Ironman World Championship on NBC

This Saturday NBC will air their coverage of the 2011 Ford Ironman World Championship. The actual race took place on October 8th in Kona, Hawaii. Why someone (NBC, ESPN, Fox Sports, Versus, etc.) can't seem to find a way to show a live broadcast of this race, I have no idea. I understand that NBC wants to show you all the back stories and be able to show human intestest pieces, but why can't they do both. Someone could broadcast the race live and then NBC could do their production to be shown in December, as it always is. It's not like those really interested in the race don't already know who won and how it played out. Ok, I'm off my soap box now.

Here's some of what you will see at 4:30pm on Saturday:

• The amazing story of cancer survivor Teri Griege. She completed the 140.6 mile race despite going through chemotherapy for the majority of her training and having with 12" of her colon and much of her liver removed.
• Legend Lew Hollander. For anyone that has watched this broadcast in the past, this name should be familiar. Lew is 81 years old. If my memory is correct, he's completed this race 22 times now. His goal is to live to be 120...he's well on the way.
• Another guy in the 80+ age group is France Cokan. He came to the US as an immigrant in 1959 with $11 in his pocket. This IM was is 44th!
• 23 year old Firefighter Jonathan Roth. He was diagnosed with Familial Polyposis at age 16. He had to have his entire large intestine removed. For those layperson, the large intestine is where all the nutrients from food is absorbed by the body. I could see where this would make doing an Ironman a challenge! Not only did he finish the race, he did it in just over 10 hours!

Along with these stories, they will also show some of the pro race. Spoiler alert! Here's how that went.

Here's a preview of the NBC broadcast. I recommend you record it. I know I will...and I will watch it several times over the next few months. I find it very motivating!

In other news, I did run that Santa Sprint 5K last Saturday. I started out too fast (6:31 first mile) and then struggled to hang on. My lungs and legs were burning like crazy the last mile and I nearly vomited at the finish line. My time was 21:41 (6:58 min/mile pace) - my GPS showed 3.14 miles...I could have done without that extra .04! I'm not sure how this fared overall or in my age group. It was a small race, so it might be a few weeks before results are posted.