Anyway, as I entered the Ironman portion of the building my eyes lit up as the entry hall was covered in IM paraphernalia, along with a bookcase showing their 14 Emmy Awards for Edited Sports Special and such. We were shown to our intern office where 3 of us will work, while Stephen Ray will be in a separate office. We each have our own cubicle to customize as we please. We each have our own phone with our own extension as well, so we all set up our voice mails. I felt so professional :)Tomorrow our individual laptops will be ready for our use.
Since the intern supervisor was working on something she gave us a huge stack of documents and said, "Well, start reading up on all of this material until I'm ready to give you the tour and make all of the introductions." Then she left us alone to mull over everything. It made me think of a movie scene where a lowly intern gets bombarded with stacks and stacks of files of boring material to go through. But for me, this was like leisure reading time! Our "reading materials" consisted of past IM media guides and official race programs filled with photos, quotes, highlights, statistics, results, personal stories, company history, etc of various IM events. It was the first interesting thing in a long time that I can remember being told to read by someone. I'm used to reading dry textbooks with bold vocabulary words. In other words, good bedtime reading material. So, it was actually enjoyable for me to read all this stuff.
We got a grand tour of the office and met everyone. Just as I had anticipated, the vast majority of the staff is VERY young and VERY active! I think 6 of the people we were introduced to today are former interns, and can't be much older than me. It was not uncommon to peer into someone's office and see a bike hanging on the wall or tennis shoes lying about or stacks of Powerbars and bottled water. The sign above the coffee pot was what really did it for me though, "Go for an exercise break instead of a coffee break." Classic.
We did a little bit of mindless packet preparation for the upcoming Atlanta Iron Girl race (women's only triathlon), but it was okay b/c it gave Jen and I a chance to get to know Bryan, one of the other interns. He's actually still in school and is getting credit for the internship. After that we each went our separate ways to meet with our individual supervisors. My current supervisor is Nicole, one of the past interns. I'll be working with her on several Iron Girl projects, the first of which is helping hire a local person as a volunteer coordinator for the Bloomington, MN race in Sept. She said they discussed the fact that they may just have me take on that position by myself. Also, we'll be working on the expos for several upcoming races. I'll be managing the vendor accounts and communication and also helping with marketing to vendors in the cities of the races to bring in more products, services, and people related to triathlon, or health and fitness in general. Also, she said I'll probably go to a few Iron Girl races to manage the expos on site! There is also a complimentary post-race breakfast cafe at each race. So I'll also be coordinating the catering and helping them research all of their local options to find the best deal and then overseeing it on race day.
There are several other projects that we'll cover, but that's what she wants me to start with. I'll also be doing a few things for Ironman as well. I don't know what I'll have to do as of yet, and there's the possibility that I'll be working exclusively with Iron Girl, which is a bummer, but she did say that if I want more projects with Ironman and want to be more involved with that brand then that's more than fine. Any other areas of interest are apparently up for grabs. I would actually like to at least learn if not actually work on some things with PR, b/c what my roommate Jen gets to do seems awesome! She's in charge of editing current and designing/writing/developing new media guides and race programs. So she'll get to work with Photoshop and other software to produce any print media. I know that Bryan's major is in hospitality management, but he left earlier than us without being given his assignment b/c his supervisor was out. So, it's pretty awesome that we get so much responsibility and work so quickly! I'm totally ready to work though!
B/c our computers weren't ready they sent us home really early...the first and last time I'm sure. They told us that before we begin our individual assignments tomorrow all of us, and a whole bunch of the other staff will have to camp out in the conference room and do an assembly line for 800 race bags. Judy, the lady who told us this, also said that it'll be a good time to talk and meet some of the other staff since we'll all be "sharing the misery," as she put it. But she said we get a pizza party when we're done, so that's cool.
Oh, and before we left they gave us IM bags full of goodies! I got a Timex IM watch, an IM mesh running hat, IM cycling socks, an IM keychain lanyard, a luggage tag, and we get shirts tomorrow! Hooray for free stuff!
So, my first day overall was great. I got the good vibes from the environment and staff that I was hoping for. I really think I'm going to love this!
Then, since we had no "homework" and I had all afternoon free I decided to go to the beach again. I ran along that causeway with the water on both sides of me. It was so hot though that I did sprint intervals instead of a steady run. The scenery though sure did make the heat more bearable! My reward was getting to wade in the warm ocean water afterward. I managed to get a few shades darker. A few hours later I went back to the condo and decided to scope out the pools at the resort. Apparently we do have free access to all of them except for the one right next to us. I found a 25 yard pool that actually had lane buoys and there was only a few old ladies doing water aerobics...no rowdy kids! It's open from dawn til dusk everyday so I've found my new swimming spot. I went ahead and put some lap time in since it's been about 2 weeks since I've done any swimming. Jen's checking out an Olympic sized pool in Clearwater that her friends go to for 5am Masters swimming, but I don't think it's worth the gas money, and a 6am workout is the earliest I'm willing to do. I'll stick to the free 25-yarder...it's the same length I had to use back at the Preston Center anyway, so it's more than fine.
So it looks like this Friday night Jen, some of her Tri-Gator friends, and I will be doing a 5k in Clearwater. The race is on 60, which is called Coast to Bay or something like that and stretches over the water..the same bridge we biked over a few days ago. The incline's pretty steep, but then you get to run downhill, so it should be a fun, cheap race.
Well, that should do it for today. Until tomorrow...
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