St. Croix 70.3 Race Results
The sun rose. Lots of people woke up before it did. Many went into town to start the grueling triathlon. Many actually finished. A few people won in their categories. For all that information, you can check the newspapers.
This is what we did:
We slept in. We played with the dogs, took them for walks around the yards and did yoga. We ate bananas with our Dean’s Beans organic coffee and had a late, lazy breakfast of omelets and toast.
Michael then began the gutter-on-the-carport project while I did dishes and laundry. I went out to help Michael with the project and we didn’t quite finish before it was time to get ready for our 4pm triathlete massaging appointment.
In past years, we have volunteered in the massage tent. We don’t any more. I need my hands to make my living. At my age, I can’t really afford to spend hours giving free massages. Besides, how many of our numerous local triathletes (many of whom get free massages on the day of the race), actually have supported Ambrosia Body Care over the years?
One.
And that was for a few months, around 5 years ago.
We do a lot of other volunteer work around the island, so we don’t do this particular thing anymore. We did help clean up the roads last week. That was a blast. I’m tired of picking up after the lazy slobs of this island, too. But we did it to show our support for the island-wide team effort.
Anyway, all told, when the visiting athletes have gone back to reality, we will have massaged around a dozen triathletes. Some before the race and some after. I love listening to their stories. Most of them complained about the heat this year. One guy lost his bike computer because the roads are so bumpy that the rattling loosened it to the point that it fell off.
But he says he’ll come back next year. His wife wasn’t so sure, but she says that every year. This was their fourth year competing.
We look forward to seeing them again.
May 3rd, 2010 at 5:38 pm
Years ago I started withholding benefits and services to monitor if it made any difference in business. Most of the time I noticed no difference and I benefited from more personal time.
May 4th, 2010 at 8:22 am
The first Triathlon in 1988 was “BW” – before Windows – and Graphically Speaking did the typesetting for the Cat Sports group that came to run it. I volunteered, sharing the Drafting Marshal Leader job with “Harper” and continued for years until I stopped as a protest to what I felt was a very dangerous course defect at the lower end of Company St. – this was only changed when the course was adjusted to be a Half Ironman.
Knock on wood, we have still not had any serious loss due to the HEAT nor the Crucian drivers who continue to drive on the course. Pro Craig Alexander crashed when he took his eyes off the road at the Sunny Isle intersection and hit a pot hole. He might have been distracted by a fatal accident that had just happened when a spectator was hit by an out of control Mustang (muscle car), probably raging at having to wait to get onto the open west lane of the highway.
Hopefully the Bike Way will be able to make training athletes safer – I’ve heard many complaints about them not sharing the road. Perhaps the course can loop back and forth to be able to open the East End roads earlier while the 79 year old nun is still out there near noon!