Ironman Triathlon Hall of Famer and Carlsbad High School graduate Julie Moss gave a wonderful talk about her triathlon career, and how her life changed dramatically from her famous crawl across the finish line in the 1982 Ironman.
The presentation opened with ABC Wide World of Sports footage of the race, showing her falling all four times near the finish. She opened her talk with a fun trip down Carlsbad memory lane, circa 1960s-1970s, telling stories about the places she worked, surfed and had fun – and also sitting at the “thinking table” in elementary school (aka, talking too much in class). It served her well as a storyteller, as Crawl of Fame attests! She then shared the back story of how she decided to run Ironman as her senior thesis project at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, the humorous back-and-forth between she and her professor – who encouraged her to strive into the unknown – and her own affinity for the event after watching it on TV in 1981. (Believe it or not, after completely overperforming and changing triathlon forever in the process, and speaking in front of 1,500 professionals at Cal Poly, she only got a C on her thesis!) She took us through key pieces of the race.) She then took us through key points of the 1982 race, and the finish-line revelation that her life had changed forever.
She jumped to 2018 and talked about her final Ironman, and the joy of turning at the finish line on Alii Drive in Kona to wave to the fans one final time — then walk down the finishing chute into the arms of her son, first-time Ironman finisher Mats Allen, who draped the medal around her neck. She was Julie at her best – telling great stories, funny, poignant, and inspiring with her themes of bringing out the “Inner Wonder Woman” and “Inner Super Man”, of finding our fullest capabilities and operating at them.
If you are interested in purchasing the book, get your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Crawl-Fame-Fifteen-Created-Triathlon/dp/1681778564/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1544290401&sr=1-1&keywords=crawl+of+fame+moss