WEST DES MOINES, IA – The website for the 2010 Hy-Vee Triathlon is now live.

Darin Hirl, Director, Event Marketing for Hy-Vee, said a number of improvements have been made to the site to make it more user-friendly for athletes and fans. “We’ve responded to the feedback we received last year by incorporating some new features that make the site more interactive, more informative and more visually interesting,” Hirl said.

The 2010 Hy-Vee Triathlon, to be held June 11-13 at Raccoon River Park in West Des Moines, IA, includes competitive events for amateur age groups and the ITU Elite Cup for the world’s top-ranked professionals. The elite competitors will race for triathlon’s largest purse -- $1 million, with first-place checks of $200,000 for the winning male and female athletes. Proceeds from the Hy-Vee Triathlon benefit Variety – The Children’s Charity of Iowa, an organization that provides grants to more than 80 charities serving children and families. 

The Hy-Vee Triathlon website allows amateur athletes to register online for the USA Triathlon-sanctioned kids races (ages 5-17), the adult age group races, the para-triathlete race and the adult and para-triathlete team relays. Beginning February 1, registrations will be accepted online for several hundred volunteer positions available during the event, Hirl said.

Other new features on the Hy-Vee Triathlon website for 2010 include:

• Full integration with YouTube, Flickr, Facebook and Twitter and RSS feed subscription options
• Custom Google search capability and embedded Google maps of the courses
• Latest news headlines on the home page
• A Race Updates section on the home page containing a countdown ticker, continuous posting of water temperature and other information athletes want to know
• A customized form that can be used to direct queries to Hy-Vee or its event partners.

The 2010 Hy-Vee Triathlon begins with the popular USAT-sponsored Kids Clinic on Friday, June 11. The Junior, Youth, and Kids triathlon events will be held Saturday, June 12, and the Hy-Vee Triathlon age-group events and ITU Elite Cup events will take place Sunday, June 13.

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Hy-Vee, Inc. is an employee-owned corporation operating 228 retail stores in eight Midwestern states. For 2009 the company recorded total sales of $6.4 billion, ranking it among the top 30 supermarket chains and the top 50 private companies in the United States. Visit the company’s website at www.hy-vee.com