Papa Pea's Birthday Biathlon

I just realized it's been three weeks since our last post. It's not that there hasn't been anything going on, but maybe too much going on! Honu has come and gone, and 24 Big Island residents were selected to participate in the Ironman World Championships in October. The first annual Ka'u Half Marathon, 10K and 5K was held on June 11, followed up by another successful Queen K Tri Club training run on June 12.

This past weekend had two options for the whole family. First on Saturday were the Keiki Fun Runs hosted by Kona Commons in connection with the Kona Marathon. As always those events were a blast to watch. Some kids are natural runners and others need some coaxing from mom and dad. Overall, it looked like all of the kids had a great experience. Results from the runs can be found here. Unfortunately, I was volunteering that day and didn't get a chance to take any photos.

Then on Sunday, everyone gathered again to celebrate Father's Day and Papa Pea's birthday with Papa Pea's Birthday Biathlon.

Race honoree Papa Pea sprinting to the finish (even with his injured shoulder).

The event distances were a 1/2 mile swim and 2 mile run. After doing a long(ish) run before the race, I decided just to swim while Jason tagged off me for the relay. Needless to say, I was the weak link on that relay team. But I did manage to have a pretty good swim (for me), getting under 20 minutes for the first time ever. I think the course must have been short! In any event, we managed to finish sixth in the Split Peas division in a time of 30:21.

Jason in the final stretch.

Full results from all the races are here. There's been some discussion as to the results not being quite right this time around, with the first three people listed in the full race actually having completed the peawee distance, but we're not sure about that. Also, there are several entries listed as "No Name Provided." After much studying of the results, I think we've concluded that those individuals completed the run only event and therefore didn't have a relay partner. Anyway, since we're not exactly positive on what happened, we'll move right to the pictures.

Allyson Prater

Mark Curry floating on air.

Garrett Oka

Lee-Ann and Christine having a ball.

Peaman awarding pier volunteer Brian with the Perpetual Pea.

And the fun continues today with Team Mango's Summer Solstice Run at the Natural Energy Lab (OTEC) at 4:30 p.m. Then this weekend is the Kona Marathon Family Runs. We hope to see everyone out doing one of the distances!