Close Knit Team
The team spirit has been on fire lately and many of our athletes are leaning on each other to get through big challenges. There have been some big birthday events and there are more races and epic training days taking place. This blog tries to capture some of the #MackDaddy nature of what’s been going on lately with the TriKidsGeorgia and their adult counterparts at TriCoachGeorgia.
Birthday and more Birthdays
The Week got started with a birthday bang! For his birthday early week, young stud and USATriathlon Junior Elite Cullen, who is coaching Summer swim for the youth squad, started off with a killer 19 year old brick of 19’s. He crushed 1.9k open water, then rode 19 miles at 22mph in the hilly sections of Oconee County, ran 1.9k at 6 minutes pace off the bike and finished off with a 1.9k cool down in Slayer Lake.
Cross Country Season Gets Going
Over at Athens Christian Academy, on a challenging course in tough humid and hot conditions, a few of the TriKidsGeorgia, hit up their respective races and showed their year round free training to be very solid. High places and team victories were taken by the Malcolm Bridge Middle School teammates, Caroline and Ellie. Also, Amy won her 3k JV overall in helping her North Oconee High School squad.
Columbus, Georgia is Our South
Over in Columbus, Georgia, our team members and #TeamHargrove were at it again. Dirty Tom raced the 2015 Miles Perret Cancer Services Triathlon in Lafayette, Louisiana! He crushed the course and came in 2nd in age group, while his son Taz, aka Wes, dominated the Alliance Ride for Heroes century in Callaway Gardens. Meanwhile, Coach KimPossible and Hacksaw aka Trey Sawtelle dug deep in their peak Ironman building, for Ironman Maryland and Ironman Florida respectively.
The Horses Age Up
On the night before our team’s quintessential Athens, Georgia and sponsored event, the Cancer Foundation of Northeast Georgia‘s Tri to Beat Cancer, (covered in a different blog found HERE) the team gathered at Chops and Hops in Watkinsville to surprise long time team members, Angela and Reuben Adams, aka Dark Horse and Iron Horse, who both recently celebrated their 50th birthdays. Folks like the Corleys and McGritty and Lauren drove in from far distances to join the party.
The surprise worked and brought a tear to the eye of each of the Adams, who also had special cakes made locally and snuck in by their daughter for the occasion. Thus, their daughter Delaney was there to see the surprise as well. A great time was had by all but the surprise didn’t end there!
#TeamTagg going to Disney World!
Later in the evening, two or the organizers of the Go Fund Me campaign for #TeamTagg presented the parents (Viper and IronMouse aka Steve and Amy Smith) of Tagg Smith with a check for close to 7700$ for the entire family, including their son Emery to be able to fulfill Tagg’s wish to go to Disney World before his next huge surgery in Mid September 2015. As you can imagine, the tears were flowing again!
Athens, Georgia’s Own #TriToBeatCancer
The Race Expo was on Saturday and was a blast. Like they did during their series of free clinics where free training plans for the event were given away, the coaches offered a lot of racers tips to improve their performances.
On Sunday, the race was a huge success. Volunteers were a plenty, as were supporting friends and family. Both the TriKidsGeorgia and their adult counterparts put on a huge showing described in a blog HERE. The Reapers, young and old, had some stellar performances where athletes crushed prior year times, scored podium slots 0or just missed them in hotly contested age or category groups, and generally reaped what they had sowed. Lots of high fives and words of encouragement were exchanged beforehand, on course, and post-race.
The TriKids meet Hunter Kemper
A team video conference call with multiple USA Olympian, Hunter Kemper was arranged prior to race day. The video conference call was an absolute treat for the team. The team even Skyped in Keaton from up North where he’s visiting family for the call.
After a nice introduction about how he got into the sport and his progression, the team members one by one asked Hunter a lot of pertinent questions about what to eat before races, if he will ever do an Ironman, what his favorite and toughest races/competition was, etc. He then gave some race day suggestions, introduced us to the Pinky Swear Foundation as a charitable organization, and everyone thanked him for his generosity.
TriKidsGeorgia Crush Atlanta Kids Triathlon
While Ethan made the podium at a local 5k, Carter, Lindley, Simon, Luke, Addie, Nico, Molly, Issac, Callie Rose, Harry, David Andrew and Caroline headed to the 4th annual Atlanta Kids Triathlon, with athletes in regular and X-Class races.
Race day was pretty bad weather and a awful storm forced a cancellation of some of the races for the olders. This caused some disappointment but the youngers on the squad raced super strong with solid age group placings, podiums, and smiles. There was a 1st, a couple of 2nd overalls and 4th overalls as well as other great showings in tough age group classifications. More importantly, their sportsmanship shined through again!
Team TidBits
The team also sent a couple racers to half marathons where they performed admirably. Ingo knocked it out of the park at the Hotlanta Half Marathon on the way to Ironman Louisville and All3Sports.com employee and team member, All3Eedee aka Eedee also had a great race at the Area 13.1 Alien Half Marathon. However, this pales in comparison to her good news that she is now engaged to get married. Join us in wishing her congratulations.
Final Words
There is truly never enough time to write all that can be written. As you can see once again, the team is rocking it hard now with even more big events soon.
Come on over and learn about what makes us special. We would love to have you join us and see what sets us apart as a community.