The 2009 Kona Ironman swim start!

When I competed in this race, there were less than 1,000 who showed up, Yesterday there were 1,700. I have never see a race start this intimidating.

Craig Alexander repeats as Kona Ironman but Andy Potts (TYR Sayonara), John Flanagan (TYR Sayonara) and Pete Jacobs (bueseventy) won the swim!

The swim times were a bit slow this year: 49:42.0. I could not swim it that fast but I could have been within 5-minutes of that time. I suspect the swim course may have been unwittingly extended and the athletes swam farther than 2.4-miles

From the Examiner:

Flanagan led Potts, churning through the water like he was fleeing a shark as Potts loped along on his tail, looking relaxed. In the last several hundred meters of the swim, Flanagan decided that he had had enough of Potts swimming on his toes and turned up the heat. Potts fell a body length behind, but ultimately caught up and passed Flanagan to collect the day's swim prime with a time of 49:42. Two minutes later the follow pair emerged and their identities were revealed: Pete Jacobs from Australia and the 20-year-old dark horse Philip Graves who some have compared to a male Chrissie Wellington.

[Link]

For a larger version of the video here is the YouTube [Link]

Redemption for Eddie Freas: replacing an unhealthy addiction with a better one!

CNN brings us a story about athletic redemption: Eddie Freas, a raging alcoholic addicted to both pot and cocaine as well hit bottom after a three-day binge.

While lamenting his situation in tears, he did what most losers do, he turns on the TV to "Oz-out" the hangover. Luckily enough the channel was set to ESPN who was doing a story on a guy named Todd Crandell who liked doing this fringe sport called the triathlon. Doing this sport also got him off drugs.

In fact, this particular sport got Crandell who had a drug problem like Freas, completely off drugs. From CNN:

"His whole story seemed like mine," Freas said. "That's why it hit me so much. It was my story but it happened to somebody else. I knew I had to get back into fitness."

He took a bus to Racing for Recovery's office in Sylvania, Ohio. There, Freas said he learned to "stay clean and use other things -- fitness, instead of drugs." On his first day, Freas pushed himself to run 10 miles.

"It killed me," Freas said. "I was just motivated. I was sore for a week and I gradually got into it. As soon as I started including fitness into my everyday lifestyle, it made it so much easier. It kept me busy and because of the physical fitness, it was making me feel better about myself."

He pushed himself to run farther and raced in his first Ironman competition in 2008.

[Link]

Of course CNN has to wreck it and states that exercise has antidepressant effects hence his recvovery but I think they miss the obvious. Isn't "having fun" an antidepressant?

OK, a show of hands: Who did a triathlon after seeing Julie Moss crawl accross the finish line in the 1981 Ironman Triathlon on Wild World of Sports.

FINA approves new speedsuit from the "SCAQ Laboratories"

Since the plastic in this swimsuit is woven, FINA has acknowledge that it is indeed a fabric and thus a perfectly legal swimsuit. Wired has the review: [Link]

SCAQ Workout - Santa Monica swimming today

My swim club, SCAQ, caters to both Masters swimmers and triathletes. If you are a triathlete in need of swim skills it is a great club to learn and develop aquatic skill sets. Today SCAQ had what is called a Ironman set at VNSO for triathletes; (VNSO: Van Nuys Sherman Oaks pool), but I headed over to Santa Mo for one of Dimitriy's mid distance workouts instead.

I don't remember the intervals but I remember the yardage. Oh, and blogger trevr was there. He has a play coming up on April 13. Go to his website and check it out.

200 warmup
6x50s kick/swim
6 x 75s descending 1-3 and descend 4-6 with a more agressive interval
3x300 with a descending interval.
3x300 with a faster descending interval
6x50s warm down

Total: 3050