Grading Racing

My first Ironman in Kentucky.  Can you tell I am excited?!

When I was in 5^th grade my grades were finally good enough to be on honor role.  I could not wait for my report card to come in the mail so my parents could open the letter and see what I had accomplished.  Yes, I was finally doing well in school!  I may make it after all!  Up until this point, I am sure my parents were worried that I would struggle through life as a professional dodge ball player.  It seemed things may change though, I had finally arrived!  Honor role, here I come! 

A few days passed after receiving my report card in the mail, and nothing was said at school about me making honor role.  This was weird; usually something was posted or announced.  I mean, nothing short of a miracle had happened and I felt like I deserved some credit in front of my peers.   I was supposed to be on honor role!  I mustered up the courage to talk to my teacher, who was also the school principle, and asked him when honor role was going to be announced. The answer I received was devastating.  “We are not doing honor role because it is not fair to those students who do not make it on.”  WHAT?!  Are you kidding me?  No honor role?  What school does that?  Obviously, mine did.  I felt like there was a conspiracy against me to test how far you could push my mental stability before I cried.  (I rarely cried as a child, and still struggle with mustering up tears)  It worked, I almost cried.  I felt the tears welling up in my eyes but pushed them back.  The only response that my teacher gave me when he saw how hurt I was, was that I did a good job and that maybe the next semester honor role would be reinstated and I would make it then.  I was not as confident as he was.  Needless to say, my parents were very proud of me regardless and after they picked their jaws up off the floor when they received my miraculous grades, I am sure we went out for ice cream to celebrate.  That is how we did things in the Shadle household.  Celebrations = Ice Cream!

Now I am an adult and have forgiven my elementary school for not recognizing my outstanding achievement of all A’s and B’s.  I have not, however, forgotten the importance of good grades, but in the a different way than many of you would think.  Some things seem to follow us into adulthood no matter how hard we try to outrun them, my fear being bad grades.    

As far as triathlons are concerned, I think of my races in terms of letter grades.  “A” being the most important, “B” being the second most important and so it goes..  The more important the race is, the more focused and ready you go into it and will usually have higher aspirations for yourself concerning your finishing time and placement among the other athletes.  Well, this next week I have an A- race coming up.  Lake Stevens 70.5, meaning it is a half ironman.  My “A” race for the year is Ironman Wisconsin on September 9.  (more on that later)  I have been focusing on my training for Ironman Wisconsin for almost a year when I hired a coach, Chris Bagg, to help me after my disaster last year at Couer D’Alene Ironman, read about it here.


I am still working towards getting good grades, only now I do it on a race course!  I always was competitive; hence my parents concern of me wanting to be a professional dodge ball player, only now I want to be a professional triathlete.  Guess they were not too far off!  Wish me luck next Sunday, July 15, when I race Lake Stevens 70.5!  I have studied, trained, and prepared for the race.  That is more than I can say about school growing up, but you live and learn..  The competition will be stiff, but I am up to the challenge and hope that I feel healthy and well on race day so I can race my hardest and not get a bad grade on an A- race.  

Race day!  Getting ready to swim Troika.  

Preparation is key.  Working on my bike before a half ironman. 

Do you have any nightmare stories from your childhood about grades? 

What are your “A” races this year?