Everyday Ironman Podcast 20 - Brookelyn Coffey
In this episode, I speak to 19 year old Brookelyn Coffey who recently completed Ironman Indiana. After establishing her athletic background, Brookelyn shares how she got started on her Ironman journey. To keep her dad company while he recovered from a stroke in 2019, they trained together to be ready for the 2020 season.
Brookelyn confesses that she had wanted to join her parents and train for a triathlon with them but didn’t want to hold them back, after her dad’s injury she realized that she would be able to build fitness with him and he recovered. They had originally signed up to race Muncie 70.3 in 2020 when she would have been 18 years old.
After the crazy that was 2020, her dad, her mom and Brookelyn all registered for and completed both Ohio 70.3 and the inaugural race of Ironman Indiana just a few weeks ago.
Brookelyn explains how she was 1st out of the water for family bragging rights and that since they has sequential race numbers, she and her mom where able to hang out in T1 to make sure that her dad, Travis, made it safely out of the water before heading out on the bike course as a family during 70.3 Ohio.
For Ironman Indiana, it was everyone for themselves as they all decided to race their own race. Because it’s a loop course with a few out and backs they did get to see each other several times, in passing, on both the bike and run courses.
We breakdown her finish times for all 3 disciplines and talk about the advantages and disadvantages of a multi-loop course can be. Additionally, we agree that there are so many fun people that you meet on the run course when you’re a “back of the packer.”
After completing Ironman Indiana, Brookelyn was able to get the M-Dot tattoo. She explains how her tattoo has more meaning than just completing a 140.6 mile endurance race.
We talk about what she has planned for next year and she shares some advice that she was given.