By Paul Baldwin
There's 15 minutes left until dawn on an already-humid spring morning, and Jonathan Blue's footfalls are one of the few sounds along the tree-lined sidewalks of Frankfort Avenue. For a few minutes, the clack and rumble of an early-morning train just across the street overpowers the rhythmic punctuation of Blue's shoes hitting the pavement.
Although it's just a few minutes past 5 a.m., the rest of Blue's day is already spoken for. His company, SFX Worldwide, has brought the AVP Crocs professional beach volleyball tour to Louisville for Memorial Day weekend. For the past few days, professional beach volleyball players have been in to Louisville, playing matches in the sand at Waterfront Park.
Blue already has interviews scheduled with local television and radio stations beginning at 6:30 a.m. Others will follow during the day. He has no doubt the tour's stop in Louisville will be a success: since the tour's arrival, volleyball fans, as well as workers from the nearby downtown office buildings, have shown up just to catch a glimpse of towering, super-fit professionals practicing for their upcoming matches.
Still, it's his family's name on Blue Equity LLC, the company that owns SFX, and much of his time will be spent getting the word out the upcoming matches and about Louisville's embrace of the tournament . But before all that, Blue is trying to put a few miles under his feet this morning so he can pursue one of his other passions, triathlons. “When I'm working out in the morning, when I'm out running or biking or swimming, things fall into place,” Blue said.
Blue, chairman and managing director of Louisville's Blue Equity, has no shortage of things to manage. In late May, the company acquired New York-based Worldwide Football, the firm of NFL agent Joel Segal. The agent's client list includes 50 NFL players, including Michael Vick and Reggie Bush. Blue Equity also owns Sección Amarilla, the largest publisher of Spanish-language telephone directories in the United States. Another company, Blue Leather, has business interests in Latin America and China.
Given the variety of his business and entrepreneurial interests, it's no surprise Blue chose triathlons — a race of varying distance that combines swimming, cycling, and running. The challenge for triathletes of any level is to find enough time to train. For Blue, the early-morning runs form the backbone of his training.
Adjoining his office at Preston Pointe, a building he helped develop in downtown Louisville, Blue has a shower and bathroom he can use if he needs to grab a run downtown or if he wants to dress for a workout. On a recent weekday, a pair of running shoes sat next to a pair of running shorts on a small table in his office.
Amid the signs of Blue Equity's success adorning the office walls —reproductions of local and national news articles, academic achievements, business honors, and sports memorabilia in glass cases — is a picture of Blue running out of the water at the Halfmax Triathlon, a half Ironman held each year outside of St. Louis.
Blue's first triathlon was in 2001 at Long Run Park. He progressed quickly, finishing second in a sprint distance triathlon at E.P. “Tom” Sawyer State Park in 2003. Since then, he's increased his distances to Olympic and half-Ironman triathlons. Like many people who take up triathlons, Blue was most comfortable running. Blue ran his first Kentucky Derby Festival miniMarathon before he was a teen-ager and played soccer as a student at St. Francis High School. And, like many beginning triathletes, the sport most difficult to master was swimming. With his trim, compact build, Blue, 40, looks like he could still hold his own on the soccer field. But he says his body type isn't the best for swimming. “Swimming is the hardest to improve,” Blue said. “I don't have long arms and legs.”
Blue said he received coaching and encouragement from the late Steve Geer, an accomplished triathlete and fellow member with Blue at Congregation Adath Jeshurun. Geer, who died suddenly last October, completed 15 Ironman triathlons — consisting of a 2.4 mile swim, 112-mile bike ride, and 26.2-mile run.
Blue credits Geer's guidance as well as several Total Immersion ™ swimming books and videos with improving his performance in the water. During swimming workouts, Blue often uses the spiral-bound book Workouts in a Binder: Total Workouts for Triathletes.
For beginning triathletes trying to make the most of their training and for people who may be inexperienced at one of the three sports, Blue recommends new athletes seek out mentors, like Geer, or find groups with whom they can train. To keep himself motivated and to increase his understanding of training and fitness, Blue subscribe to publications like Bicycling and Triathlete.
Blue says weight training is especially valuable for days when it's difficult for him to find time to run, bike, or swim. It also helps offset some of the calories consumed during business dinners and other events while on the road.
The majority of Blue's training time while he's in Louisville starts at between 5 and 5:30 a.m. When he's on the road, which can mean he's in Mexico, China or New York City, or elsewhere, Blue explores the city before dawn, usually running through downtown areas. “I try to do something every day,” Blue said. “If I'm traveling, I'll run to try and keep my routine.”
Besides fitness, Blue says his early-morning runs have allowed him to gain a better understanding of the cities in which he stays. Once while in Shanghai, China, Blue set out before dawn for a run. While jogging through a park he came upon a group of several thousand Chinese doing early-morning Tai Chi.
Six weeks after Sept. 11, 2001, he was able to look upon the site of the still smoldering ruins former World Trade Center in New York City. In Memphis, he and several other early-morning runners made their way past the Lorraine Motel, where Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated. He's run past the Alamo, in San Antonio, Texas, and the site of the Liberty Bell, in Philadelphia. But given the choice, Blue says Louisville's parks, especially those designed by Frederick Law Olmstead, are some of the best places to run. “I do like running here better than anywhere else,” Blue said. “Louisville offers everything.”
Cycling, however, is more complicated. Blue says that because he's not comfortable riding in the dark, almost all of his cycling miles are completed on stationary bikes. At home, he pedals in front of a television while watching reruns of The Sopranos or 24 . He also attends spinning classes at the Louisville Athletic Club. For competitions, he rides a Litespeed Blade, an aerodynamically designed bike with a lightweight titanium frame.
Although he won't be competing in the Aug. 26 Ford Ironman Triathlon in Louisville, Blue says he's encouraged by its presence here, saying it adds to the mix of activities to which residents are exposed. “We need participatory sports and spectator sports,” Blue said. “And we need to find the right ones for Louisville.”
To foster more events and to ensure Louisville is viable as an athletic venue, Blue says sponsorship is essential. He cites both the Mayor's Healthy Hometown Movement and Humana's sponsorship of the 2007 National Senior Games as examples. (Editor's note: The writer is a Humana employee.) “We need much more corporate sponsorship,” Blue said. “As goes the event sponsorship, so goes the event.”
