What makes a clydesdale/athena? (Page 2)

Zeus... yeah that's it.  I want a nice big Z on my calf!  Go Zeus...... more cowbell.

my last race I was Clydesdale in I did get a nice huge Z if it makes you feel any better.

Love the "Z"

"Z" for Zeus

Hilarious thread, y'all. Someone told me this was a new forum on BT so I thought I'd check it out. Definitely worthwhile! I would definitely sign up for a race with a Hippo category, especially if I could get it on my t-shirt. I mean, what's the point if you don't have a sense of humor about it? Nice hippo photo there, too.

Most of the races I've done with Athena categories are 150, though some have a 160 limit. Hah! I would be so skinny if I weighed 160! I would be very interested in someday doing (or even organizing?) a BMI-based triathlon, with some kind of handicap so that a combo of your time, weight and height would determine your "placing" in the final results. Like maybe your total time in minutes divded by your BMI and lowest number "wins"?

Cheers,
Jayne

Um, yes, that is me actually. Thanks for the kind words and congrats on your first sprint!!!! Here's to many more. Athenas - goddesses of wisdom (and endurance!)

Jayne

Jayne Williams was the reason I started tri- ing.  So cool!!!!  I'd be on Team Hippo any day.

Not all races have an Athena/Clydesdale category. One of the biggest race companies in northern California doesn't have it. The race director says that if you start making special categories for heavier people, then you should make categories for short people, who are (according to him) at a disadvantage in the swim. I'm not sure I agree with his reasoning since one of the fastest swimmers I know is about 4'11", but I don't do his races anyway for other reasons, so there.

-jayne

At the risk of hijacking the thread into a Jayne fan club...
I LOVED YOUR BOOK, you got me off the couch and I think of you several times a week.

Team Hippo. Maybe I'm not THAT self confident. I even worried about getting an Orca wetsuit until my husband told me Orcas are not whales.

I am not sure about that. The life gaurds tired to harpon a few of us clysdesdale as we went by. I think 4 hours in that boat was getting to them.

Jayne who? Heck if she is able to inspire people to "tri" I want to read her book, not for myself but for the group of people who are sort of interested in Tri'ing.

Oh and by the way, an Orca is an whale/dolphin type of mammal. However, I am pretty sure being called an Orca is heck of alot better than being called a whale.

The book is

Slow Fat Triathlete:
Pursue Your Athletic Dreams in the Body You Have Now

www.amazon.com/Slow-Fat-Triathlete-Athletic-Dreams/dp/1569244677/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-2145602-1990338?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1188176328&sr=1-1


and her website

www.slowfattriathlete.com/


And I looked up Orca on wikipedia: they say dolpin/whale but the photo looks quite dolphinish and nice.

Hey everybody,

thanks for all the kind words about the book. It's great to know that it's still giving people some support and a few giggles along their triathlon journeys.

Maggyruth - I did actually do a little "nanny-nanny boo boo," how did you know? It was after the year that the race director in question failed to put up portapotties at the massively overcroweded campsites at Wildflower (like 150 people in an area designed for maybe 40), and yet found the resources to provide the pro triathletes with a chocolate fountain for their pre-race meal. That kind of pushed me over the edge.

Orcas are very powerful, sleek, socially developed and intelligent mammals. They are, I believe, more closely related to dolphins than whales. I've always felt that my Orca wetsuit made me fast and strong (or maybe that was just the compression factor of the neoprene).

-jayne

That is true; Orcas are more dolphin than whales. On top of that they are predators top of the sea mammal food chain and are more dangerous when hunt in a pack. So I figure if all of us Clydes/Athenas swim as a pack we should grab one of those “smaller” swimmers and have a pre-post race lunch!!!

Thanks for sending me the website and book information healthieme2, my wife read the site and wants to buy the book, hopefully she will be inspired. Anyway we can help someone who is writing about their adventures in Tri we should;; promote, promote promote!!!!

That RD should be fired, better yet tossed into the lake and Orca hunted.

I just want to jump on the bandwagon (orca wagon?) and give a shout out to Jayne. Yours was the first and only book I saw that made me realize that it was actually possible for a fat, 41 year old woman who spent the better part of the last year in a wheelchair to actually become athletic again. I laughed and nodded my way through your book as I dreamed of crossing a finishing line (ANY finishing line!). I recently finished my first 5k, I have another this weekend, and if all goes well will have my first Tri by the end of next year.

So, THANK YOU! Your book definately made a difference in my life. Even though I hope to be out of the Athena category by this time next year (15 more pounds to go!)...I would proudly compete in it if I could.

Virginia

Jayne! I'm going to jump in with the fan club to tell you that I LOVED your book, and it was what inspired me to go ahead and sign up for the Danskin team training in 2006. You are awesome, and I totally want to know how to buy a Slow Fat Triathlete shirt .

I am jumping in on the Jayne bandwagon as well. I picked up your book in June and just did my first tri this past Saturday. Your book is so funny and so inspirational. THANK YOU!!! I love what you said about Body Glide, I have so many tubes of it.

Thanks for dropping in on this site!

Hey y'all,

You guys are embarrassing me! But it's great to hear that you all are having such awesome athletic adventures.

LastCall - I have been a lapsed Weight Watcher for most of the last 2 years. When I'm on the program it works really well though. Eventually what happens is that I get tired of obsessing over counting points and measuring portion sizes and I go off the wagon with some massive cheeseburger and french fry binge. And I must have been a Belgian in a past life because I like french fries with ... mayonnaise. Argh! But my next attempt at WW will involve their "core" program where you don't have to count or measure anything that's a whole grain, a non-fat dairy product, a lean meat, or a veggie. Something like that. Then you just count/measure the other stuff. There are a lot of triathletes (and other endurance athletes) online on the message boards at weightwatchers.com. Some of my best tri buds are from the Fitness Challenge/Tri-ers daily thread. In fact one of them is the one who told me about the Clydes/Athena board here. And another one is a gal who lost 160 pounds and just did IM CDA this year.

When you train a lot, you get to eat more on the WW program - so that's a plus.

Cheers
Jayne

Two years ago I was skating at the oval in Lake Placid, when a strange man skated up to me and asked me if I ever did triathlons. At that time he could have been asking me if I had ever thought of flying to the moon and the answer would have been the same, NO! He kept after me, telling me I should think about it, that I would be an awesome Athena. Thinking this was some sort of werid come on, I skated away from him as fast as I could. Part of me was flattered that some guy would think of me as a Greek goddess who could actually DO a triathlon, and part of me wanted to put ALOT of distance between me and him. As luck would have it, I kept on running into him all weekend and he persisted, even giving me his email and offering me a place to stay if I would come up and do the LP tri next year. I think he might have planted that first seed of interest for triathlons. Now I know what he was getting at, well, perhaps he was trying to get at something else, but at least I understand a bit more about the whole classification scheme. As a post script, that strange man told me he was also building a space ship in his backyard.... yikes..

Ditto! My son in the other room asked me to "Chill, Mom"!! The picture of the hippo chasing the boy had my sides aching!!!

ROFL