Andie Psilopoulos competes in Triathlon

By Mike Zummo
Posted 9/1/21

Andie Psilopoulos is a multi-sport athlete and sometimes does all those sports at one time.

That started when she was seven years old and participated in her first kids’ triathlon in New …

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Andie Psilopoulos competes in Triathlon

Posted

Andie Psilopoulos is a multi-sport athlete and sometimes does all those sports at one time.

That started when she was seven years old and participated in her first kids’ triathlon in New Paltz and found that she liked it.

So about eight years later, she competed in her first national triathlon when she traveled to West Chester, Ohio at the end of July to compete in the USA Triathlon Junior Elite Nationals.

She finished 60th among girls ages 13-15.

The race started with the swim portion, which is her strongest portion, as she has been swimming competitively since she was 7.

Psilopoulos was the second female out of the water, finishing the 750-meter portion of the event in about 5:07, but things got more complicated during the 20-kilometer bike portion.

She dropped to 59th place after she and another competitor got their wheels tangled up, and sent them both to the ground, and leaving Psilopoulos with a bunch of scrapes and bruises.

“So, I was really beat up,” said Psilopoulos, a rising sophomore at Wallkill Senior High School. “I had a bunch of cuts, but I got back on my bike and finished because I was like, ‘this is my first time going to nationals and I didn’t want to not finish.’”

She finished the biking portion, and pushed herself through the final part, the run, and when the race was over, she was 60th out of 71 female competitors.

“That kind of stunk because, like I was saying, I wanted to finish, and I knew I wasn’t doing as well as I wanted to because the crash took a while and then I wasn’t running as fast as I could have.”

But she did finish.

And then after cleaning up the scrapes and getting some x-rays, which turned out negative, she was back in the water for the mixed relay on Aug. 1.

She qualified for the nationals on June 6 in Pleasant Prairie, WI, where she was one of the top 17 athletes to qualify for Nationals.

She was sore and stiff, the next day, and swimming the mixed relay, was the hardest part because it hurt to move her elbow to swim.

Then the following week, she was in Milwaukee, where she finished 27th in her age group, amongst a lot of familiar faces.

“A lot of the girls who were in Ohio that week before were also in Milwaukee,” Psilopoulos said.
So, what goes into training for a triathlon?

It involves a lot of swimming, cycling, and running. A competitive swimmer, Psilopoulos swims on her club team 5 to 6 days per week. She swims for the Wallkill swim team, and this fall, she’s adding an additional wrinkle. In addition to swimming, she is running on the Panthers’ cross-country team.

By the way, practices are at the same time.

“I go to swim practice because that’s my primary sport, and then I need to get my six practices in for cross country,” Psilopoulos said. “So, I went (Aug. 24) because I didn’t have swim practice.”

If there is a cross country meet and the swim team isn’t competing, she’ll go to the cross-country meet, but if both are competing on the same day, she swims.

She hopes to return to nationals.

“I’m planning to compete in multiple cups again,” she said. “Hopefully I make it back to Nationals. And then I’m hoping to do triathlons in college because now it’s an NCAA sport.”