Lisbeth Kenyon: From the Sidelines to Leading the Pack

Fran Arfaras Profiles 2009 Women's 40-44 Age Group Champion Lisbeth Kenyon, Barrington, RI, USA

Growing up in Norway, Lisbeth Kenyon was not a born-athlete who loved to compete. She participated in sports such as swimming and cross country skiing, but didn't care for competition. Her brother was excelling in decathlon and her sister in swimming, but Kenyon was content to cheer them on. It was later that she caught the bug.

Fast forward to 1992. Kenyon was now living in Miami and a neighbor talked her into joining him in a local Bud Light sprint event. She won her age group and she had fun. She was hooked.

In 1996, Kenyon spent her honeymoon in Kona, racing the Ford Ironman World Championship. She finished in a very respectable 10:40:47, grabbing sixth place in her age group. Stumbling down the chute, and across the finish line, she was swept off to the medical tent with hyponatremia. It was a hard way to learn about the importance of nutrition out on the course.

By this time she was already racking up some impressive finishes in major races. She was the twelfth age-group finisher at the 1994 ITU World Championship in New Zealand and sixth at the 1995 ITU Worlds in Cancun.

Kenyon took the next seven years off to have three children and work on her career. She is a former Biomedical Engineer and also worked a few years in OEM software licensing. She now helps her husband Todd run three small businesses, two of which are triathlon related (www.ttbikefit.com and www.trifitlab.com). The corporate world included travel for her which became increasingly hard with the birth of their third child. The flexibility of their own businesses is far better for training, she says.

When asked about her training schedule Kenyon says “My usual training schedule in prior years: get up in the morning, see how I feel, go do something different than yesterday or hook up with friends and do their workout.” That worked well enough for a while. She raced Kona in 2008 and finished fifth in 10:34:50.

To get ready for Kona last year she got a one-on-one coach (Coach Al). “I have learned a lot and progressed on all levels, so I am definitely sticking with the new longer term way of treating training via being coached by someone who knows a heck of a lot more than me,” she said.

Third time was the charm for Kenyon as she ran away with the top spot in her age group with a time of 10:15:05. “The experience and appreciation for Kona gets better every time,” she said. “Having been there twice before made the week much more relaxing and less scary (except for the swim start – I am always scared of the swim start).”

Kenyon had trained well for the race but was still surprised to win. “There are so many factors during a long day of racing, especially in Kona,” she said. “You have to focus so much on your own plan and energy. I tried to keep track of others in my age group but it’s difficult to decipher wrist band colors and race numbers of girls passing me during the marathon. I expected Peggy Yetman to be my toughest competition because she can run circles around me. My expectations were correct – she was approaching rapidly.” In fact Yetman finished second with a time of 10:25:21, about ten minutes behind Kenyon.

“My game plan was to stay within my limits and not take off when I felt good, just to blow up later,”
she said. “I have learned this the hard way many times. That said, I always have my eye on that sub-10 hour finish and the goal is to be there again, although Kona is likely not where that will happen for me.”


The win in Kona made some changes for the Kenyon’s race plan for this year. They were going to skip Kona and do the Norseman Extreme in Norway instead, as this is where her family lives.

“However, since I didn’t have to requalify, I thought I should give Kona another shot,” she said. “My husband Todd and oldest son Lars (12) were with me last year and somehow were everywhere during race day, including several places along the bike course. Realizing how much Lars appreciated Hawaii we would like to bring all three kids this year.”

This just might be the year for that sub-10.

You can reach Fran Arfaras at farfaras@ironman.com.