Ironman!

GEC had a big day this year at Ironman Arizona. Big breakthroughs!

Tucsonans Cheryl Palen, Michael McClure, Sylvain Lebreton, and Joe McNally all became IRONMEN after training on GEC plans and guidance.

Then GEC full-time athletes finished and all raced to new Personal Records at Ironman!
- Scott LaRoche finished Ironman #2 with a breakthrough finish. Scott just returned from Afghanistan (US Air Force Fighter Pilot) where his only cycling was on the rollers, his swimming was on stretch cords, and his running consisted of a single, monotonous road. We spoke before the race about how this was not necessarily going to be his year to PR. He decided to prove me wrong and went 10:40 for a 20-minute PR. I was floored. Impressive.
- Owen Paulus came off a nagging running injury and a severe bout with the piggy fly to run sub-4:00 for the first time and come in at 10:29. Wow.
- Polita Paulus als had some running setbacks late season and was worried going into the race that things weren't going well. She held tough and we built a taper plan to get in some late running, and she performed great on race day! 11:07
- Joe McNally PR'd by one hour! His plan was to break 13:00, so he and Bill put together a plan. Joe was successful and went 12:52! Well done.

Brad Hendron stole the show, however. Brad and I have worked together for a number of years, and have lately really worked hard to get under 10 at IM and get him to Kona. When we started, Brad was a 13:30 IM and a 5:30 Half IM racer. Cycling was his weakness and was making his run suffer, so we put together a long-term plan to change that. He was always mentally tough--a great thing.
He had a great season last year with some breakthrough results at Olympic and Half IM distances, including an age group win at the Trisports.com HalfMax National Championships and an impressive 4:19 at Soma Half IM. But the IM was still eluding us.
We doubled our efforts, get him on PowerTap to really nail his cycling, and away we went. With a tough, high-volume plan and a small run injury to deal with, Brad held tough through some dark training sessions--both physically before the sun came up and mentally tough.
But he did it.

It's bitter-sweet, however. Although a breakthrough race both mentally and physcially, a 1:30 PR, a 9:33 finish with a PR in all three disciplines, and near flawless race execution, that time did not gain him a Kona slot. I couldn't believe it. Still can't. You can't plan on who else will show up and who will have a great day, too, but in any case, Brad had a great race and is already looking forward to taking time off in 2010. Next year, Brad.

Congratulations to all Ironmen out there. Well done.

Late Season Racing!

Updates from the late season:

Clearwater 70.3 World Champs--

Kathy Rakel killed it at Cleawater. Although she was 11th in her age group, she was 20th overall amateur! Tough age group! And her time of 4:25 placed her in teh top half of the pro field! Kathy will be moving up to the pro field for the 2010 season.

Scott Perrine had a stellar day as well. Scott was training for Ironman Arizona the following week, so went into Clearwater as a "training race." He killed it for a 20 minute PR with a time of 4:26, feeling relaxed the entire time!

Well done in Clearwater, guys!

Soma Half Ironman--

Kathy killed it here, too. SHe took 4th amateur overall, 2nd in her age group. 4:44.

Rebecca Tschider ran to a huge PR of 5:03 for 2nd in her age group as well! This was a great race for Bec and a huge breakthrough! Congrats!

Austin 70.3--

Jim Williamson completed his first Half Iron race! Not a bad time at all, but more a breakthrough in the distance than anything. Huge kudos to Jim!

Blue Water--

Leo Carrillo continued a great season with a 2nd overall at Blue Water!

On another note, 3 good friends took spills in races and weekend of Soma and Austin. Be careful out there. For John, AJ, and Kel: heal up quickly and get back out there!

Brian

Virginia

I’m in Virginia for a USAF conference. The conference was not why the day was cool, mind you. After the conference I rushed to the hotel, changed out of my uniform and thanked God for my phone-embedded GPS mapping. I just drove. I’ve never been to VA—all over the Pacific rim, but never to VA. Being somewhat a history buff this is a good place to just drive.

So I rambled upon some pretty cool history. Yorktown is most famous as the site of the surrender of General Cornwallis to General George Washington in 1781. The Yorktown battlefield is a spacious expanse complete with the redoubts and encampment areas from 230 years ago. You can almost see the battles, hear the conversations between Washington and his men, and smell the gunpowder.





Later, during the 1862 Peninsula Campaign of the American Civil War (1861–1865), Yorktown was captured from the Confederacy and then used as the base for the Union Army of the Potomac under General George B. McClellan. And as the capitol of the Confederacy, more Civil War battles were fought in VA than any other state. I’ll check those out tomorrow. Just up the road are Jamestown and Williamsburg, among the first permanent settlements on the new continent.

And now, some of the newest and most capable military equipment in the world: Naval Station Norfolk and Naval Air Station Oceana are home to the Atlantic fleet of Naval aircraft carriers, destroyers and submarines and half the US Naval Aircraft; Marine Corps Base Quantico is everything “schoolhouse” to the Marine Corps; Langley AFB is home to the 1st Air Force and the F-22 Raptor, and of course, the “5-sided Puzzle Palace” is here (fighter pilots can’t say the word “Pentagon”). There’s a lot here. In fact, this area is the largest concentration of military bases of any metro area in the world.