[Rest day today]
This morning I volunteered at the IronKids triathlon in Round Rock. My job was to ride back and forth on a section of the bike course and make sure everyone was safe. The age groups were 6-8, 9-11, 12-15. It's interesting to watch kids race because you can see in them the same variety of seriousness and focus as in adults. Some kids are out there with expensive tri bikes, race wheels, and aero helmets racing to win. Other kids are out there with cheap bikes from Target with pink streamers on the handlebars just having fun. Some kids were able to push themselves really hard out of a competitive spirit and some of them didn't care much about that.
It was very rewarding to see their faces light up and smile when I would ride next to them and tell them what a great job they are doing. I asked a few girls about the swim and they told me it was good but there was seaweed and it stuck to them (giggle). When I saw kids slowing down or about to give up, I told them to go chase the kids ahead and that always lit a fire under them.
This race reminded me how triathlon is fun stuff. It's play. For the kids today, the distances were plenty long (2/4/8 miles on the bike) and for us big kids at Ironman the distances are longer but it's still the same fun game. And with that I'm gonna go chase down those girls ahead because I don't want them to beat me.
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