by Bob Dittmann, Kyle’s Bikes 2014 Triathlon Team

Most of my triathlon warmup strategy in the past has involved "trusting my training." This meant spending my pre-race time talking to the merry band of fellows wearing Speedos, ensuring that my transition area was in proper order, and plotting the post-race festivities.

As we are training into race-ready form, a number of us on the Kyle’s Bikes Triathlon Team were discussing ways for us to better our performance and minimize the risks for personal injury. Within this conversation was a strong focus and surprising debate about the usefulness of and strategy behind the "warmup" time before the starting gun goes off.

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by Andy Bernholtz, Kyle's Bikes 2014 Triathlon Team

"Anything Is Possible.” These three simple words can tell any story. As an individual you just have to be willing to take small steps to achieve big steps. In my case, this equated to a 2.4-mile swim followed by a 112-mile bike and 26.2-mile run.

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by Pro Triathlete Tami

It is very hard for me to write this race report for Ironman Texas. It feels like the same story over and over. Why can’t everything just go right (or as right as things can go in a roughly 10-hour race) and I have a good race that I’m happy with? It’s easy to have a pity party and get frustrated. And I think I did, for about two days. But then I got my head on straight again, and used another subpar race result as more fuel to the fire.

You know all those sayings... Fall down nine times, get up 10. You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.

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by Katherine A. Roccasecca

The cool thing about working for a triathlon company is that I get to hang out with a lot of triathletes. The downside is that there is a lot of pressure to do triathlons, and triathlons are hard. So I am really happy that the local Hickory Grove Triathlon has started offering the Hickory Grove Aquabike.

All I would have to do is swim 500 yards, bike 15.5 miles, and stroll over to the finish line. Sounds great, except that spring can’t decide if it wants to come to Iowa this year or not…  and the water temp on race day was 59°F.

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by Bob Dittmann, Kyle’s Bikes 2014 Triathlon Team

Race Report #3
Hickory Grove Triathlon
Sunday, May 18, 2014
Colo, Iowa

The quick and short summary of the 11th annual running of the Hickory Grove Triathlon in Colo, Iowa could be “Cold Swim.” That seemed to be the theme that dominated my morning and anticipation leading up to the race.

You see this race offered me lots of firsts this year, including my first triathlon of the season, longest brick of the season, first open water swim of the season, and first cold water swim in a very many years!

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Tuesday evening the Kyle's Bikes 2104 Triathlon Team hosted a pre-season triathlon party, encouraging folks to stop by the store on their way home from work to enjoy free food and talk about the upcoming season.

Christian Baughman, Andy Bernholtz, Shawn Blaesing-Thompson, Scott Carkhuff, Robert Dittmann, and Laura Miller all gamely hung out in the chilly spring weather to pose for pictures (lots of pictures) in their new kits. You can check out the whole album on our Facebook page.

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