All Over the Place April 2015 – Tri Coach Georgia

April 30, 2015/in Blog, Team Summaries /by Slayer

First off the team welcomes new athletes even at this point in the year. As mentioned before, we were pleased to add the Mad Hatter, Michelle from Colorado, and now we add Julie R. from Pooler. The team that trains hard keeps racing well!

Coming off a great winter or “off-season” where we won the overall division and bike and run months in the USAT NCC Challenge, TriCoachGeorgia and TriKidsGeorgia were poised for a huge season of racing. The team has been simply crushing races all around the country this year so far. We have raced from Boston to New Orleans, Charleston to Oklahoma City, and often in and around the Southeast USA. This weekend was no different.

We started off the weekend with a terrible lightning storm. Initially, the team set up with the Chattahoochee Challenge 70.3 in Columbus, Ga, the home of Coach Kim Hargrove and her husband Wes. DocSlay, aka Julie Gayer, and IronMouse, aka Amy Peavy-Smith, were there to test their fitness out. Each were bummed to learn the race was cancelled due to awful weather.

In contrast, at John Tanner sprint tri in West Ga, the race was able to be pulled off after a postponement and All3Eedee knocked it down! Likewise, the Xterra went down in some terrible conditions but Todd H. wore out the course after a great night partying!

Back in Athens, Ga some of the youth and adults participated in the Athens Criterium weekend, which has cycling as the centerpiece, as in the Gambler group ride, but also a nice 5k called Athens Twilight 5k. Strong performances were delivered by several team members throughout the weekend. For example, podiums were garnered by family members from the Hayes and Duncan families. PRs to Ethan and others too!

Also, FC, aka Cj O’Mara, went 2nd AG with a massive PR as he comes back from kidney cancer! He’s our next year entry in USAT’s comeback of the year award challenge.

Next up was the Gainesville Park and Recreation Sprint and Supersprint triathlon in Gainesville, Ga. Many of the youth team and their parents went there and demonstrated great skills and sportsmanship, winning big in the game of life. We saw brilliance from Jr. Tax Dr. and Hatchet Jack S. in the sprint and Simon and Luke in the Youth race!

Down south of the State of Ga. was Judas Priest, aka Judith Garrard, who took on West Point Lake Olympic Triathlon in her quest to race and finish Ironman Raleigh 70.3 and Ironman Maryland in 2015, and Tom H., TomTom for #TeamHargrove kids, who did the sprint. Judas Priest and TomTom thrilled us all with sparkling results! Even further South in St. Augustine, Ingo, dropped a 5th in Division at St. Anthony’s triathlon!

We can’t leave out Speedy Gonzalez’ son J, who rocked his first 5k in Virginia too! We also had Big Ben, aka Richard Nasser, back out on the race course this weekend! Less than one week off Boston marathon, he paced his friend to a solid race at the Evans Ga 13.1.

The final racer for the team this weekend was Gruesome, aka Dr. Lisa Harrington, who took on the Oklahoma City 13.1 half marathon. She is trusting the process and rebuilding her run to top notch levels and had a day to remember!

All told, another brilliant weekend for the team that everybody wants to join. The kids race again this weekend and Watch for the ongoing growth of the team and our positive outcomes!

Go Big: April 70.3 Weekend – TriCoachGeorgia

April 23, 2015/in Blog, Team Summaries /by Slayer

The early spring racing continues full throttle for the team this weekend. We have athletes racing in Georgia, South Carolina, New Orleans, and Boston!

We started with Running Through History 5k in Andersonville, Ga where Rollling Thunder aka Troy Garland broke into 8th place overall! His running continues to progress in his chase for 2x 70.3 this season.

Next up we went to TryCharleston, SC. There we had a 10 minute PR for McGritty, despite a loss of her shoe in the mud, and the first OWS triathlon for her hubby, Paul. Hurricane Sandee pounded out an overall female podium too. Feedback from the racers was very positive for this muddy wet course described as:

The TryCharleston Half and Sprint triathlons are moving into their sixth year after finding the perfect solution in year 3 for this point to point event. This course is flat and fast starting with a one-loop swim is held at the KOA campground lake in Mt. Pleasant, SC and will be wetsuit legal. The one-loop bike will take participants on a journey around the area on flat, mostly smooth roads with lots of brand new pavement. The 5K mile run will be out and back in nature on paved running trails within the Park West Development.

Saturday morning also brought out the best in the youth and their parents as well as Brittney E. Thanks to team mom Jessica Casey, who organized the race for all of the kids, they all took on the 13.1 from Chik Fil A in Athens Ga and did wonderful, showing off their hard earned fitness. 5 relay teams of 3 TriKidsGa each did amazing and inspired grown ups all day long. We heard so many positive statements made about their sportsmanship and fitness.

Coach BigBad‘s Brittney also raced strong and so did youth team member Nico’s father, Diego, another team mother, Kelly W., and several others. The youth team followed it up with a trip to Steak and Shake for a huge recovery meal where the smiles were abundant!

Next up, TeamHargrove, including Coach KimPossible and Taz, and new team athlete Michelle H., took on Ironman New Orleans 70.3 in their first triathlons for the team. Sadly, Tax Slayer, Coach Slayer (injury), and Longman (family), could not join them, but nonetheless, the Hargroves and Michelle were poised, prepared and pumped to do well. Weather was very sketchy and the race was postponed a half hour. Temps got up to mid 80’s for the race and humidity was 60%.

All three athletes swam very well, biked perfectly and negatively split their runs. This was textbook racing by mature athletes with wisdom well beyond their age. Uniform praise was offered. Consider being coached by someone like KimPossible who trains and races in a efficient fashion!

Next up was the famous Boston Marathon for BigBen, aka Richard Nasser. He has largely overcome a terrible TBI in a year’s time. Several national and local news outlets carried his story. His race went super and he came in at 3:10 then proposed to his long term girlfriend “the Glue”, Ali Hale, who accepted. They will live happily ever after!

Now the team turns to South Georgia for the Chattahoochie Challenge 70.3 in Columbus Ga and the West Point Lake Olympic distance triathlon as we wrap up a stellar April. Also, we head up to Gainesville, Ga for more triathlons, and to Oklahoma City 13.1 for road racing. Athens, Ga holds a big Twilight weekend of cycling and road racing too that we intend to shine at. Bring it on!

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Racing the Tony Serrano Charity Bike Century – April 11, 2015 TriCoachGeorgia

April 13, 2015/in Blog, Team Summaries /by Slayer

Last weekend, the team had a very active weekend. Several of the athletes rode in the Tony Serrano charity bike century in Northeast Georgia. This temperature was chilly to start but soon warmed up. This course is described as gently rolling, scenic back roads of Walton, Morgan and Oconee counties for routes of 10, 37, 62 and 100 miles. The “Best Rest Stops Ever” are included in this ride and provided by the Rest Stop Queen, Joyce Jones.

Tri Coach Georgia 2015 Early Bird Triathlon Video

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Several athletes, including Speedy Gonzalez in from Virginia for the weekend, did the full century. We had athletes in from Atlanta and Athens as well.

Sadly there was a pile up in the front group and Coach Slayer went down in a ditch after an armadillo scurried out from the side of the road. This led to his fractured pelvis and ribs, as well as a concussion. The outpouring of support from our team and others in the triathlon, cycling, and running communities has been amazing and we are all glad that his prognosis is optimistic after a period of convalescence.

Saturday night was brilliant time to get together. The team had a night out at Buffalo’s in Athens and had plenty of good food and drink, but, more importantly, laughs. Early to bed then early to rise.

Sunday morning, the team further descended upon Coach BigBad and Slayer’s hometown of Athens Ga for the Early Bird Sprint Triathlon at the University of Georgia (UGA), This is one of the Georgia Triathlon series from Go Race productions who we are closely affiliated with. Crisp MacDonald is the race director and he welcomes us all, youth and adult members.

The youth team provided some on course excitement with relays, mixed relays and several of the older group racing the full sprint triathlon. Results were uniformly strong and they worked out some early season bugs and cleaned up the younger podiums for the race.

Likewise, the adults from the team, who had come in from Augusta, Virginia, Atlanta, and Watkinsville, showed up very well as the video from Viper indicates. Judas Priest volunteered and the youth parents were all over the course along with a visit from the recovering Coach Slayer. Coach BigBad was on course as well. All told, it was a great reminder of how strong the team has become, how well trained they are, even during the early part of the season, and how good sportsman the team is from the youngest athletes to our most senior!

Now we move onto another huge weekend of racing in the Southeast and Northeast. #DoYourJob #ReapWhatYouSow