Ironman comes to Boulder

Today, I'm competing in the 5430 Sprint Triathlon. Barry and Jodee Siff, founders of the race and owners of 5430 Sports (named after Boulder's elevation) recently sold their company (and its eight races) to World Triathlon Corporation, which owns the Ironman brand and races around the globe.

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The Meaning of Tri{athlon}: The Hearts and Minds Behind the Swim, Bike & Run

This anthology of 15 essays, written by every day triathletes, is about humans doing what they were meant to do. In these pages, you’ll read why these triathletes love their sport. They are the men and women you meet every day. Some of the authors have regular jobs and some are retired. Some of them are barely out of school and some are grandparents. They are the fast one and they are the not-so-fast one but they all compete from start to finish just the same. You’ll read stories of triumph and defeat, of finding oneself and leaving one’s old self behind. They write about meeting new love on the course and leaving love-gone-wrong in the dust. For these athletes, triathlon is more than a sport, it's a way of life. And, that’s the way it should be.

Excerpt from "Triathlon as Evolution" written by yours truly:

It was August 1997, and I was rapidly approaching that time of life when many guys might consider getting a Porsche or a cute blond girlfriend or some other flashy distraction. On one Saturday morning I happened to read in the paper about something called a triathlon being held the next day. I was intrigued.

I didn’t know anything about the sport. In fact, I hadn’t participated in competitive sports since I was on a swim team at age nine or ten. But, as a mild-mannered, geeky, relatively active but noncompetitive kind of guy, I thought I could finish the race.

With my experience on a childhood swim team I figured the swim would be easy. As an occasional bike commuter, on weekends I often enjoyed riding up into the foothills, so the cycling wouldn’t be a problem. And, even though I’d never done it before, how hard could a bit of running be? If worse came to worst, I could always walk.

So, my wife, Caron, and I peddled our mountain bikes to Boulder High School to register me for the Boulder Peak Triathlon. It’s an Olympic-distance race, although I didn’t know what that meant at the time. A newbie in the worst way, I asked all the dumbest questions: What do you wear? What is a wet suit? Can I ride my mountain bike? Somehow I missed the crucial ones: Why am I doing this? What should I have done to prepare?

(I Can't Gitmo) Satisfaction

Fortunately for our nation's interrogators, Gitmo is in no-man's land. If it were in the United States, there would the pesky problem of our Constitution and laws. If it were in some other country, the problem would be that country's rules.

When the U.S. government built the prison at Guantanamo Bay, they cleverly put it in part of Cuba that's not part of Cuba. President Teddy Roosevelt won it in 1903 from the first president of Cuba in a card game in which he wagered $24 in cigars.

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