Boulder, bolder
This is another instalment in what is becoming a series of posts on travel and triathlons, as I follow my wife Brenda around the globe for her races. You can find previous stories here.
There’s no voiceover this week, as I’m away from my office. I’ll add one when I return.
We were in Boulder last week for Saturday's Ironman 70.3. She has been out in the Rockies for a week acclimatizing to the altitude, while I have been grounded at home with tendinitis in my left foot and ankle, a case of post tib from going back to running too soon after breaking the other ankle! I mention the foot because it might step into the story from time to time.
Tuesday, I fly out to meet her. I'm supposed to fly out Thursday, but the weather persuaded me to switch my flight, exchanging rain and wind for blue skies and sunshine, and tsunami evacuation routes for tornado shelters. We're not in Kansas, but we're not that far.
Wednesday, we decide to drive the bike course. The race will take place in and around the Boulder reservoir. We see prairie dogs along the bike route, also a couple of mule deer, big-eared versions of the black-tailed deer we have at home. It's a pretty course that climbs a little then descends into a valley with lakes and a stream, where we see a group of white pelicans who have been enjoying these lakes since long before they discovered the coastal lagoons on Whidbey Island, and then passes through the small town of Hygiene.
Are you wondering how a town came to be named Hygiene? Me too, so I went down that rabbit hole, or perhaps its a prairie dog warren. According to Visit Longmont:
The town gets its name from the sanitarium located here in the late 1800s helping patients overcome tuberculosis (TB).
In the late 19th century, many people suffering from tuberculosis came west to Colorado for their health. Clean, mountain air, low humidity, high elevation, and year-round sunshine often provided relief from the symptoms of TB or ‘consumption’, as it was once known. Sanitariums sprouted up throughout the state from Denver to Colorado Springs to Hygiene. By 1900, about 1/3 of Colorado’s population was residents that were here seeking treatment for TB.
Another piece of trivia acquired.
Summer Wednesday evenings, there's a Stroke and Stride event at the reservoir, a low-key half- or one-mile swim, followed by a 5K run, a perfect warmup for the Ironman athletes. We arrive to find it had been postponed at the last minute due to wind. Brenda and her friend Annie decide to swim and run anyway.
While waiting for them to finish their swim, I stand up to my knees in the water to soothe my aching foot. Next to me, a man is holding his young disabled daughter's hands in his as he dangles her feet in the water.
"Y'all here for the race?" has asks.
"Yes, well my wife is, I'm support crew," I reply.
"I thought about doing this one, but I just did Ironman Texas, so it would have been too much."
Texas was a full Ironman. This is a half, officially known as a 70.3 for the total mileage. We launch into a conversation about Ironman, weather, and travel. It turns out he and his family travel a lot. I ask how he does it.
"Well, I'm a nurse" he explains. "I work threes, but I can add time in the winter when it's busy for more paid time off in the summer when they want us to take it. With three kids, we fly Frontier and Spirit a lot. Don't Iet this girl here fool you, she's a seasoned traveler too. She's going to dance school in LA next week. It's for kids with spina bifida and, like her, with cerebral palsy. She's got a wheelchair dance solo!"
We'd been chatting for a half hour by then. He'd been holding her the whole time, letting her feel the sand and the water on her feet. The ladies are coming in from their swim, so we shake hands, exchange names, and thank each other for the conversation.
That young dad from Waco, Texas, makes my day.
Thursday, it's back to the reservoir for a one-lap test ride of part of the bike course, and a packet pickup.
Thursday is also the 80th anniversary of D-Day. I was born in 1951, just seven years after D-Day, and grew up in its shadow, literally, and metaphorically.
We celebrated its 25th anniversary at my high school in Portsmouth, the navy town that launched the invasion and today houses a D-Day Museum. Much of the planning happened in the warren of tunnels in the chalk under Fort Southwick, pronounced "Suthick", on the crest of Portsdown Hill behind Portsmouth, on whose slopes I lived, and friends and I hung out, peering occasionally past the gates into the tunnels. The village of Southwick behind the hill houses Southwick House, where Eisenhower wrote the order to invade, as well as the letter to be sent in case of failure. Nearby was the Golden Lion Pub, where General Eisenhower would drink whiskey and General Montgomery would not, and, many years later, I would drink a beer.
The metaphorical part was a little grimmer. The war had taken its toll on Portsmouth and on those who had lived through it, including our teachers and parents. The adults in our lives were suffering undiagnosed, untreated, and at that time, unnamed PTSD, and they could not help but pass some of it on to us. But that’s a longer story for another time.
Friday is a rest day, apart from a couple of calls and some writing!
Saturday is Race Day for the Boulder Ironman 70.3. The weather forecast calls for thunderstorms later, but the morning is fine. I drop Brenda off at the shuttle to the start and go back for more coffee and breakfast. I take the shuttle myself an hour later to see Brenda start and finish the 1.2-mile swim. She has a good swim, sixth out of twenty in her age group. A fast transition brings her up to fifth as she heads out for the bike stage, her strongest. I find a shady spot under a cottonwood tree where l can take the weight off my foot for the next couple of hours and pull out my tablet to work on this story.
The tracker app shows that she's fourth at the first checkpoint of the 56-mile bike ride. My heart is in my mouth at she seems late to second bike checkpoint but then I remember that she started the swim later. She gets there, still fourth, then pulls up to third at the third bike checkpoint.
She's late for the fourth, 35-mile bike checkpoint, then very late, and I'm getting worried, then very worried. I'm hoping there's a problem with the tracker app or the timing gates. Now she's late for the 45-mile and I'm picturing her lying in a ditch somewhere. Eventually, well after she should have finished the bike stage, she clocks in at the 35-mile, over an hour late. At the 45-mile, she's making good time, and maintains her pace all the way to the bike finish. I can see her in the transition area.
"I had a flat," she calls out.
"I couldn't fix it. I had to wait an hour " she tells me as she heads to the run start.
"I would have PRd the bike " she adds, over her shoulder as she starts the 13.1-mile run.
Yes, she would have.
Her run features a thunderstorm, rain, and hail, but she manages seventh in the run, and finishes twelfth in the race, pulling back from eighteenth right after her flat. Brenda's friend Annie joins us of the finish for congratulations and commiserations in equal measure.
Neither hail nor rain nor thunder nor a flat tire stays Brenda from the swift completion of her appointed race. (With apologies to the Postal Service.)
We're not quite done with drama. The line for the shuttle back to the car takes us almost an hour to shuffle through. Apparently the organizers underestimated the number of spectators, and had not requested enough school buses. Our driver is certainly ready to go home. I had no idea school buses could corner that fast.
A little mental arithmetic tells me that without the flat Brenda would likely have finished fourth in her age group, with medals going to the top five. She coulda been a contender! The awards ceremony is at six at a nearby brewery, but we skip it in favor of our own private ceremony, with a six-pack of the same beer I find at the grocery store.
Monday we're headed to Santa Fe for a few days. I'm sure I'll find something to write home about.
Thanks, as always, for reading.
I love these accounts, the details of the race/weather (!) and the casual encounters with strangers that always seem to have that kismet magic in them, of unexpected brief connection. 💜
This is relatable as I'm going to support my wife in an Olympic distance triathlon in Bend this weekend! There's something so inspiring about watching Ironman finishes. A few years ago I found myself out at the Madison Ironman finish until the midnight cutoff!