It’s with a heavy heart that I start this blog post. One of the Accelerate 3 athletes lost her son this week. Losing a family member is always a tragedy especially when they are only 23. My condolences go out to Noreen and her family in this difficult time.
On the racing side, it’s turned into a pretty good weekend. Cory finished IM St. George in a new PB dropping 28 minutes off his Ironman PB. His effort netted him his first trip to the medical tent ever post race. A double congratulations go out for his efforts. IM St. George is considered one of the hardest IM courses in the world. This is the second year in a row Cory has lowered his IM PB on this course. Last year was a 50 minute PB, this year was a 28 minute PB. That’s not shabby at all!
James finished fifth overall at the White Lake Half today in NC. They cancelled the swim keeping his streak alive of swims being cancelled for every half he has done this year. This was a bittersweet result for him. Bitter in the fact that he is disappointed that he did not run as fast at Nola 70.3, sweet because even though he never felt on top of his game, he still ran his second fastest half run ever. This race shows he continues to make significant progress towards his goals of racing elite in the next year. Looking towards his late season half’s he is set up to swim a huge PB for the swim portion of a half, if they let him swim.
I raced up in Phoenix at the Iron Gear Sports triathlon. Which may not have been the smartest thing I’ve ever done. I woke up with a sore throat but raced anyway. A decent swim had me out in 7th but a blazing fast transition put me on the bike course in 4th position. Historically my transitions have been ok if not a bit on the slow side of fast. But this year I’ve started the bike or run legs at many a race thinking “holy shit I was in and out of there like Superman changing in a phone booth.” My bike was the 5th fastest on the day and left me in 2nd overall starting the run and ahead of third by about a minute. Unfortunately my lack of run speed was evident by my plummet down the results sheet faster then a hooker taking off her clothes. I dropping six spots losing the majority of those spots over the last 2km.
A wiped out Coach Brian
