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Sports
The grueling trifecta : Sports : Oswego Ledger-Sentinel : Hometown Newspaper for Oswego and Montgomery, IllinoisThe grueling trifecta
| OEHS senior set for Sunday's Junior Elite National Championships
| by Kristin Sharp
| 8/6/2009
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Melanie Greiner is not your typical high school athlete.
But triathlons aren't typically part of high school athletics.
"Some people don't know I'm an athlete sometimes because I don't compete in high school sports," Greiner said. "I'm actually extremely girly."
Greiner, an incoming senior at Oswego East High School, departs today, Thursday, for the Junior Elite National Championships held this Sunday in Colorado Springs, Colo. The triathlon will consist of a 750-meter swim, a 20-kilometer bike ride and a 5K run. She will compete in the 16-19 year-old age division.
"I'm hoping to get the highest place I can and have a good race," Greiner said. "I want to do my best because it's the last race of the season. Put all that hard work out there."
Multisport Madness
Greiner, 17, is a member of the Multisport Madness Triathlon Club, a team based in the Fox Valley area and coached by Keith Dickson.
Multisport Madness formed in 2002 and in its short seven-year life has produced six National Championships, 14 individual National Champions and two World Champions.
"This team in the Fox Valley happens to be the best team in the country by far," Dickson said. "The fact that Melanie was a swimmer as a kid and had some run talent, what we did was just take her and train a tremendous amount from there. They train from 16-18 hours a week during the school year and 20-22 hours in the summer."
Olympic triathletes used to be college graduates in their late 20s, but now they are almost a decade younger. Dickson recognized this and created Multisport Madness - which swims at Aurora's Provena Mercy Medical Center and Wellnes Club, runs at Peck Farm and cycles in Geneva.
This summer, Greiner has endured two daily workouts with her teammates. They meet in the morning for a 90 minute swim workout before regrouping in the afternoon for a variety of training.
"Our practices are hell," Greiner said. "We did a camp this summer in Galena and we rode 90 miles. It took a couple of hours."
Career highlights
Greiner began her triathlon career three years ago after entering the Oswegoland Park District's annual 'I Tried A Triathlon' in August 2006.
"I swam with [Oswego swim coach] Deryl Leubner for four years and I went to Chicago for form training. It was a triathlon center, but I didn't know anything about triathlons. I loved to run," Greiner said. "I did Oswego's 'I Tried A Triathlon.' I heard about this triathlon group in the area and I got in contact with Keith Dickson."
Greiner joined the swim team and track and field team at Oswego East as a freshman, but opted not to pursue those sports in favor of triathlon training.
"It changed me. I'm such a harder worker now," Greiner said. "I'm thinking of doing [high school] swimming this year. My triathlon coach wants me to do more speed work with high school swimming and take a break because we've been training all year."
This weekend's National Championship triathlon will cap off Greiner's summer race schedule. In April, Greiner competed in the St. Anthony's Triathlon in St. Petersburg, Fla. and placed first in the 15-19 age group. On May 16, she competed in the Pan American Championships in Oklahoma City finishing 23rd overall. On June 27, Greiner competed in Lake Geneva's Big Foot Triathlon and won overall female. Most recently, Greiner entered the Strawberry Fields Triathlon in Oxnard Shores, Calif., on July 19.
In 2007, Greiner competed in the Hamburg Triathlon World Championships and in 2008 she entered the Mazatlan Pan American Championship and the Vancouver Triathlon World Championships.
"She has a passion for the sport," Dickson said. "That's why she got good very fast. She adapted well coming from the sport of swimming to the triathlon. It's hard to be the best in the country and to be the best in the world, and Melanie is not the best. But she shows up and she's a contender."
Training is a 12-month process with a brief two-week break. Some members of Multisport Madness are involved in their high school cross country or swim teams and begin training with Dickson when their seasons are complete in November.
After Greiner qualified for both the 2007 and 2008 World Championship triathlons in the age group division, the focus is now on the next level - the U.S. World Junior Championships. And based on Greiner's quick adaptation to the sport, that goal could be attainable when training for the next season gets underway this fall.
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