Sometimes it does rain even on weekends...

A strange thing about triathlons is that they lack narrative and theme of pure running. They are neither the four-line poem of a mile or the epic journey of a marathon (which in my mind is far tougher). I want to write about them but don't have an easy slant.

Doing them (and granted I only have two medals) I break them down into little pieces - a swim scrum, a few buoys, some hills on the bike, watching older guys and then younger women pass, and then a run/walk. It is a disjointed mix in which none of the stuff in the first act really affects the third. Most of the time I wind up paying attention to my heart rate and how many minutes I have until snack time. Like the fish at the Steinhart aquarium I need to feed every half hour.

Maybe the weather is where to begin. Wildflower was more about foreshadowing. You know that it might be a tough day when the car parked next to you is from a guy who was just voted off of surivor ). I had heard that wildflower was supposed to be the Woodstock of triathlons. And while the crazed hippies were replaces with crazed tri geeks, we did have Woodstock's rain and mud.

It rained most of Friday. That night I huddled in my Charlie Brown tent and listened to scattered squalls pound the walls. My important tri stuff was wrapped in Ziploc bags while the rest of my clothes absorbed water from a small hole in the tent that I did not cover. The low for the race was lying in the dark unable to sleep and wondering how much it was going to hurt - like a kid the night before the dentist.

The rain kept coming even as we trudged down the hill to set up our transition areas.

I don't know if the lake was choppy, because I really could not see it. Rumors started to flow around that they were going to change the course and they did. They decided to make the run hillier. Rather than have an Arch-Rock-like climb on trails we were going to do a Divasdero-street(where my parents live) uphill on concrete. Twice. We would be required to walk our bikes over steel bridge at mile forty and the race was going to go forward.

In fairness it was more of a California rain than a southern drenching. If you squinted you could gaze far enough to see the bikers ahead, but the flowers and the mountains were blurred. There were patches of dryness but these occurred more in the open flats than the white knuckled descents.

It was also windy. And then got hot in the run. I think I might be the only person dumb enough to have finished Wildflower in a turtleneck.

As stupid as the day got there was never really a moment of quitting. Sure I was going to walk up beach hill, but I was going to run after that. When you have waited over a year to do something you damn well want to make sure it gets done. I never really had the moment of despair that I got when I hit the wall at mile 18 of the Honolulu Marathon or the fifth hill of the Top Hat Classic. It was a slow, steady whittling like a boxer who is aware how many more rounds he has to go and knows how many teeth he has left. Take a few punches. Keep shuffling the feet.

Also, I knew that I wasn't having the toughest weekend. The night before we had our kick off party catered with low budget meatless pasta and salad driven in from Salinas. The coaches spoke and then a couple of honorees, cancer survivors doing the triathlon, gave talks. It is inspirational to hear someone has come back from chemo and is strong enough to do what you were about to do. A guy missing an arm passed me on the run. A blind women would do the Olympic course. In the scheme of things I travel through life blessed.

After the second honoree talked, the coordinator introduced "And now Oleg."

Oleg?

He is a tall fellow with a Clydesdale build. He is jolly, enthusiastic, has the sweetest wife, and used to work at Mellon before I arrived. I have had to actually clean up some of his spreadsheets. From time to time he joins the work crew at Aquatic Park, but has yet to come close to be able to swim as fast as his wife. He can run faster than she and they had both come down for the Olympic distance tri.

Oleg?

I had done water running with him on Tuesday as my last taper workout. (I am still a complete nut the weeks leading up to a distance event and I have tried to buy the person working next to me many burritos to apologize).

Oleg?

The day before he had felt a bump on his neck and went to the doctors to check it out. He found out he has a lymphoma but the biopsy has not specified the exact kind. Obviously unable to do the race, he had come down to support us and would wind up running the entire 10k with his wife who finished her event in a haze. She could have dehydrated through tears.

He has named his tumor Jerry and told us all he plans to get rid of Jerry as soon as possible. Standing in front of three hundred people and telling "yesterday I learned that I had cancer" is tougher than any rain on any bike. On any day.

I did talk to my boss and he asked about how you assist someone in this state. I only know the part of how to feel helpless during your senior year at boarding school when my brother was in 8th grade with ALL. His approach was getting a Nintendo and watching Divorce Court. He referred to the probabilistic approach of which treatment he would receive to as the big spin. Dark humor can help with the healing. There were plenty of dark moments without humor, but I don't want to talk about them now.

I know Oleg will keep his wit and I hope he knows that he will have a lot of us cheering for him. I will buy him beers next year when he completes the course (and help as I can in the meantime).

Yes, it did rain during wildflower. I had it easy.