| The Santa Barbarba News-Press August
17, 2006 |
Sports News
Times that bind: Training time is family time for teams competing
in Santa Barbara Triathlon
MARK PATTON, NEWS-PRESS SENIOR WRITER
August 17, 2006 12:00 AM
Family
time had always been important to Bob and JudyAnn Dutcher. But it
became downright precious when two deadly illnesses entered their
home.
They fought for their health by becoming triathletes -- and are
now bringing their kids along for the battle.
"To have a boy and be able to do something physical like this
with him -- it just doesn't get any better than that," Bob
Dutcher said after he and JudyAnn completed a long bike ride with
their 10-year-old son, Andrew.
The Dutchers are among the growing number of families that are
training together for the Santa Barbara Triathlon, which is set
for the weekend of Aug. 26-27. The trend prompted Momentum 4 Life,
which started out as a women's training group, to create a coed
team three years ago.
"One of the reasons I switched to this group was so I could
do this with my son," said Cornelia Alsheimer, whose 12-year-old
son, Ben Barthel, has already become an award-winning triathlete.
And now daughter Franziska, 8, is also joining in.
Momentum's women's group, meanwhile, is now accommodating an increasing
number of daughters who want to join their moms in the swim-bike-run
competition.
"It's become a real nice way to stay connected to your child,"
said Amy Mayfield, a four-year triathlon veteran who will be competing
for the first time with her 13-year-old daughter, Addison.
• • •
JudyAnn
Dutcher was sick of sickness after she caught meningitis from her
newborn son Brandon in 1998. The illness was dragging through its
second week when she noticed a newspaper advertisement about the
triathlon.
"It was really, really scary how sick she was," Bob said.
"And then for her to say in a very weak voice, 'I want to do
a triathlon' -- and actually go out and do it -- was absolutely
amazing."
The fact that JudyAnn didn't know how to swim didn't stop her,
either. She took some lessons with the Moms in Motion training group
and dog-paddled her way through the start of her first short-course
triathlon in 1999.
"Two years after that, I learned how to breathe on both sides,
and the year after that, I swam my first mile," she said. "It's
really been a steady progression for me."
Bob began tackling triathlons in 2003 -- a year after undergoing
surgery for bladder cancer -- when JudyAnn directed him toward Momentum's
coed group.
"He'd always been a great runner, he'd always done half-marathons,
and I wanted this to be a comeback sort of thing for him,"
she said.
Andrew
was making noise about joining the fun even before that.
"When he was about 5, he asked me, 'Do boys do triathlons?'
" JudyAnn said. "I told him, 'Yes, boys do triathlons.'
"
He competed in the Santa Barbara Kids Triathlon, taking third in
his age division, but wasn't satisfied. He does Scouting with his
parents -- Bob is the Scoutmaster and JudyAnn is the den mother
of Cub Scout Pack 36 -- so why not triathlons, too? "The kids
triathlon was too short," Andrew said.
And so he joined his parents' training group this summer.
JudyAnn has noticed how much he has matured through the sessions
with the team's physical trainers -- Pete Engle, Eric Schmitz and
Robert Wilcher. "We had told him that he has to be an adult
when he goes out for his training," JudyAnn said.
Bob has entered the triathlon's long-course race while Judyann
will compete in the parent-child sprint race with Andrew.
"A big reason why I wanted to do this with him, and focus
on him, was that my mother passed away in October," Judyann
said. "Because of that, I knew I couldn't possibly focus enough
on my own goals this year -- I couldn't possibly think about how
to improve -- but I could be there for him. I could help him, and
encourage him.
"This year, it's all about him."
• • •
Cornelia Alsheimer joined Moms in Motion in 2001, but by her third
summer she was more concerned about her son getting into shape.
"Ben was 9 years old then, and I'd drag him down to the track
with me every day to do the mile," she said. "I told him,
'You can run it, you can walk it, you can do whatever, but you have
to do four laps.' I did tell him that it would be over a lot quicker
if he ran.
"For sure, he wasn't always happy that we did that together."
The Barthels started doing triathlon relays together in 2003 --
with dad Rick swimming, son Ben cycling and mom Cornelia finishing
up with the run -- before Ben went solo on the Santa Barbara Triathlon's
short course last year.
"He won third place for his age division, and then he just
took off with it from there," Cornelia said. "It was the
sweet smell of success."
The transformation is now evident every Saturday morning: Cornelia
no longer has to drag Ben out of bed for their training sessions
with Schmitz, Engle, Wilcher and the rest of the coed group.
"Now, he's the one who's always standing in the doorway, saying:
'C'mon, Mom! We need to get going!' " Cornelia pointed out.
Ben has improved so much that he's moving up to the long-course
race this year.
"Two years ago, I had to run that mile every day to get into
shape, but now I run seven miles a day," he said. "I found
out that it's something that I'm actually good at.
"Now I want to win the Ironman someday."
Little sister Franziska didn't want to be left behind, either.
"Smaller siblings, they want to copy what the older ones are
doing," Cornelia said. "She kind of grew into it without
anyone having to push her."
Franziska relishes the challenge.
"I got a bicycle for my birthday when I was about 4 or 5,
but I didn't know how to ride it," she said. "This kid
wanted to ride it, and that's what made me want to. That's right
when I started."
Franziska joined her mom and brother in Momentum's coed group last
year at age 7. Dad accompanied her on her ocean swims, allowing
his wife and son to train at an accelerated pace.
"He's also our bike technician," Cornelia said. "My
husband doesn't show up on any of the result lists, but he's been
participating with us the whole way, too."
The Barthels also have a 3-year-old, Julian.
"He ran the kids race at Nite Moves last week, but he stopped
at the first turn," Cornelia said. "Richard said, 'Well,
I guess this one is still a ways away from his first triathlon.'
"
• • •
Amy Mayfield, who is gearing up for her fourth triathlon, got Addison
to enter her first one last year. But she didn't get her to join
her Momentum 4 Life training group until this summer.
"We stayed together the whole way in last year's race -- literally
from start to finish -- and that was really fun," Amy said.
"But this year, she's competing in her own age group.
"The biggest difference this year is that I'm not her coach
now. Last year, I had to be the bad person, and now I'm just back
to being the mom. They respond so much differently to a coach than
to a parent."
Coaching has made all the difference for Amy.
"I couldn't swim one lap in the pool when I started this,"
she said. "I can honestly say now that ocean swimming is my
favorite part. The swimming instruction is one of Momentum's greatest
strengths."
Her coach on her first day of Momentum 4 Life training was Richard
Schroeder, an Olympic gold medalist and the husband of Momentum's
director, Dawn Schroeder.
"I trusted that he knew what he was talking about," Amy
said with a smile.
A friend talked Marilyn Caldwell into joining the training group
last summer, and so this year she passed the challenge on down to
her own 17-year-old daughter, Brooke.
"She always wants to be in shape, so I asked her, 'Why not
do this with me?' " she said. "She's really stuck with
it, too. I'm very proud of her.
"She doesn't like spending her Friday nights at home, and
so it's not easy to get up at 6 or 6:30 in the morning on Saturday,
jump on our bikes and ride out to Goleta Beach or UCSB or wherever
we're training that day. Begrudgingly, she's done it."
They have had to miss a few weekends, "but Brooke and I made
our own little pact that if we missed practice, we'd go out and
do our own."
Training partners will become race rivals when Triathlon Day arrives.
"She doesn't want to be beaten by her mom, and I don't want
to be beaten by her," Marilyn said with a laugh. "I've
been riding this little kid's bike that weighs a ton -- but I just
got a new, lightweight road bike. I'm hoping that will give me an
edge."
Susi Stanfield, a Foothill School teacher who commutes from Santa
Ynez, didn't join Moms in Motion five years ago to win any medals.
"It's just been a good activity for me, physically as well
as mentally," she said. "I'm not a great athlete, but
this was somewhere that I could find some good, positive camaraderie."
And this year, she got her 14-year-old daughter, Abbey, to join
her on her Saturday morning drive to Santa Barbara.
"When they get to be teenagers, they basically don't want
to be with their parents anymore, so this has been great for us,"
Susi said. "We get to spend some time together during our drive,
and we get to experience the same things, too."
Abbey is a mountain biker and a good runner, but she didn't truly
appreciate her mom's achievement until she joined her training group.
"The first time she swam with us in the ocean, she did just
one buoy and that was it," Susi said. "But she's worked
at it, and last week she swam 800 meters and was just thrilled.
She used to see all these old women and say, 'Oh, that must be easy.'
But now she's seen how much energy you have to put into it, and
she's realized how hard it really is.
"She's told me: 'Hey, mom -- you can actually do this! That's
pretty amazing!' "
e-mail: mpatton@newspress.com
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