Meeting New People

Today I had lunch with one of the newer members of the Triathlete Alliance, IronBenny. IronBenny came into town to race the Soma half Ironman on Sunday. Triathlete magazine calls Soma, "The World's Best Year End Triathlon ."

IronBenny is a really nice guy and we got along great. If he lived in Phoenix we could definitely train together. His wife Nytro is also a blogger and triathlete and I must admit, I can't get enough of her stuff. I kinda wish she had made it down here so I had someone to hang with tomorrow.

IronBenny and I had a carbo load session at Olive Garden and then drove some of the course going to the expo. Honestly it was a cluster of an expo. The registration booths were crammed together and the expo booths were on the other side of the walkway, so it was just a gaggle trying to get a 6 lines of 50 people to fit where only 20 should be. Then the body marking line was not set up very clearly and no one was told to get their swim cap and ChampionChip actived before going to body marking and...well we wanted in a couple of lines for two hours.

While we waited around I ran into many friends. Even though I am not racing it still felt like good community. IronBenny and I took in many of the sites, however I must confess that the superfit IronChicks were upshadowed by the super expensive tricked out bikes. For those of us who have participated or witnessed a big race, man what a rush to see all those investments toodle on by. Even the guys with Cervelo P3 Carbons were putting their eyes on other bikes and their frames alone are $3, 200.

By tomorrow night I hope to be able to post some good photos from the event.

This was on my race schedule before I cleared out the last part of the year to devote to training and recovery. In hindsite I wish I had the opportunity to race it. I was so damn motivated while I was there. It just soldout so damn fast and next year its too close to Ironman Florida to enter. But my goals are bigger than my ego, so tomorrow I spectate.