Hey everyone,
Hope all of you that raced this last weekend made it to the finish line considering the considerably crappy weather there was around the east coast this weekend.
I love love love being my husbands beloved Tri-Sherpa but honestly, what are you going to do the entire time that your spouse or SO is out on the course? I mean seriously you’re looking at a minimum in most cases of 10 hours standing around for maybe a two second scream at them somewhere out on the course and let’s be honest the Expo is only just so good at these events and only if you happen to be a competitor yourself. So what do you do with your time? I polled a few people and they said that they usually head back to the hotel room and watch TV or they go out shopping at the local mall till its time to make their way down to the finish line. Not exactly what you call a fun weekend for the spectators in your racing life.
Well, since I work for a triathlon company as a buyer and I basically shop Monday through Friday going and doing more shopping is the LAST thing on my list to do on race day. So this year I committed to volunteering at every race venue that my husband races at and this last weekend was no exception.
Hubby did the Beach 2 Battleship Full in Wilmington NC this last weekend and as promised I volunteered myself (trusty tri-sherpa that I am) to do whatever they possibly needed. My duties for the day ran the absolute gamut, I went from signing up other volunteers to handing out T1 bags and cleaning up T1, then it was down to the Battleship for sorting and hanging medals to medaling the athletes as they came across the line. I also did back up event timing (a bonus is knowing 10 key by touch in this case) with none other than Linda Scott (the owner of Setup Events) herself!
But the best part of the day is that I was even lucky enough to get to medal my husband which was a real treat since this was his first full distance race and meant even more considering he won his division. After he came across the line it was off to the warming tent for him and back to timing on the finish line for me, then off to the finishers corral to hand out finishers T-shirts and schwag and many more little jobs until it was time to take Mister pooped to the room to get a shower and some food.
All in told I worked from 5:30 am to 8:30 pm and I enjoyed every moment of it. I was busy the whole day and figured out very quickly that if you just step up and do the little dirty jobs (like cleaning up T1 of all the garbage and swim to bike bags) you usually get rewarded with a more fun job somewhere in the day. If you remain flexible and also speak up and let the people in charge know that you are an experienced tri-volunteer they will most likely grab you and give you exactly what you ask for… it just takes a little initiative on your part to let them know you can be responsible and will follow through.
The day all in all was great! So if you have the gumption… volunteer, not only do you get a great t-shirt and hot food… but you have an opportunity like I did to make potentially lucrative business contacts within an organization that could mean good things for you down the road.
Hope y’all will consider it in the future!
~LBB