Yesterday I had the pleasure of volunteering at the Rev3 Ironman at Cedar Point.

What an experience.

I signed up to help at the finish line from 4:00 to 8:00 (and was secretly hoping I’d get to hand out the medals to the athletes!).

Krystal and I checked in promptly at 3:45 (we were only a tiny bit excited – hehe):

And got right to work. There was no time to spare – we just jumped right in.

And, lucky me, I was all over it when the girl in charge said they needed someone to help with the medals!

I seriously cried no less than 10 times Sunday evening. I couldn’t help myself. The athletes were so gracious and thankful to ME, even though they had just covered 70.3 or 140.6 miles. I wish I could have told them how much it meant to me that I was to be able to help them. But instead I did the only thing I could and just placed that amazing medal over their head and told them (most sincerely) “Congratulations!”.

Maybe they’ll remember me, maybe they won’t (probably not). But I’ll always remember them.

I am truly moved by triathletes. They are welcoming and inspiring and friendly and gracious and sweaty and stinky and ridiculously BADASS.

Hopefully I will be one of these triathletes who crosses that finish line next year.

And I will never forget to thank the volunteers. Maybe I’ll be lucky enough to inspire one of them to wanna swim, bike, and run.

Who inspires you to get after it??

You really didn’t think that C was the only one who did the triathlon this weekend, right?

The kid’s race was on Saturday and the adult’s race was on Sunday. Luckily the kids got the perfect weather on Saturday, because Sunday was crazy town.

The weather channel kept reporting thunderstorms and heavy rain for Sunday morning from 7am on. I was terrified:

• #1 because I’ve never swam outside in anything but calm waters
• #2 because I’ve never ridden my bike in the rain
• #3 because ever since my bike crash I’ve been very tentative on my bike, especially on turns, and the rain made me terribly scared

I even emailed my Coach Saturday night freaking out about the race. Poor guy was trying to watch the triathlon on the Olympics and was having to deal with my craziness instead. (sorry, Coach!)

So when I woke up Sunday morning (4:45am, to be exact), I was happy that there was no rain. But when I got to the race and saw this:

I freaked the F out. My hands were sweaty, my teeth were numb, I couldn’t stop having to pee, and kept laughing like a hyena (I laugh and pee a lot when I’m super nervous).

I got lucky when they announced that the swim lengths were going to be shortened due to the roughness of the water, but I still had to swim 400 meters! At this point there wasn’t anything I could do about it so I just sucked it up and dove in.

Since we were swimming AGAINST the current it felt like I was swimming in place at times. I did a lot of breast stroke and also had to breathe on my left since the waves were coming in from the right. Of course, I am a dominant right side breather. Luckily I’ve been practicing my left side breathing, but still, just my luck!

I was just so happy to reach shore and get on my bike (and the bike is always my least favorite of the 3 sports!).

And, I have to say, despite the stupid headwind the first half of the bike, this part of the race went by really quick!

Before I knew it I was heading back in to transition.

And putting on my running shoes (my favorite part!).

My goal was to stay under a 9 minute mile and I ended up averaging an 8:50/mile. Right on target!

I probably could have even pushed a little harder. But I’m still learning when to push and when to conserve my energy during a triathlon. There’s just so much going on!

Life is always good when you cross that finish line, though.

And you wonder why you ever doubted yourself.

And then you say, “This is awesome. When’s the next one??!” Sound familiar?

When is a time you wondered why you ever doubted yourself??

Warning: Proudest mom ever post…………….

Saturday was an important day.

It was C’s first TRIATHLON!!!

For the 7 to 10 year olds:

• 100 meter swim
• 3 mile bike
• 1/2 mile run

(it was double that distance for the 11 to 14 year olds)

We got there bright and early so that he could check everything out before the craziness began. This race was no joke.

I had a mini panic attack when the officials wouldn’t let me in transition with him. For some reason when I read that parents weren’t allowed in transition, I thought that was only during the race! Luckily we had gone over the process the night before and, with a little coaching from the sidelines, he set himself up quite nicely.

C and his friend, Alex, goofing off before the race:

Can you believe they’re only 18 months apart????

They were both so confident that they just took off for the start line without us! Alex’s mom and I ran over to say good luck before they started the swim and got the half ass “we’re fine, we’ll see you later, Mom….” with a little wave. Lol.

I can’t even tell you how cute the swim was. Some of these kids could really SWIM!

He didn’t waste any time getting into the water, but ended up more towards the end of the pack.

He didn’t seem to care, though, because he came out looking strong (and so cute, right??!).

J and I chased him over to transition and watched him be a total rockstar. We didn’t have to tell him anything!

He had to ride 3 one-mile laps and said the bike was his favorite part because he actually passed other kids. Ha.

I wasn’t worried a bit about his run – I knew he could run a half mile in his sleep.

Check out this kid’s face:

So determined.

So inspirational.

So awesome.

I love this kid more than anything in this world, but I have never been more proud of him than I was yesterday. He did this all on his own. No help from anyone. He pushed himself to finish. He didn’t give up when it got hard. He did his best!

And then he said to me (without me even asking), “That was fun! Can I do another one?”

No one can deny that he is my kid.