Past Races

Shawn Nicklin

Winter Garden, Florida

I had been involved in competitive sports my whole life (hockey, baseball, skateboarding, mountain biking) and always in great shape. After I graduated from college (software engineering) I ended up in a very sedentary lifestyle, and over the years the pounds started adding up. Before I knew it my 20's were gone, and I was in my mid thirties, and way beyond out of shape. After years of trying my wife and I finally conceived a child in 2016 to be born in early 2017. My wife looked at me after we found out and said "I don't want a husband/father that is going to die at 40 because he is obese and out of shape". This really hit me, she wasn't being mean, she was being real. The next day I started my fitness journey. Since that day I've lost well over 100 pounds and added 15-20 pounds of lean muscle.

The first thing I started to tackle as the weight came off was obstacle course racing. I successfully complete the Spartan race Trifecta challenge. After completing that I turned my sights to Triathlon. My brother in law is a many times over Ironman and I secretly always wanted to do that. I only had a small problem, I couldn't really swim. So I started hitting the pool at work everyday, slowing progressing from barely finishing a single length to regular 1500+ yard swims. In the summer of 2018 I completed my first Sprint distance triathlon and I was hooked. In the fall of 2018 I bought my first Triathlon Bike, then a new set of FLO 90's . 2019 was a busy racing year for me, I started with an Olympic in March, then 2 sprints in July, a Duathlon in July, and my first Ironman 70.3 in September in Augusta (finished top 10% on the bike rocking my FLO's). I have one race left this year, Daytona Challenge in December.

My 2020 Calendar has Ironman 70.3 Florida, and Mont Tremblant, many sprint/olympics and hopefully Ironman Arizona in the fall.