Today is Wednesday, 4 days after the last athlete crossed the finish line for the 2009 Ironman competition.  It has taken almost all of those 4 days to recover, both personally and as a community!  We had media passes to everything – so we swam through the thousands of fans to find special spots along the way to observe and take picts – up close and personal – and right along side NBC.

The event itself was great – inspiring and dramatic.  Watching Chrissy Wellington get out of the water and close enough to give her a hand (we didn’t) was as close to Hollywood as we’re going to get in Kona.  Being up close to all the athletes was thrilling and very much the spectator sport.  However, there was little left to do in between the events and for us locals it would have been nice if the Athletes’s Village could have stayed open until Saturday – the many new products and technologies left before we could say “I’ll buy it.”

Sunday we toured the town – the diligent volunteers had done a very good job in picking up the trash.  Here’s an interesting fact: not one of the athletes volunteered for clean up after the event.  Most were out early biking or running followed by serious beach activities, so we know they weren’t too sore to bend down and pick something up. We encourage the Ironman organization to give the participants a chance to work side by side after the event with the over 5,000 volunteers who cheered them on and offered support.  Would at least make a nice talk-story.

Monday we went on a bike ride – the roads are safe again.  The locals are back and it was great to wave hello and say “Aloha” to our friends on Alii Drive again.  Seems everyone had an Ironman Story – some good, some bad.  The one we loved the most was about watching the event at home on the computer (they lived just feet from Alii Drive) because the Ironman website had better coverage than they could get live at the event.”   We agee – the web coverage was ideal and in HD plus the computer tracking this year worked like a charm.  When it came time to watch the pros and our regular friends finish the race we knew when to be there to cheer them on.

Thanks to everyone who helped us along the way – see you next year.

For the best coverage and results of Ironman 2009 click here – the links at the top are the best we found.