Hello everyone – I hope everyone is enjoying these steamy hot days of summer!! Triathlon season is in full swing and I am staying very active in our triathlon community even though I have not been able to race yet this year. Most recently, I was at Viterra Calgary 70.3 helping with the production of that event. I wore so many hats that week from pro and sponsor liaison to awarding finishers with Clearwater slots and handling awards to moving and packing boxes at the expo! I did think about jumping into the event and swimming, biking and running as an athlete ‘encourager’ but I had too many little chores to do on race morning! Racing is much more fun than organizing although everything I did, I did for the athletes and that made it very rewarding!
Prior to Calgary, I was in Lake Placid and Coeur D’Alene co-hosting Ironman Live with Greg Welch. Both were great weekends of triathlon where I interviewed athletes for Universal Sports and then gave play by play commentary and analysis on race day. It was my absolute pleasure to greet fellow Saucony athlete, Linsey Corbin, at the finish of her first Ironman victory and fellow Tyr athlete, Andy Potts, with his first win as well! My next Ironman Live broadcast will be at the Hawaii Ironman in October. Rather than commentating at Ironman Louisville, I will be attending Subaru Ironman Canada and doing a few talks and autograph signings for Subaru and I will coach a swim clinic on behalf of Power Bar. I am hoping to host a few training clinics when I attend these Ironman events – for example a Subaru swim or a Saucony run or a Power Bar bike the run course session. So stay tuned and I will announce them on www.twitter.com/lisabentley.
On the coaching side of things, we coached a wonderful Subaru Success Camp in the middle of June at Deerhurst Resort in Muskoka just before the G-8 landed in Huntsville! It was a fabulous weekend of training and coaching and sharing. A big thank you to Subaru, a big supporter of our camps, Power Bar for providing our nutrition, Saucony for outfitting our camp leaders, The Zone for providing fish oil for all the athletes, Fuelbelt for all of their treats and Cervelo for getting me my new P3 just in time!
We have also coached a few training days in Caledon for our athletes. These days have build a great sense of friendship among our athletes and that will hopefully ingrain triathlon in their lives as a lifestyle forever sport. Everyone is getting faster and stronger. I have a young athlete in St. Thomas Virgin Islands who is likely to qualify for the Pan American Games and he just started doing triathlon in January! He just rode a 62 minute 40 km time trial last weekend missing out on the National Team by 15 seconds (and that wasn’t even the goal – it was just a workout!). Many athletes are racing the Subaru Triathlon Series with their big goal being the Subaru Muskoka 70.3 and others are racing Subaru Ironman Canada. And I have one man who just wants to get his life back under 350 lbs and to finish Subaru Ironman Canada 2011! I have so much to share and I love this new phase of triathlon!
And on the official side of things, I am now certified as a Level 3 Triathlon Coach. I don’t know what those credentials will do for me but I thought it was important to be “official”!
On the racing front, I actually have raced this year!! At the end of June, I raced in the Peachbud 10 km run as part of the Subaru Charity Chase. I was part of the fundraising component where I started the race last and money was donated for every runner I passed. There were 636 competitors in the race and I passed 560 runners to finish in 76th place overall. Yes, I was well off of my PB of 33 minutes but I had a blast and got to raise money at the same time.
This coming weekend, I am speaking at Can-Fit Pro – a Consumer Fitness and Wellness Show. On Friday, I am speaking about Eating for Performance and Wellbeing. On Saturday, I am leading a group on a run and doing a run clinic. Later on Saturday, I am speaking on Living Full and Being Your Best. You can find information on the show at www.canfitpro.com.
From there, I am off to Subaru Ironman Canada and then in mid-September, I have triple the fun on the same weekend – we have Subaru Muskoka 70.3, I am commentating the ITU World Championships on CBC Sports and I am meant to do Ironman Live at Ironman Wisconsin. I think I will be able to do 2 out of the 3 of these commitments but it will be very busy!!
And of course, Fenway is growing and being crazy. We had a blast in Lake Placid watching her jump in Mirror Lake and run around the beach snatching things out of the athlete bags. And when her craziness was over, she slept long and hard!!! She has good choice in running shoes – these are the new Saucony Kinvaras! Stayed tuned at Ironman Louisville for Fenway’s pre race pics and other fun. I will be at Subaru IMC but we are planning some long distance fun so that Fen and I don’t feel left out of the Ironman Live coverage.
Train safe and happy!! Lisa