EDITORIAL: There's some iron will in everyone
Welcome back, all you Fe men and women.
(That's not a typo. Remember the periodic table?)
The people of North Idaho open their arms to you on this, the 20th anniversary of the Ironman competition in and around our beloved lake.
Just a few days ago, the Coeur d’Alene City Council voted unanimously to extend the athlete-community love affair for another three years. That’s good news, especially because City Council members balked at having to pay a small fortune for overhead costs through taxpayer funds even though Ironman is a private business that profits considerably from the race. Graciously, Ironman officials softened the blow by $50,000.
We reflect back on 20 years of Ironman, acknowledging that the event can cause more than participants to sweat. Each year, Ye Olde Complaint Box gets stuffed by local citizens angry over inconveniences the race may cause them. But since no massive event has ever gone off with 100% support, a little whine is fine.
Ironman fever has dropped a few degrees from those early years. While clanging cowbells and encouraging shrieks still ring out, the thick layers of humanity packed for miles along the race route, like insulation on a live wire, have eroded. Now, lengths of that wire lie exposed, naked to the elements, but there’s still enough fan energy and enthusiasm to make this event a very big deal.
Back in its earliest iterations, Ironman CDA brought out scores of funny, clever and inspiring signs. Remember this one?
A man with long white hair and beard, cloaked ominously and bearing an expression of doom and gloom, grasped a four-word sign on Sherman Avenue just a few blocks from the finish line. Darkly, it announced: The end is near. Even exhausted, some of the athletes nearing the finish line could be seen laughing.
Then there was the 2014 race, when a man and his daughter were cheering contestants on as they passed The Press building at the corner of Second and Lakeside. The man was wearing a Chicago Cubs shirt honoring No. 25, Derrek Lee. In 2005, Lee crushed 46 home runs for the Cubbies, led the league in batting at .335, swiped 15 bases and won a Gold Glove at first base.
A fellow Ironman fan tapped the local man on the shoulder and said he, too, was a big Cubs fan. The man turned and looked up into the smiling face of Derrek Lee himself.
Today new memories will be made and fresh heroes minted. People will come together despite differences in politics, religion and baseball teams.
As it has for two decades now, Ironman will remind us that if we apply ourselves, we are all capable of more than maybe we’d thought possible. That’s a personal race each of us can win.