Last month, the longtime Bend resident completed the Ironman World Championship triathlon — a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile bike and a 26.2-mile run — in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii.
That is an accomplishment in itself, but by no means is it a rare one. A total of 1,772 other participants also finished the race that day. And Hollander himself had completed the race on 21 previous occasions.
But in this year's field, only Hollander was as old as 81 years.
In fact, no one else in the history of the Ironman World Championship has completed the race at Hollander's age, making him unique among the thousands of finishers who have crossed the finish line at the event, staged annually since the late 1970s.
“I reflect a lot on it, and it means a lot because it means I'm still alive,” Hollander said last week of his achievement. “And I've never been the fastest around, but now I say, ‘Well, I'm the oldest. That's a good thing.' ”
To boot, Hollander, a physicist, repeated as world champion in his division, for men age 80 and older. In 2010 he won the title by default, being the only competitor in his age group.
This year, however, three other men, all 80, joined him in what Hollander said was dubbed the “Iron Gents War.”
Recounting the race, Hollander said he took over the division lead from Bob Scott during the bike leg. But during the marathon run, France Cokan, a Slovak whom Hollander described as his nemesis, passed him.
“Everybody can run faster than me, but I'm pretty steady,” Hollander explained.
That steadiness paid off, as Hollander maintained contact with and then overtook Cokan in the final two miles of the run to win the division in 16 hours, 45 minutes, 55 seconds.
Hollander's time was 14:05 faster than the race's 17-hour cutoff time, but well slower than the 15:48:40 he turned in at the 2010 race.
“Last year I had the race of my life,” noted Hollander, who contested his first Ironman world championship race in 1985. “It's going to be a long time (before) some 80-year-old beats that one. I just had a good day. I got there and everything went right.”
This year, though, a lot went wrong.
A couple of months before this year's world championship, Hollander developed a hernia on the right side of his abdomen. Swimming and cycling did not aggravate the hernia, he said, but he ran the marathon portion of the race holding his hand to his side.
And that day — “out of the blue,” as Hollander put it — a kidney stone began to bother him. That resulted in back pain and abdominal cramps, the latter of which prevented him from ingesting almost anything but water during the race, not an ideal situation for an endurance athlete.
The kidney stone was taken care of shortly after Hollander's return to Bend, and he underwent an operation to repair his hernia this past Friday.
Hollander, a Long Island native, does not expect either of those health challenges to deter him for long. He still has plans for the future.
“Life is really good for me,” he explained. “I just feel full of life, and I'm not done yet either.”
He said he has not ruled out competing in another Ironman, though he may not make a 23rd trip to the world championship.
“I'm not going to say I'm not going to do another Ironman, but it would take a lot to get me back to Kona,” Hollander said.
He does, however, plan to take part in some races on the mainland in the months ahead, including an Ironman 70.3 race (half the distance of a full Ironman) in Galveston, Texas, in April.
Whatever he does decide in the end, Hollander will probably keep trailblazing for the octogenarian set.
“I guess I have actually done some good,” he admitted. “People will see you can be active and be old.”
2011年8月8日星期一
Navigating the Difficult Road to All-American Wrestler
When given the choice of either grappling with the nation’s toughest wrestlers or having to battle kidney stones, Barrington’s varsity wrestler Jared Parvinmehr feels it is any easy choice.
“I would rather wrestle,” he said after finishing fifth in the Greco-Roman ASICS/Vaughan Junior and Cadet National Championships held at Fargo, N.D.
“I tried to wrestle with the kidney stones” in an earlier tournament, Parvinmehr, the Greco All-American went on to say. “But that area (of the body) was just too tender.”
Contending with kidney stones wasn’t exactly in Parvinmehr’s plan when he began his summer wrestling, which started by winning state in freestyle at 112 pounds; rather he was focused on gearing up for the nation’s best wrestlers.
Moving on to compete in the Central Regional Tournament in Indiana, Parvinmehr continued his impressive wrestling by qualifying for the Fargo National Tournament with his first-place finish in both freestyle and Greco in the 112-pound weight category.
Unfortunately, it was the time off between the regional and national tournaments, while participating in the Junior Duals in Oklahoma, which forced Parvinmehr to the sidelines with kidney stones, despite attempting to wrestle with the ailment.
With a small window of time remaining before the Greco-Roman portion of the National Tournament in Fargo, Parvinmehr, with the rest of Izzy Style School of Wrestling, headed to the University of Illinois and began the daunting task of cutting weight in preparation for the elite competition in Fargo. Cutting weight is not relatively new for the wrestlers, but Parvinmehr did spend much of his varsity season wrestling above his natural weight category, when he wrestled at 119.
“I was conditioning and dieting all to cut weight without affecting technique,” Parvinmehr said of his extensive and exhausting workouts that would last all day.
And the extra workload paid off for him.
He had wrestled in the Fargo tournament in previous years but had failed to crack the top 10. But Parvinmehr wouldn’t lose his first match this year until the later rounds, when he faced last year’s 98-pound Greco-Roman champion, and this year’s eventual champion in the 112 division, Colton Howell of Missouri. Howell would defeat the Barrington wrestler by only the narrowest of margins in the two periods 1-0, 1-0.
Despite the difficult loss, Parvinmehr stayed focused and on track in the tournament, thanks to the guidance of Stanford’s assistant wrestling coach Ray Blake.
“Coach (Ray) knew how to fire me up,” Parvinmehr said of getting to work with and pick the brain of the collegiate coach. “He knew what to say to me, and he gave me good advice.”
But the conversations didn’t mention having to face another All-American, since the level of competition wouldn’t taper off in the later rounds. Facing Hawaii’s Cassidy Oshiro, Parvinmehr suffered another heartbreakingly close loss that would have had him wrestling for third place in his final match, but instead positioned him for at a fifth place finish in the tournament.
Parvinmehr’s final bout, to decide fifth and sixth place, was not going to end as closely as the previous rounds. Parvinmehr stayed aggressive and was able to win on technical fall 7-0, 10-3 securing the fifth-place finish in the National Tournament.
“It feels amazing,” Parvinmehr said of the recognition of being an All-American for his fifth-place finish, “and something I wouldn’t have thought was going to happen.”
The win may move Parvinmehr up in the United States’ future Olympian ratings, too. Parvinmehr is ranked second in the nation with 800 earned points from competing in various meets and matches, trailing Georgia's Darshawn Sharp by only 75 points.
Parvinmehr was hoping to add to his point total and build on his recent success during the freestyle portion of the tournament, but he was unable to because he had to wrestle two classes above his normal weight due to his inability to cut the necessary weight by weigh-ins.
Cutting weight isn’t something new for most wrestlers but it is something relatively new to Parvinmehr, who was used to wrestling at the 119 category on the Bronco varsity team and thus needed to keep weight on. However, wrestling at 125 pounds left little room for error in Parvinmehr’s bracket, and the extra weight he carried proved too much, as he was eventually eliminated by the third round.
Even with the early elimination from the freestyle portion of the tournament Parvinmehr isn’t ready to take time off.
“I would rather wrestle,” he said after finishing fifth in the Greco-Roman ASICS/Vaughan Junior and Cadet National Championships held at Fargo, N.D.
“I tried to wrestle with the kidney stones” in an earlier tournament, Parvinmehr, the Greco All-American went on to say. “But that area (of the body) was just too tender.”
Contending with kidney stones wasn’t exactly in Parvinmehr’s plan when he began his summer wrestling, which started by winning state in freestyle at 112 pounds; rather he was focused on gearing up for the nation’s best wrestlers.
Moving on to compete in the Central Regional Tournament in Indiana, Parvinmehr continued his impressive wrestling by qualifying for the Fargo National Tournament with his first-place finish in both freestyle and Greco in the 112-pound weight category.
Unfortunately, it was the time off between the regional and national tournaments, while participating in the Junior Duals in Oklahoma, which forced Parvinmehr to the sidelines with kidney stones, despite attempting to wrestle with the ailment.
With a small window of time remaining before the Greco-Roman portion of the National Tournament in Fargo, Parvinmehr, with the rest of Izzy Style School of Wrestling, headed to the University of Illinois and began the daunting task of cutting weight in preparation for the elite competition in Fargo. Cutting weight is not relatively new for the wrestlers, but Parvinmehr did spend much of his varsity season wrestling above his natural weight category, when he wrestled at 119.
“I was conditioning and dieting all to cut weight without affecting technique,” Parvinmehr said of his extensive and exhausting workouts that would last all day.
And the extra workload paid off for him.
He had wrestled in the Fargo tournament in previous years but had failed to crack the top 10. But Parvinmehr wouldn’t lose his first match this year until the later rounds, when he faced last year’s 98-pound Greco-Roman champion, and this year’s eventual champion in the 112 division, Colton Howell of Missouri. Howell would defeat the Barrington wrestler by only the narrowest of margins in the two periods 1-0, 1-0.
Despite the difficult loss, Parvinmehr stayed focused and on track in the tournament, thanks to the guidance of Stanford’s assistant wrestling coach Ray Blake.
“Coach (Ray) knew how to fire me up,” Parvinmehr said of getting to work with and pick the brain of the collegiate coach. “He knew what to say to me, and he gave me good advice.”
But the conversations didn’t mention having to face another All-American, since the level of competition wouldn’t taper off in the later rounds. Facing Hawaii’s Cassidy Oshiro, Parvinmehr suffered another heartbreakingly close loss that would have had him wrestling for third place in his final match, but instead positioned him for at a fifth place finish in the tournament.
Parvinmehr’s final bout, to decide fifth and sixth place, was not going to end as closely as the previous rounds. Parvinmehr stayed aggressive and was able to win on technical fall 7-0, 10-3 securing the fifth-place finish in the National Tournament.
“It feels amazing,” Parvinmehr said of the recognition of being an All-American for his fifth-place finish, “and something I wouldn’t have thought was going to happen.”
The win may move Parvinmehr up in the United States’ future Olympian ratings, too. Parvinmehr is ranked second in the nation with 800 earned points from competing in various meets and matches, trailing Georgia's Darshawn Sharp by only 75 points.
Parvinmehr was hoping to add to his point total and build on his recent success during the freestyle portion of the tournament, but he was unable to because he had to wrestle two classes above his normal weight due to his inability to cut the necessary weight by weigh-ins.
Cutting weight isn’t something new for most wrestlers but it is something relatively new to Parvinmehr, who was used to wrestling at the 119 category on the Bronco varsity team and thus needed to keep weight on. However, wrestling at 125 pounds left little room for error in Parvinmehr’s bracket, and the extra weight he carried proved too much, as he was eventually eliminated by the third round.
Even with the early elimination from the freestyle portion of the tournament Parvinmehr isn’t ready to take time off.
2011年7月20日星期三
Millions of Americans share Michele Bachmann's challenges with controlling migraine headaches
The pain can be excruciating, ranking with kidney stones and childbirth. And all it may take to trigger a migraine headache is a few missed meals, fitful sleep or stressful working conditions.
Migraines, as the almost 30 million Americans who suffer them know, are nothing to take lightly. So reports of the severe migraines experienced by Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann have raised questions about how the condition may affect her ability to handle the nation's highest office.
The Minnesota congresswoman said in a statement that migraines have never kept her from functioning and wouldn't keep her from serving as commander in chief.
Headache specialists agree that migraines don't have to be debilitating when properly managed with medication and lifestyle measures. Though Bachmann released a physician's statement Wednesday, without detailed medical records not enough is known to predict how she might fare under Oval Office pressures.
Someone who has accomplished as much as Bachmann surely has strong coping skills, noted Dr. Kavita Kalidas, a headache specialist and neurologist at Tampa General Hospital and the University of South Florida.
Certainly, the presidency is no stranger to medical problems.
"We certainly have had presidents with illnesses that were more serious," said Dr. Diana Pollock, a neurologist at Morton Plant Hospital in Clearwater. She noted that migraines are prevalent in all walks of life.
"I don't think it should eliminate anybody from holding the office of president."
Migraines are characterized by pulsating pain, often on one side of the head. They can be accompanied by nausea and intense sensitivity to light and sound. Without treatment, a migraine typically lasts four to 72 hours.
Women are three times more likely than men to suffer from migraines, which can be triggered by hormonal changes.
"We've come a long way in the management of migraines," Kalidas said. "Initially, this was considered some sort of hysteria and a women's problem, or it's-all-in-your-head type of diagnosis."
For many patients, she said, modern medications taken at a migraine's onset can relieve pain in as little as 10 to 15 minutes. Drugs used to treat seizures and control blood pressure, as well as antidepressants, also are effective in reducing frequency and severity of headaches.
Bachmann, 55, said she controls her condition with prescription medication. She said the condition has not gotten in the way of her campaign schedule or her congressional duties.
She released a letter Wednesday from the attending physician to Congress stating she is "overall in good general health" and experiences migraines "infrequently."
"Your migraines occur infrequently and have known trigger factors of which you are aware and know how to avoid," wrote Dr. Brian Monahan. "When you do have a migraine, you know how to control it."
The Daily Caller website drew national attention to her migraine history with a report late Monday that Bachmann experiences episodes once a week on average and can be "incapacitated'' for days.
Citing unnamed sources, it reported that on at least three occasions, she has been hospitalized due to migraines.
In July 2010, Bachmann missed eight House votes while being treated for a migraine at a Washington hospital, according to POLITICO.
Even when suffering, Kalidas said, most patients still can make decisions at work and continue everyday tasks. Still, many with severe pain will need to lie down, said Pollock, noting that drug therapies are most effective when begun right when symptoms begin.
Dr. Lucas Bachmann, the candidate's son and a medical resident at the University of Connecticut, told the New York Times that his mother began experiencing migraines about 15 years ago.
Bachmann's son, who does not treat his mother, said she has sought emergency treatment in urgent-care centers at least twice while traveling. She received nonnarcotic injections and was monitored by doctors, but did not require overnight stays.
Migraines, as the almost 30 million Americans who suffer them know, are nothing to take lightly. So reports of the severe migraines experienced by Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann have raised questions about how the condition may affect her ability to handle the nation's highest office.
The Minnesota congresswoman said in a statement that migraines have never kept her from functioning and wouldn't keep her from serving as commander in chief.
Headache specialists agree that migraines don't have to be debilitating when properly managed with medication and lifestyle measures. Though Bachmann released a physician's statement Wednesday, without detailed medical records not enough is known to predict how she might fare under Oval Office pressures.
Someone who has accomplished as much as Bachmann surely has strong coping skills, noted Dr. Kavita Kalidas, a headache specialist and neurologist at Tampa General Hospital and the University of South Florida.
Certainly, the presidency is no stranger to medical problems.
"We certainly have had presidents with illnesses that were more serious," said Dr. Diana Pollock, a neurologist at Morton Plant Hospital in Clearwater. She noted that migraines are prevalent in all walks of life.
"I don't think it should eliminate anybody from holding the office of president."
Migraines are characterized by pulsating pain, often on one side of the head. They can be accompanied by nausea and intense sensitivity to light and sound. Without treatment, a migraine typically lasts four to 72 hours.
Women are three times more likely than men to suffer from migraines, which can be triggered by hormonal changes.
"We've come a long way in the management of migraines," Kalidas said. "Initially, this was considered some sort of hysteria and a women's problem, or it's-all-in-your-head type of diagnosis."
For many patients, she said, modern medications taken at a migraine's onset can relieve pain in as little as 10 to 15 minutes. Drugs used to treat seizures and control blood pressure, as well as antidepressants, also are effective in reducing frequency and severity of headaches.
Bachmann, 55, said she controls her condition with prescription medication. She said the condition has not gotten in the way of her campaign schedule or her congressional duties.
She released a letter Wednesday from the attending physician to Congress stating she is "overall in good general health" and experiences migraines "infrequently."
"Your migraines occur infrequently and have known trigger factors of which you are aware and know how to avoid," wrote Dr. Brian Monahan. "When you do have a migraine, you know how to control it."
The Daily Caller website drew national attention to her migraine history with a report late Monday that Bachmann experiences episodes once a week on average and can be "incapacitated'' for days.
Citing unnamed sources, it reported that on at least three occasions, she has been hospitalized due to migraines.
In July 2010, Bachmann missed eight House votes while being treated for a migraine at a Washington hospital, according to POLITICO.
Even when suffering, Kalidas said, most patients still can make decisions at work and continue everyday tasks. Still, many with severe pain will need to lie down, said Pollock, noting that drug therapies are most effective when begun right when symptoms begin.
Dr. Lucas Bachmann, the candidate's son and a medical resident at the University of Connecticut, told the New York Times that his mother began experiencing migraines about 15 years ago.
Bachmann's son, who does not treat his mother, said she has sought emergency treatment in urgent-care centers at least twice while traveling. She received nonnarcotic injections and was monitored by doctors, but did not require overnight stays.
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