always.