Who Is?: Robin Rongey

Who Is Robin Rongey?

When Patrick asked me to write a post about “who I am”, I kept thinking, I really don’t

know what I can say. I mean, I could tell the truth and say that I am this super smart,

ultra fit, amazingly hot mom, “oh wait, I’m channeling Reese Witherspoon again, so

that’s not right. Well I could tell you what I have been called in the past, the little round

ball of muscle, and the … oh wait, I can’t put the other names in print, so maybe that’s

not who I am either.

After putting some more thought to it, I think to tell you who I am, I need to tell you

where I come from. So let’s see if I can sum up my life’s journey in just a few short

paragraphs.

I was born in March of 1964, one month pre-mature, my name was going to be April,

but when I was born in March, my mom decided on Robin because it made her think of

springtime. I was early arriving in the world and have been early at everything since,

like talking, walking, tying my shoes, everything I do, I want to do fast and be the first

one done, it doesn’t matter what it is, work tasks, workouts, races, I was even the

fastest person at picking berries in the summer, no one could keep up with me. I think

there is a pattern here; maybe that is where my competitiveness comes from.

I grew up in the projects, we were poor, but of course I didn’t know it at the time

because poor is relative. We may have been financially poor, but we had a close family

and always had fun, we just did stuff that didn’t cost anything. So many people living

around us were poor in my eyes and I always felt so sorry for them, little did I know, I

was as poor as they were.

I am the only girl in a family of 5 kids. I am the second in line, but I ruled the house like I

was the oldest. I was always told I was really mean and bossy.

I spent my summers heading outside at daylight and not coming in until dark. We

played kickball, hide n seek, kick the can, football, baseball, soccer, we even setup

a ring with our shoes that we ran around acting like we were in the roller derby and

knocking people out of the ring. Most often I was the only girl allowed to play any of

the neighborhood sports. I think that is because all the boys were afraid of me, at least

that’s what my brothers tell me.

When I was 9 my dad died and at 12 we moved from the projects to the country. I went

from having hundreds of kids to play with, in a quarter mile radius to having 10 kids to

play with, in a 5 mile radius. This is when I started picking up endurance activities, riding

my bike, skateboarding, even running, I would run laps around my block and it was 2

miles long.

Two weeks into my freshman year of high school I was in a bad car accident, I spent a

few months in a hospital and then spent months on crutches. My mom was told that I

would most likely have brain damage, so now when I do stupid things I blame it on the

brain damage. It took a year to recover, so it was my sophomore year before I could

play any sports. I ran track and cross country the rest of high school, then I ran track in

college on a scholarship. I was just an above average runner, but heck back then they

just wanted to find girls that would run, that’s why I had a scholarship. I was actually the

first girl to ever run cross country for SIU-E.

After college I got married and had 3 kids, I continued to run, but not really competitive.

When my kids started getting self sufficient I started training hard again and decided to

try some new things, like triathlons, mountain biking and road biking. I loved it all! Then

in 1996, I took a job with Boeing and met my friend and now teammate Chuck Vohsen.

You all know Chuck as a Badass Adventure racer, but back in the day, he was just

some overweight jeep driving, martial arts practicing engineer. That was when I could

beat him both on foot and on wheels, but now, I’m just lucky he lets me follow him

around and share his adventure racing glory.

That leads me up to the current day and the fact that I am so lucky that I have a strong

mother who raised 5 kids on a yearly income that is less than I make in a month, having

4 brothers who even though they called me mean and bossy, they put the smackdown

on anyone else who said it, having friends like Chuck who would fight a bear for me or

give me his last sip of water if I was out, having 3 healthy kids that fight like cats and

dogs and are always planning the next way to pull the wool over their dad and my eyes,

but at the end of the day always give me hugs and “I love you’s”. I guess what I’m trying

to say is that all the events in my life have made me who I am today.

I still sometimes wonder who I am, but if I have to say who I think I am in one big run-on

sentence, this is what it would say.

I’m a girl who works hard at everything I do, I’m very organized, to the point of

annoyance to my family, I love being outside and I love adventure of any kind, I never

give up because I know with persistence I can accomplish anything, I may not be great

at it, but I can do it, and most of all, I’m a real cool mom, well my kids may not say that,

but I like to think I am.