Race Coverage

PP & Hankee Rock LC Du Nationals & Other Stuff...!

paige-and-a-guy.gifPhoto - Paige Danielson, 17, and a guy. Paige rocked an overall podium finish at Blaine.

BLAINE TRIATHLON - Sunrise Lake was a shrinkage-inducing 51.4-degrees this morning, yet 250ish intrepid souls accepted the challenge. Devon Palmer and Heather Lendway led the way. Words, results and photos to come.

 

TRF SANDFORD HEALTH TRIATHLON - Manitobian pro, Riley Unger, 21, who has several wins and records at this event, outdistanced the 76-athlete field, winning by just less than a seven minute margin.Thirteen-year-old Payton Ryz, also from Manitoba, took the women's title. RESULTS ...

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Kerfuffles & Pork Sandwiches...

michael-bike.gifBy Michael McConkey
 
RACE REPORT - After a LONG BRUTAL winter in the pool, on the trainer, and the treadmill, many of us are antsy for the start of race season, but early races are always sketchy  due to the uncertain weather here in the land of 10,000 frozen lakes.  For those who don’t like to swim or don’t prefer to swim in freshly thawed lakes, May is perfect for Duathlons.  If you are like me and prefer riding to running, the Central Lakes Cycle DU in Fergus Falls is a perfect way to get an early season race in. CLC has a different twist on the traditional duathlon as it is a 20 mile bike, 4 mile run and then a 7 mile bike!! 
 
This was the 3rd year of the event and Clark and his crew at CLC know how to put on a fun race. The Du has a time trial start with two rider leaving every 15 seconds. The first 20 mile bike leg is challenging as the first 10 miles are a series of hills with great climbs and fast descents while you head SE to Dalton then you turn back to Fergus on the Central Lakes Bike trail for a screaming fast return before a final series of climbs back to transition.  The run is ...

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Gone to the Next Level...

nicole-oakdale.gifOAKDALE DUATHLON - This race drew its largest and deepest field ever. How deep, you ask? Well, for the first time in its 13-year history its field quality rivaled those of Gear West and Apple. The result was very fast times, featuring several broken records. Hospitable weather also contributed to this.

The previous men's race record was Scotty Penticoff's 1:03:35, set in 2012. On Saturday, four men crushed Scotty's mark. Overtaking Matthew Payne in the final run to win was pro David Thompson, who crossed the finish line in 1:00:30. Payne's brilliant 1:00:54 established an amatuer CR. Third went to Nathan Hoffman, who led after the opening three mile run (14:55!) and was only overtaken by DKT and M-Payne the rest of the way. The former collegiate cross country runner who is a super nice guy clocked a 1:01:21....

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Ang Unedited...

hopper-swim.gifBy Angie Hop

KINDA LIKE A RACE REPORT, BUT NOT REALLY - I was thinking about Chain of Lakes the other day, after it was over, and had gotten reporting from Stromberg and a few clowns from Fergus Falls that decided to partake in essentially the tri race opener for Minnesota over the past eleven years.   The race originated in 2003 by Mark Storhaug as a fundraiser for the Alexandria Swim Club, the team I started swimming with in 1979, yes, that is a SEVEN next to the 9, but I was only 8 years old.   My mom’s best friend had a daughter my age and she was a handful, so in order to get her out of her hair and perhaps tire her out a bit she thought she’d sign her up for swimming.   But, she would only agree if I would swim as well.   My mom agreed, wrong the check for $50.00 to the AAU swim club and a swam.  It was like no swimming I was used to.  I went from barely being able to swim 25 yards to being able to finish a 2000 yard workout by August.    Coach Storhaug hit the scene in 1983, took me from a average freestyler to a above average breaststroker.  He taught us how to work hard and to have each other’s backs.  I know no other people ...

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"My Best Duathlon Race Ever...."

teddy-hat.gifA Win!

By Devon Palmer


I won a duathlon on Saturday. It was fun. It was a nice course out of Square Lake park in Stillwater. The top 4 men from the prior weekend at Falls Duathlon were all back. This race was an out and back 5k, a two lap 20 mile bike, and the same run again. Given the length of the bike I figured it would be down to Joe Johnson and I. My Gear West Bike teammate Brian Sames (pronounced the same as the word same, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise) would get a good lead right away and Joe and I would need to ride him down before the half way point in order to get a big enough gap before the second run. Curt Wood, a very strong cyclist but not super fast runner, pointed out an obvious equation I still use for duathlons – if both runs are equal length and you’re trying to beat runners on the bike you need to take the lead before half way on the bike. Otherwise it will probably be too late to build a sufficient gap.....

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Ben & Lauren Take the Hill...

ben-and-amy.gifTAKE THE HILL TRIATHLON - Ben Trnka is a fine young man who parts his hair on the right. He got married to a lovely girl who looks kinda like awesome actress Amy Adams (photo L) last summer and he is still very happy.

Ben also won last Saturday's Take the Hill Triathlon in St. Peter, and assuming that the distances haven't been altered, he did so in record time. His groovy time was 1:00:13, which lowered Mike Torchia's five-year-old CR by 37 seconds. Additionally, he was 3:01 faster than runner-up Nick Weiler, who also made the podium here in 2013. Nick was so inspired by the Winter Olympics that he did the City of Lakes Loppet which gave him major beard-cicles (photo below).

Third place for the guys went to Nate Sanders (1:03:23), who is a doctor and, like Ben and Nick, a totally good guy. Nate went to Florida a few months ago, probably to scope out some future retirement locales....

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