MVHS High School Reunion Triathlon - Race Post

What is better than reconnecting with great friends from high school...

... in your 40's...

... and trying to kick each other's BUTT in a triathlon...

... with beer (and braging rights) on the line, of course...

... WELCOME to the 2nd Annual MVHS 25th High School Reunion Triathlon Relay Challenge...

... we had (3) relay teams this year...

... and it was all about this...

... the racers...

... and my favorite moment...

... read below... trust me... my sweet husband is a BEAST!

 ... time to let the photos tell the story...

Team "2DudesNG"... come on... we were limited to the number of
characters we could use to name the teams.  Gary... bike leg... had to bail out
a few days before the race, so Gina (sorry Gina... flying in from Atlanta to
do the race and had to get a bike to do the bike and run legs of the race last minute...)
This relay become a two-some... and having SOOOO MUCH FUN!

The swim leg of our (3) teams... getting in the water for the warm up.

Gun went off and (2) of our (3) teams running to the start...

... and (1) of our teams doing a penalty.  FLASHBACK...

 ... after our first tri challenge last year... at lunch a few hours later... we all had so much fun that we decided to do it again this year.  There would be a few new rules.  The selection of the teams and who was doing what leg of the race for each team would be randomly selected.  Needless to say, this made a few of our group members nervous... so an option was added. "Any team that decides to switch the assigned legs of their team... can do so... but with a penalty... 20 burpees for each team member before they start their leg of the race." 

And only (1) of our teams decided to accept the penalty and made the switch.  I don't think any of us really thought about the reality ramifications of such a penalty, but we all agreed anyway.

... back to Mike... the rest of the wave group started with the horn... except Mike.  He started 20 burpees... in the sand... and all of the spectators looked and him and started asking, "What the hell...?" Those of us that were taking photos and videos explained the situation, and the specators thought that was crazy awesome!


... little did any of us care to realize was that Mike is a multi-time Ironman
and Ironman coach... a few burpees weren't going to slow him down...
and he passed and finished before both of our other teams.

... back to Jeff and my favorite moment of the race.  So, Jeff was on Mike's team...
... and had to do the 20 burpees before he started the bike...
...what nobody knew was that Jeff had never done a burpee...
... and that he can't be in the normal push-up position because of his bad wrists...
... so my sweet husband...
... did his 1st ever 20 burpees...
... ON HIS KNUCKLES...
...on the blacktop...
... IN HIS BIKE SHOES (which has a slippery metal plate on the bottom where your
shoe would hit the pavement in the push up position)
... AND HE KILLED IT!!! (I love you, Sweetheart!!!)

... so back to my team...
... Steph finished 3rd in the swim and Greg (Iron Man in training) was 5 minutes behind Jeff at the
start of the bike... and I knew that Julie was at least 4 minutes faster than
me in the run... so I needed Greg to come in first... with a 4 minute lead...

... as I was grabbing the timing chip from Greg... and thinking were were OK...
... Greg said, "RUN...Jeff is right behind me..."
So, Greg caught up to Jeff (Yeah)... but Jeff held tight to Greg (Augh)...

And Gina... who had to jump in to do the bike and run
for her team... gets a transition area escort from her new
husband (4 month old newlyweds...)

The finish of the run was uphill... and I CAN'T TELL YOU how AWESOME
it was to hear my friends cheer for me... I started sprinting and brought it home...
... unfortunatley for my team, 1:45 behind Jeff's team...

   

It was all good at lunch after the race... good food... good friends... and thank you,
Gary, for the main round of drinks!  CAN'T WAIT for next year... new
challenges... and hopefully a 4th team!