December Updates

Man oh man, It's been a while. I know some of you's are gonna be mad for the long delays between posts, but I'm busy! So shut up. SO far since my last post, I've won a cross race in Georgia, finished third at a ross race in Georgia, gotten back on the track and found that I still have decent fitness, but still am having trouble getting up and staying up in the mornings.

I'm really working toward being consistent this year with my training. I have found that the only real time to put in some miles is in the morning which will require me to go to bed early all the time. I sure am glad that Carrie is going to marry me in March, but I'm going to put her through the ringer for these next couple of months with my devotion to my training.

Here are some objectives for the upcoming year; 1) Get married, 2) win Gasparilla 15k, 3) have fun at Citrus City Cyclocross series, 4) win Morton Plant Triathlon, 5) Get to some ITU races and get results, 6) have the best year ever as a coach.

This should be fine I can do it.

Cross season in effect

This past Sunday, my co-hort Brant Speed and I participated in the first official cyclocross race for the season in Augusta, Georgia. Team Chainwheel Drive was able to pull out a 1-2 finish in the "B" race.

The course was awesome! Just as I had hoped, it was cool (in the 50-60's) and rainy and the course was steep ups and downs with many technical aspects to navigate. At the start, I was able to spend the first lap (of 6) sitting pretty in third position. On the second lap I took over the lead on a flat grass section, only intending to take a pull on the front of our group of three. After going through the most technical aspect of the course, which was a steep set of barriers, I found my self with a bit of a gap to the chasers. I held the lead, riding patiently, and steadily put time between myself and the chasers. I was able to ride conservatively and took the win.

Amazingly, my teammate, Brant Speed, was able to go from being in last place on the first lap, to second place at the finish. He rode awesome, and was gaining time on my the whole race. This was very impressive considering that this was not only Brant's first cross race, but it was also his first off-road race!! He was incredible!

We had such a blast at this race and met some cool people who we will hope to see again at some later season races. Check out www.georgia-cross.com

Santa Rosa Island Triathlon

Hey folks, I forgot to publish my summary of the SRI TRI from a few weeks back. I finished second to National team member Brian Fleischman, who pretty much demolished the course.

I had a rough start, where my goggles were knocked loose and filled with very salty ocean water. I swam blind the whole swim and tough that I was right with Brian. Turns out he was way off the front. I had a terrible bike ride on the way out. For some reason I just had no power going out on the out-and-back bike leg of the race. After I made the turnaround though, I was firing on all cylinders and chasing guys down. I came off the bike in 5th I think, and immediately caught two guys in transition. Then I was able to run down two other guys before the turnaround point, halfway through the 5k run. I knew I couldn't make up the huge deficit to Brian so I was able to put the engine in cruise control and high five my niece Emma at the finish. It was cool! This was a good way to end the triathlon season for me. It was a great race and a blast to participate in. Check out www.sritri.org

Busy Sunday for Team Campbell

Last Sunday was quite full of events. I raced the Sand Key Triathlon in the morning and won the event. I felt really good and under control the whole time. The bike course was awesome! Bev Buysee setup a nice course that had a bit of everything. It went over the Sand Key and Memorial Causeway bridges twice each. It had some nice fast straightaways and some tight technical turns in downtown Clearwater and Clearwater Beach. It was a delightful deviation from the all too often, "out and back" courses that we always have to race on. The run course was also a fun adventure. Bev had us on pavement, grass, sand and even a nice dirt path. All of the run was within Sand key Park so the spectators had ample opportunities to cheer for the athletes. It was a great event that should grow big time in the future! Visit http://www.trithisinc.com/results.shtml

In the afternoon on Sunday, I raced the Suncoast Road Race in Venice. I finished 2nd behind my Chainwheel Drive teammate Brant Speed. We went on a breakaway half way through the 12 lap race and put a good 2:30 between ourselves and the main pack. It was awesome! I bonked on the last lap and fought my way to the finish line with Brant a good minute ahead. I was finally exhausted from a tough but fun day. visit http://www.floridacycling.com/USCF/DataAccess/RaceResults.asp?RaceID=200&CategoryID=5

Carrie spent the day at the Bucs game where Chris Simms had his spleen ruptured in a loss to the Panthers. Carrie spent the rest of the evening t the hospital covering the story. What a weekend!

Here comes the Fall

Well after an unusual summer of racing with both ups and downs, I slowly make the transition to the "Off-season". This past weekend was big for me. I won the Sand Key triathlon and then on Sunday afternoon, I finished second behind my teammate and break-away partner Brant Speed, in the Venice cyclefest Road Race (cycling). It was a blast but man was I shelled after it was all over. The next big event for me is the Santa Rosa Island Triathlon in Pensacola. It's going to be great because that is where my sister has moved to a few months back. Please check out another blog I'm working on called floridacross

Morton Plant Triathlon

This past weekend I placed 5th at the inagural Mortan Plant Triathlon. It was a pretty awesome field for a sprint triathlon with two Ironman champions there! I was still very much rundown from the sickness I had the previous week. I was probably racing at about 60% of my true ability. That's not to take anything away from anyone else, or from me for that matter because I worked hard to hang on to 5th place. I only had about two training days in the previous two weeks, which if you're following, really sucks! I am really motivated to get in great shape from the rest of the races this season. I think most importantly, I want to have some great races here locally in Florida. It's nice to do well here at home.

2006 Race Schedule

2006 Race & Travel Schedule
Hank Campbell
(tentative)


May 13th Sarasota Sharks Olympic Siesta Key, FL
May 28th Crystal River Sprint #1 Crystal River
June 4th Dunedin Beach Triathlon Dunedin, FL
June 9-12 Nissan Xterra Southeast Championships Birmingham, AL
June 23-26 Long Beach ITU Long Beach, CA*
June 30- July 4 ITU Brampton Brampton, Canada*
July 16th Morton Plant Mease Tri Clearwater, FL
August 3-6 USA Pro Nat’l Bridgeport ITU Bridgeport, CT
August 19th Coca-Cola Sprint Triathlon Ft. Desoto, FL
August 25-29 Trip to D.C. D.C
September 1-4 ITU Boston Triathlon Boston, MA
September 14-17 ITU Westchester Westchester, NY
September 24th Sand Key Triathlon Clearwater, FL
October 6-9 Santa Rosa Triathlon Pensacola, FL

* Indicates Potential race

A tousand Apologizises

Yes I know it's miss-spelled. That's part of the fun folks! So I messed up again, by not sending you folks this web address when I sent out an e-mail to tell you about the blog. However, I guess that if you're here, then obviously you were able to figure it out huh!

Tonight is Ladies' Night at the bike shop, and I'm the only male staff member that was asked to be a part of it. I told my boss that I didn't know weather to be honored or offended by my selection! Either I'm the most even keeled, confident, positve, understanding, non-judgemental, professional employee at the shop or I'm way too emotional and the whole, "Pink is the new Black" thing is being taken the wrong way!

Just kidding gang. I know that I was chosen because of the way that I respect others. And that is a direct result of surrounding myself with good people like yall out there in cyber-land. Keep in touch and I'll see you soon.

Also, I'm coming to Birmingham for the Xterra Regional Championships at Oak Mnt. on June 11th. I'm coming in on the 8th or 9th, and I'm bringing Carrie with me!!! So all of you who can get there, make it so!!!

Put one in the W column

Well after a two week let-down from St. Anthony's performance, I rallied and came up with a victory. I had a great race at the Sharks tri-club Olympic distance race in Sarasota this weekend. I swam really well, which was amazing because I was just trying to keep under control and not POP! I had a huge lead from the start but let a few catch up to me, for what reason? I don't know. But it still went well. I got out on the bike, and after a slight mishap with my shoe (it came unclipped), I was rolling. There were a few turn around points where you could assess how far away people were. I saw that I had a few guys coming up on me, and decided to just floor it! And boy did I! I found a whole other gear that I haven't had in a while and it was rockin'!!

Coming off the bike I knew I was in front by a ton, so I set it in cruise mode and was having a great time. I was high five-ing little kids that were cheering on the side of the road and they were having a blast! That's what it all about right there! Those kids will be the future of the sport and they need to see us out there having fun so that they will want to have as much fun as us, RIGHT! Right!

The only scary part of the race was the last part of the run. It was on the beach along the Gulf. There were a lot of people out walking and enjoying the morning sun. I had to weave my way through them when all of a sudden it happened! An older (and I'm assuming foreign) couple in matching thong bikinis! AHHHHH!! Don't get me wrong here. I'm usually one for moderate amounts of exposure, I mean after all, I'm a triathlete where I basically run around in my underwear all day, but please! Refrain yourself once you reach a certain point. Yikes!!!

In all seriousness, it was a great race and put on very well. Thanks to all who participated and volunteered we couldn't do it without any of these critical cogs in the machine.

www.sharkstriclub.org/ check it out

St. Anthony's

Well sports fans, another St. A's down and another unfortunate disappointment. I seem to have a real problem with racing here in the backyard. My friend Gus suggested that we get the city to set the course back up next weekend, and I can just do it by myself and I'll probably go 12 minutes faster! My new Trek Madone, Zipp wheels, Zoot Ultra uniform worked amazingly well. I think it was the classic case of Equipment out-performed the engine!!

Times like these, you just have to say, that's one race under my belt for the year and it's only going to get better! I know I'm ready to make some huge leaps and bounds, I just need to make it happen. So thanks to everyone for believing in me and I promise I'll be successful in a next attempt.

congratulations to my peeps who competed on Sunday as well. Gus, Pete, Carey, Graham and others who I know did their best on the day. Also, big props to the Boyz and Girlz at Chainwheel Drive for working their @$$es off all week long!

Something itches?

Well folks, another day comes to a close. It was a busy day for your fearless author by beginning with a ride to work. Fear not because today I was only almost hit once. Riding to and from work is hard but it sure does feel good! I had a difficult head wind coming back this afternoon. It beat me up pretty good. I still managed to have a pretty good track workout this evening too. It was 4 sets of 2x 800 w/ :60 between and 2:30 between sets. I was supposed to run the first one in 2:30 and the second in 2:40, but here's how it went- 2:27, 2:31,2:27, 2:31, 2:20,2:29, 2:20, 2:32. Not bad considering.

After the track I went out w/ some friends and had dinner @ Beef O'Brady's (can you put that many apostrophes in a word?). We had some fun, oh, yeah. People like to watch me eat for some reason? Here's a summary
Bike- 55 miles in 3+hrs
Run- 6 miles track.

Weekend Roundup!

It has been one heck of a weekend folks! I ran the Race for the Cure on Saturday morning and came out w/ a victory. It was pretty fun. I was still really tired from to crazy shift I had worked last week, so my body was definitely not feeling a sub 15 minute 5k effort. Fortunately I was left all alone after the first mile. I went out in 4:50 and there was one guy with me for the first 1200 meters or so but he dropped off. When I got to the 2.5k mark I realized I was all alone and I just said, "cruise on in buddy." The time was slow (16:59) but the best part was after!

This guy walks up to me and says,"Hey did you win?" To which you should always answer yes to, because you never know what he could be talking about, right. I mean he could be giving you a new car and you might not have won the race but you might have won against your buddy who you were racing or anything at all! Either way, if he doesn't specify what he's talking about, you can always say yes.
So, he says congratulations and hands me an iPod mini and an envelop. I thinking,"SWEET!" So I go over and look at the iPod and discover that the iPod is hot pink! To Which most men would be very uncomfortable with, but not me. No Sir, I'm 100% confident in my sexuality and proud to be wearing a hot pink iPod. It gets better!
I open up the envelop and discover that I have received $1,500 worth of Laser hair removal from Ideal Image! This is awesome! I can get my bikini line waxed AND be listening to my hot pink iPod at the same time! Oh glory I say, GLORY!!!!
Maybe next year I'll win a ticket to the Vagina Monologues or something when I go for 3 in a row!

Also to add, I have recently accepted a full time sales position and Chainwheel Drive Bike store in Clearwater. I'm really excited about the opportunity and looking forward to the challenge ahead. Thanks for reading.

It's about survival now

Tonight I pull my last graveyard shift at the wellness center. No telling how much damage I've done to my body by doing this shift all week. I don't think that anyone out there reading this would ever be inclined to exercise, at a wellness center, at 2 am. There's a guy here right now. He's just freakin' sitting on a machine doing nothing, not even working out. I want to say, "hey buddy, if your going to keep me from actually getting some rest, then you sure as hell had better be woring up a sweat! I'm not here to sit with my thumb in my ear for fun you know! Your not doing me or you any good by sitting here as opposed to at your house where I don't have to watch you!"
Well enough of that. I think I'm going insane. I'm so tired right now and wish I could just sleep. Wow am I an old man. Or no wait I'm not, the guy here is and obviously he missed the memo that old people go to bed at 7 friggin' pm! They don't workout at 2 am. GEEZ!!! I think I'm goig to go smack him. I'm kidding of course.

I didn't train today, but I did sleep for 4 hours and teach two (2) spin classes. I finally got to see Carrie and we had lunch AND dinner together, which was cool. I realized that since she got back on Monday, I had only seen here for about 3 hours cumulative before thursday afternoon. Boy howdy! Note to self- never, ever do a shift like this again! I'm going to cry now (Kidding). L8er

WoW! I'm way off!

I've been really off the ball these last few weeks. I just figured out the other day that I'm going to be switching jobs in two weeks. That was a big decision to make and with some traveling mixed in there last weekend it's just caused a massive slow down in the world o' Hank.

Tonight (and last night, and the night before, and tomorrow night) I'm working a 9pm to 6am shift! Needless to say, it's kickin' the crap out of me. I'm really tired. It's funny, I say I'm tired a lot, but this time it's really true. 9 hours of sleep in the past 60 hours is not fun.

I've still managed to get a little training in edgewise. Monday I went for a 5mile run w/ the great one Gus Rodriguez. Took Tuesday off and then Wednesday I swam about 2000 or so and ran at the track. I was proud of the track workout considering my condition. It was Mile (4:58), 400 (71), 800 (2:29), 800 (2:25), 400 (69), mile (4:57). Had to push myself through but still walked away on my own three hands.

Also just to give a little recap of this past weekends race- The Santa Rosa Island Triathlon; the swim and bike were cancelled due to wind and waves from hurricane Rita, so they just had a 5k run. I finished second to Brian Fleichman who is on the US National Triathlon team. I think that I should be able to beat him heads up but I ran kinda stupid. The wwind was a good 20-30mph and being that I'm 5 foot 15, I caught a lot of resistance. It was still a good race and fun to juct copete in something.

I got to see my friends from Premier Event Management while I was there. Their home base is New Orleans, LA so it was good to see and hear that they were all doing ok. Mike told me that he has 9 family members in his house right now! I told him that that's no big deal, cause in Alabama where I grew up we lived at least 9 to each room.

Sorry I missed

I've fallen behind folks! But,fear not faithful readers, I will begin anew anow.
Today was not bad although I didn't workout at all. I've been feeling a little stopped up w/ a bit o' congestion. Yeasterday I had a wonderful track workout of 4 miles broken up as 1200 in 4:00 the 400 in 90. It was good.
Today I also went to watch a high scool Cross Country meet in Palm Harbour. I've started to help the Largo High CC team this year and I think they can be really good if they t get their heads straight (I should know a thing or two about that, right Dad?). I'll give up a summary of the weeks workouts tomorrow. Keep on Rockin'

Big, Long.......Day

The day started off with not one, but two close encounters with injury while riding to work. The first was a cat that decided he wanted to play, "Chase the headlight b/c I'm a worthless animal (just kidding cat lovers)". The second was a guy on the Pinellas trail who thinks that all black clothing is obviously the best choice for a pre-dawn bike ride. Needless to say that started the day off a little hairy.
So I rode to work, Taught my spin class at noon, swam about 2500y, worked w/ a swim client, then rode back home. Long day my friends, long day indeed. I'm a little tired right now so forgive me for not indulging too much.
Carrie is now in New Orleans and it looks like she's going to be there for a little while. She's doing great and received three or four vaccines today from the army. She says everyone is being great there and really putting up a good effort for those in need.
For some more good news, my good friends Jeff and Erika Boyd had a little baby girl born last night at two something in the morning. She and mom are doing great and dad is super proud as we all are. Hang in there folks!
Totals- Swim: 2500y incl. 500 in 6:10 not the best time but a good effort considering how tired I am.
Bike:3.5 hrs @ b/t 18-23 mph. About 65 miles or so.
Lift: 30 mins functional training. Mainly core work and shoulders.

Wednesday Sept. 7

I'm listening to Randy Newman's song "Louisiana" right now. I heard a guy perform it live a couple of months ago when my sister Whitney, friends Joshua, Ron and I went to see Glen Phillips play in B'ham. It was very good. Check out that song if you get a chance to.
Well onto today! Slept in this morning until 5:45am. It was nice. I was planning on swimming this morning at 5am but the ole' body just wasn't having it. I decided to save my energy for my track workout this evening. Here was the workout- 1200,400,400,1200,400,400,1200,1600. My friend Brant Speed was there to push me through it. Thank the lord that he's around, otherwise I'd go crazy running alone. We went 3:54, 3:51, 3:40 and all of the 400's were under 1:15. I topped it off with a 4:59 mile at the end. It was good. I didn't think I was going to have such a good workout but some times you just need to get out there and get the thing started first!
On the Carrue front, she spent the day in Bay St. Louis and tonight she's headed for Baton Rogue. Be sure to check out the St. Pete Times website to see her work. www.sptimes.com
Totals- Run 8.5 miles track workout in 60 mins or so

Tuesday Sept. 6

Today was a pretty good day on the homefront. I had to wake up at 4am to get to work by 5am. Pulled my shift, then went to go swim. Was unable to swim @ 10:30am so I just chilled until I had to teach my spin class @ 12pm. Taught the class, had a great time, then rode with a friend of mine named Carey ( not to be confused with my girlfriend Carrie). Grabbed some food and headed to the pool for a light 2000y swim. Met with a client @ 4pm, then finally got back to the hizzie.
I've been feeling really wiped today sans nap. So I just got here to chill out. Carrie ( you guessed it, my girlfriend) called from Gulfport to tell me that she had found some people who knew me and my family. Carrie is there covering the hurricane for the St. Pete Times. When I was a kid, I thought that my dad knew everyone in Mississippi. Turns out, he just about does. I'm fortunate that I came from a great family that has made friends with just about everyone we've met. Please send thoughts and prayers, the way of our beloved Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi.
Totals- Swim: 2000y, Bike: 1.5 hrs

Here is a picture of me, onboard my trusty Van Dessel cycles, Country Road Bob. This bike is awesome! It's a single speed cross bike that has a beefy front crabon fork. The coolest feature is the flip-flopper rear hub that is a single speed free wheel on one side, and a fixed gear on the other. Right now I'm running a 42x18 on the free side and a 16 gear on the fixed. This photo was taken by my wonderful girlfriend Carrie Pratt, last winter at the Citrus City Cyclocross race in Largo, Florida. Check out her website @ www.carriepratt.com