The second gunman on the grassy knoll? Maybe? Maybe not. Explore with me the facts of one professional’s humbling experience and come to your own conclusion about whether this group here had anything to do with it.
From left to right are super triathletes and TriScoopers Moonpie (I’m ripped), HolisticGuru (Is there quinoa in this drink?), Strouter (I’m not drunk, I used to be), Rambonie (I’m finding about my nature) and CindyJo (Yes, I have multiples of this grateful dead t-shirt, so back off).
To begin this story, let’s work our way back to July 19th when Desiree herself posted this on her blog:
Good morning everyone! I have been a little tardy with my journaling and I still have all the nasty details in my head from Ironman CDA so I will have to come back to that one….
I am about to go jump in the lake out here in Lake Placid, NY. It is the day before the race and I am optimistic that I will come back from the mistakes I made a few weeks ago and have a solid race. There is some great competition up here this weekend and the hilly course is a feat to conquer in itself. We have thunderstorms for the last two days so hopefully those will hold off for us until the run portion. A rain shower on the run always feels nice.
At that point Desiree was looking like this:
At some point between lunch and dinner our mild mannered TriScoopers were innocently day drinking at Charlie’s, a popular hangout on Main Street in Lake Placid, when in walked Desiree Ficker. According to witnesses, Desiree walked up to the host and asked to obtain food, fuel, sustenance and necessary nutrition for her upcoming race. Before Moonpie could jump up to invite her over to the table, the host had apparently ignored this professional triathlete’s pleas for food (Think Oliver holding his bowl out) and sent her on her way. Where she went, no one seems to know but as you can read from her blog entry above, she was still in a very fragile state of mind and the denial of food only contributed to her performance on race day. How poor was her performance you ask? Here is a quote from Ironman Live:
Desiree Ficker gets across the line
“She hasn’t had much luck at this race, has she. Desiree Ficker isn’t one to quit, though — she walked her way across the line here today, as she did three years ago.Our spotters just told me that when they saw her she was shaking and her lips were blue at the turnaround.
It obviously wasn’t her day, but she certainly toughed this one out!”
In my mind, this couldn’t be any simpler. Charlie’s is directly responsible for Desiree’s poor performance. At the same time, the host was summarily dismissing her, our TriScoopers were being offered another round of drinks ON THE HOUSE. Why, you ask? Obviously to distract them from helping out this poor athlete.
By favoring the intoxicated TriScoopers over this professional athlete, they virtually guaranteed that Desiree would bonk during the marathon the following day. Did Moonpie bonk? NO! Did CindyJo bonk? NO! In fact, Nathan Miller (not pictured here) beat Desiree by fifteen minutes on the run and he clearly has the means to compensate the owners of Charlie’s to act like they didn’t know who she was. Didn’t know who she was? RIGHT! Please take a look at the picture above and tell me that you wouldn’t remember her face. So the question remains, did Charlie’s act on their own, or was there an outside influence that contributed to this unconscionable act?
I’m not saying that there was a conspiracy here but I think that the truth needs to come out. Desiree needs to be vindicated and at the least Charlie’s owes Desiree a pitcher of margueritas on the house.
