Twelve guys completed the race that first year. This year, the competition drew 1800 very fit and, from my perspective, crazy men and women. Everybody earns his or her place through qualifying at one of 27 races throughout the globe. We figured it would be a visual feast just being around so many folks with bulging muscles. And, indeed, the contrast with our usual Kona experience was striking.
For instance, we always like to snorkel at Kahalu’u in Kona, which we affectionately call the “ugly-people” beach. This is opposed to the beautiful-people beaches up the coast in Kohala where the rich work on their tans. At Kahalu’u the too-fat mingle with the too-white (later in the day, too-red). Believe me, one rarely sees a well-defined muscle on this beach. I consider myself a proud part of the ugly folks! And, of course, I don't really mean that they/we are really ugly. Just not exactly model-types. Here are a couple of typical beachgoers:
But, the place took on a whole new look the day before Ironman! For instance, coming out of the water was this guy:
As I looked around, I realized sprinkled between the usual riff-raff of the beach were these completely out-of-place fit people. For these folk, a little leisure today. Tomorrow would come self-torture.As I was ogling the triathletes in my midst, and readying myself for snorkeling, a girl of about 4 came within inches and demanded:
What are you doing? Putting on my reef-walkers
What are they for? So, I don’t hurt myself when I walk on the rocks.
Do you need help? No, I can do it. Thanks.
Where are you from? Hilo – on the other side of the island.
And so forth
But I am no slouch in the interrogation department, so I began my interview:
Where are your folks? There (Pointing behind I saw her mom and dad. Yes, they were keeping a steady eye on their sociable daughter and gave me the do-you-want-rescue look. Like a major league baseball pitcher, I shook off their signal.)
What is your mom’s name? Lynda
What is your dad’s name? Ted
Where do you live? I don’t know. (Later she dashed back and forth to her parents and came back with the report: Washington)
What is your name? Ba-rock-ley. Barockley? NO!! BA ROCK LEY. (I couldn’t repeat it to her satisfaction.) The second part of my name is Rose Finegold.
Leslie had joined us for the interrogation and we were firing questions back and forth. She often said of my answers: You’re funny. Yes, my repertoire with Barockley Rose Finegold was quite witty, I thought.
The most important information we gleaned was that her mom was in the triathlon. A backward glance and, yes, Lynda was quite buff (and Ted looked pretty damn fit himself). Barockley told us she was also a runner and even faster than her mom, but only on grass. I nodded indulgently.
Ted came to take his daughter (he shared her name with us: Berkeley) for a swim. After she came out of the water, she all but ignored us. Our moment in the spotlight was over. We were in the past, thrown away like yesterday's paper. Our beach neighbors were next in line for the Berkeley treatment. And, so it went in a series of meet-and-greets with various strangers.
Here is a picture of Berkeley having a heart-to-heart with another stranger in the ocean. At least, I think she was a stranger.
And here she is being her inquisitive self:
I tell you – this kid is going to be a great success. I watched her parents watching her almost as much as I watched her. And, you can tell they are great parents. They gave her a lot of room to be her irrepressible self, while always ready to intervene. (Ted asked several times if we wanted “rescue”.) They also have a much quieter son, who spent time amusing himself playing in the sand while his sister gathered up people like they were shells on the beach. A really cool family. We chatted a bit with Lynda who encouraged us to cheer her on the next day. We said we would. I am sure she didn't take our pledge too seriously.Anyway, race day we were down at the Kailua pier at dawn to watch the frenetic swim event. Here is a photo of the start of the amateur group. (The pros start 15 minutes earlier)
The photo reminds me of the scene in Titanic with all the bodies flailing in the ocean. But, of course, they aren’t dying here. But, by the end of the day, I am sure more than a few thought they might just die.After the swim, they jump on their bikes and go up the coast and back. Anyone who has ever spent time on that coast knows how windy it is. Brutal for bicyclists. Leslie – who does ride – really felt sorry for them. I can’t even imagine it.
Around noon, the first of the cyclists returned. We planted ourselves at the “hot corner” where you could see the cyclists come in and then transition to the marathon and run out. Before heading up the coast, they run up Alii drive and back to the hot corner – about 10 miles. So, after a little bit, it was a three-ring circus – bicyclist coming in, marathoners heading out, tired marathoners coming back (with 16 miles to go). And, then, another ring is added: the marathoners coming to the finish. Here is a picture of the corner:
It isn’t a great picture but if you click on it to enlarge you can see a bicylist coming in on the right, several marathoners heading out in the back (two to the left of the blue M sign, and one at the far right), and another marathoner on the left rounding the corner for the next 16 miles.We had initially planned to leave after watching at the hot corner for a short time, but now we had a horse in the race: Lynda Finegold. We wanted to see Berkeley’s mom in action. (We bought a program so we could scan through the 1800 names to find her number. She was #1347.) Of course, we had no idea if she totally sucked. She could have dropped out; she could just be really, really slow. But we watched closely as the bicyclists streamed by. And, there she was – coming in pretty early for an amateur woman! We screamed for her as loud as we could, but rock music was playing from the announcer booth, so we doubted she could hear us.
She started on the marathon course a little bit before 2:00 pm. We had planned to leave by 3:00 at the latest as we had a date for cocktails with Bud at 5:00 in Hilo. It is a 2-hour drive home. Unless Lynda was some sort of amateur running phenom, she wouldn’t be back until around 3:30. But I really wanted her to know we were out there rooting her on. We decided to hang in there and hoped that she was a decent marathoner.
We walked to a spot closer to our car on Palani, the grueling hill that the runners must climb at the “hot corner.” Many, many marathoners walked up that hill. And, Lynda was not an exception – she looked really beat. It was around 3:20. I think she was a little startled and confused to hear us yelling: “Go, Lynda!! You can do it!” To give her some context, we also yelled: “We met at the beach!” At that point – knowing she had fans – she started running again with a pretty good smile on her face. We felt confident that her time was going to be at least 10 seconds faster because of our effort. Here she is back on the run:
After she passed, we jumped in the car and hightailed it to Hilo.The next day we anxiously checked the results to see how our girl did. We were thrilled to discover that she made the leaderboard (the top ten) for her age group. The official results below:
Women 35 - 39 Leaders
Place Numb Lname Fname Age City Pro Cnt Rep Swim Tr1 Bike Tr2 Run Time
1 1386 Mader, Wendy 35 Fort Collins CO USA 55:15 2:46 5:36:16 2:17 3:17:19 9:53:51
2 1373 Lear-Kaul, Kelly 36 Littleton CO USA 1:03:46 3:04 5:40:12 3:00 3:27:23 10:17:24
3 1351 Lie, Kristin 37 Oslo NOR 1:18:45 3:14 5:39:12 3:00 3:21:18 10:25:26
4 1377 Rudolf, Michaela 36 Pyhra AUT 1:17:06 3:19 5:40:04 2:56 3:30:45 10:34:07
5 1328 Steigerwald, Chrissy 39 Colorado Spr CO USA 1:04:03 3:45 5:48:52 5:15 3:38:33 10:40:26
6 1336 Ciaverella, Ann 38 Happy Valley OR USA 1:08:20 2:50 5:57:34 2:32 3:32:05 10:43:19
7 1375 Morris, Maggs 36 Kailua HI USA 1:04:59 2:41 5:47:07 3:22 3:46:39 10:44:47
8 1372 Kunze, Anja 36 Frankfurt GER 1:06:50 3:12 5:42:25 3:38 3:56:45 10:52:49
9 1347 Finegold, Lynda 37 Wenatchee WA USA 1:09:43 3:37 5:38:21 6:46 3:57:27 10:55:52
10 1358 Schmidt, Betina 37 Viborg DNK 1:09:07 3:59 6:02:54 4:28 3:36:45 10:57:11
We are so proud of her! Way to go Lynda! (Considering that I don't even know the woman, my sense of pride in her accomplishment is a bit odd - but really heartfelt!) I fully expect Berkeley will be out there in about 20 years. Maybe we will come back and root her on.
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