Gruenfeld joins the breakfast (of champions) club
...Continued

Knowing they could not adequately train all 200, the teachers set up a tryout that Saturday that involved a one-mile run, and they chose 12 students as budding triathletes. Gruenfeld immediately realized there was far more to this than organizing a few workouts. Gruenfeld scrambled around and found four bikes and organized the students into four three-person relay teams. "Many of the children there are Hispanic, and it seems there may have been cultural factors which led to an aversion to swimming. In that first race, we swam for them. Then, as we went on to other races, gradually they started to swim on their own. But at first, we had to be right there in the water, holding them up, to get over their fears. Finally, after three triathlons, some of them were able to do the entire swim and make the triathlon on their own."

Gruenfeld, in her own words, became a "shameless hustler," begging for equipment, comped entry fees, travel money and other support from sponsors like Terry Martin at Power Bar, many local Rotary Clubs, the Inland Inferno and LA Triathlon clubs, and many many individuals who contributed old equipment, clothes, shoes and the myriad of stuff that goes into outfitting the usually upper middle class amateur triathlete. "I found it took at least as much time looking for donations as it did coaching the kids," said Gruenfeld. But as it went on, it became easy because she fell in love with them, even as they taught her a lot -- which is how these things always work.

Part of what made this leap both so improbable and so right was the fact that the many, if not most, of the students at Cypress Elementary in San Bernardino came from what can modestly be called "emotionally and economically challenged environments. These were kids at risk for an environment filled with gangs, violence and drugs," said Gruenfeld. That translates to poor families, many of them broken homes, and many kids with complex social, health and emotional issues for whom the very idea of a triathlon was either unknown or a hazy, impossibly luxurious dream.

The first races were "life-altering experiences," said Gruenfeld. "I can never forget the looks on these kids' faces when they first went to a race. They had never seen anything like this. They met people they had never seen before. They saw people who did something that hurt but accomplished a great deal and got great satisfaction and medals. Soon, these kids were finishing the same races and bringing home medals themselves." Gruenfeld said it was "hypnotic for the kids to travel to a race, stay in motels and eat at a buffet restaurant. It was a way of life they just didn't know existed, and they became a part of it." And the best part was the program continues -- it's not a one-time thing.

Gruenfeld also discovered some real talent -- some boys who just might have Olympic potential. But real life reared its complicated head, and that thought got put on hold. "One boy who was 11 ran a 19-minute 5km," said Gruenfeld. In their immediate enthusiasm, she and several coaches tried to give the boy some special attention with his running, but they feel it may have been too much too soon, and missed the central point of the whole enterprise. "There were complicating issues with his background and his family," said Gruenfeld. "His parents didn't really see the point of nurturing that talent and eventually he quit the program. He wrote a letter to us stating he didn't want to continue with it. In retrospect, I think we should not have devoted so much interest in how well he did. I think it might have been a form of pressure."

Now, Gruenfeld, the driven success-oriented winner, says she has learned from her kids. "Although I will always try to win, I think I never knew before just how much more important it is to simply do the best you can with the hand you're dealt on the day. I think that is far far more important than to try to beat anyone else. I think seeing their faces when they finished and their joy reminded me what the triathlon, what any sport, is all about."