Friday, September 8-10:00 a.m. (35 hours to go)
After taking a picture…
(A “telfie.”)
A telfie in front of the Ironman finish line I went searching for a better back backdrop.
(There’s a nice “Ironman World Championships Nice” sign in front of the expo.)
Back to the expo I went.
(You had been in Nice for all of 36 hours. How many times had you been to the expo by this point?)
Five I think, I had lost track. I replaced my cracked bike helmet. I had replaced my swim goggles; I had taken the family shopping and now…
(Now you were going back there to take a picture of you in your tallis and tefillin.)
I took the picture and packed up. I was about to leave when an athlete walked up to me and asked,
“Do you know where the Chabad is?”
“No … but have you put on tefillin today?)
“Eh,.no. You have with you?”
(It sounds like he just found Chabad.)
Hey, my family doesn’t say tachanun. We daven Mincha late and we are from the Ukraine. I just might be.
(See if Lubavitch Headquarters at 770 will designate your bike a Chabad House.)
I’ve already joked to Rabbi Nochum Kurinsky, Chabad rabbi in Florida and a fellow Ironman, that I need a swim-proof Chabad fedora.
(Wait, there are Chabad Ironman athletes?)
Yes, but that’s a story for another time.
(What happened to the Israeli?)
Amir Alfie? We are still in touch.
Friday, September 8-2:00 a.m. (31 hours to go)
We visited the local kosher mart. We loaded up on hummus and lox and cheeses and French bread and bags of chips. I know that we bought some “mains” that we could eat cold, but I can’t remember what those were. I’ve been to kosher supermarkets in Teaneck, Scarsdale, Brooklyn and out on Long Island by my sister-in-law Rona Birnbaum.
These are all large, spacious stores. In Nice, the kosher mart was a tiny store where you were shoulder-to-shoulder if you passed someone in the aisle.
(Do you speak any French?)
No, but everyone in the store spoke Hebrew.
(In France?)
When I posted that we were going to France, my childhood friend Shira Kurz told me her husband’s family was from the area … and gave me the names of people to meet. Nice was full of Israelis.
(Ok, you had Shabbos food, a new bike helmet, replacement swim goggles; was there anything left to do before race day?)
I had to pick up my race materials; the bike sticker, my timing chip and transition bags.
(Where did you have to go to get those?)
Where do you think?
(Back to the expo!)
I had to wait until 1 p.m. for my appointment.
(Why did you need an appointment?)
Because the idea of 2,200 amateur athletes showing up all at once to collect their material would not go well.
(Why not? Aren’t they just handing you a bag?)
No.
(No?)
No, you move from table to table gathering your stuff. At each table you have to verify that you passed the last station.
(Sounds like building an automobile.)
It was a little like Henry Ford’s assembly line in River Rouge, Michigan.
(That makes since Henry Ford invented the car)
Nope, that was Karl Benz in 1886.
(Ok, the first American car.)
Nope, that was Charles and Frank Duryea of Massachusetts in 1895.
(Ok, fine. Henry Ford created the assembly line. I learned that in school.)
Nope again. Swift and Co. Meat packing in Chicago inspired Ford … and now Ironman was using it at packet pick up.
I wheeled my bike through the merchandise tent, past the vendors who were selling everything an athlete might need to do a triathlon, to the restricted section in the back; athlete pick up!
As soon as they called my name the next disaster of this trip struck…
David Roher is a USAT certified triathlon and marathon coach. He is a multi-Ironman finisher and veteran special education teacher. He is on Instagram @David Roher140.6. He can be reached at [email protected].
