January Newsletter

Meeting Venue
We met at Starbucks on East Blvd for our kickoff huddle meeting last month. We’ve grown our membership base already, and may have too many people to squeeze into the back corner at Starbucks. We need a venue to have Huddle meetings & such. We have a couple of ideas, but nothing super-fantastic. Do any of you guys have a good meeting place in mind? We’d likely have 10-15 people for the first couple of meetings. Let us know if you have any good ideas.

The Website
We would really like to have everyone’s picture up at the Members page, along with a short bio blurb of who you are. Check out some of the existing member’s photos and bios for examples. This is not required, but highly encouraged.

Next Huddle Meeting
We are exploring ideas for having our next Huddle meeting. I think it would great if as many of us as possible could run a local 5K, and then go meet and greet afterwards. There is a 5K race on the McAlpine greenway on Feb 28th. How is this date for everyone? Let us know your thoughts about the race & meet.

Facebook
Yes, we are on Facebook. We’ve started a group called “FCA Endurance Charlotte“, and 4 of us are currently members. Please join us on facebook if you can. Ryan and I also frequently upload good stuff, and are constantly amusing our friends with our thought-provoking and comical status updates.

Our Focus for 2009
I wanted to remind everyone what our focus is for 2009. Our Vision:
To see Charlotte impacted for Jesus Christ through the influence of endurance athletes.
And Our Mission:
To present to endurance athletes, and all whom they influence, the challenge and
adventure of receiving Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, serving Him in their relationships and in the
fellowship of the church.

To accomplish this impacting and presenting and winning people over to the Lord, we need people. People willing to jump in, get involved, and do something great for the kingdom. Our main focus for this year is building the Charlotte team. God is already growing the numbers pretty steadily, and once we get the man-power in place, we’ll be ready to take on a different main focus. For example, the South Carolina FCAE huddles were in team building mode for the first year or two, and are now getting more strategic at infiltrating the endurance world, and are able to be very specific on how they minister. This is a big year for them, and they will have a presence at every major South Carolina triathlon. I’d like to see us move in this direction, (and we are!), but we need to have more teammates. I’d encourage our current teammates to invite other endurance athletes into the huddle. We’re not looking for x number of people to join the huddle in x months or anything like that. Jesus had 12 men in his core-group and we see what they did! Praise God for bringing all of you guys onboard! I think God will grow and direct the huddle however he sees fit. The momentum so far is incredible!

Events
We noticed that the “Events” tab on the website has always been empty, and we’d like to change that. Please pray for God to open doors with race organizers so we can be at these events. We thought it would be easier, but we’re having to contact each race director individually about FCAE showing up. We will keep you updated on the progress of these:

Jetton Park Triathlon, 5/9
Tri Latta, 6/13 and 6/14
Lake Wylie Triathlon, 7/25
Lake Norman YMCA Tri, 8/22/2009 and 8/23

We’re also still exploring having a presence at running and cycling events.

South Carolina Shoutout
The South Carolina FCA Endurance rockstars are hosting 3 events which they’ve asked all area FCAE members to be a part of if possible.
#1 – Zebra’s Do Exist 5K on 4/18/2009. FCAE will be a huge part of this race, and we’ll be carpooling down there.
#2 – The SC Ride for Life, a 3-day bike ride on June 12-14. Though this is not an FCAE event, the FCA leadership has recommended this as a great event for any huddle members (who like cycling) to attend.
#3 – The Endurance in Sport and Faith Training Camp on Feb 27 – Mar 1st. An awesome opportunity to get equiped in the ministry. FCAE 101. We’ll probably be carpooling down to this event as well.

Well, that’s it for this installment. Please remember to send in your photo and mini bio! And let us know if you have any good ideas on a meeting venue, and if you dig the 5K race/huddle meeting on Feb 28th. Safe training, and blessings on all of God’s teammates!

December Huddle Meeting Recap

We had our first huddle meeting on 12/14. I wanted to recap what we discussed, so people who weren’t able to attend could be brought up to speed.

FCAE Charlotte:
FCAE Charlotte Vision: To see Charlotte impacted for Jesus Christ through the influence of endurance athletes.
FCAE Mission: To present to endurance athletes, and all whom they influence, the challenge and
adventure of receiving Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, serving Him in their relationships and in the
fellowship of the church.

Present: FCAE is a presenting ministry. Having a presence. A presence means being there, being
visible, and being recognizable as an FCAE Teammate. This doesn’t always mean working at a booth at the race, but also goes down to the people we train with and see “out there” in the endurance world. Being in the forefront all the time, and sharing your witness by how you live your life.

Is the Huddle a replacement for a Triathlon Club or Running Group? No. The huddle has lots of
similarities to one of those groups. Those groups’ goal is to build up the athlete. FCAE’s goal is to
build up Christ. Do we also build up the athlete? Yes. But, the very people in the triathlon clubs
and running groups are the people we need to reach. We want to be very careful about always remaining outward-focused, and not form a christian clique which excludes people.

The Huddle:
FCAE Huddles are about 3 things:
Fellowship
Spiritual Growth
Outreach

Vision for 2009
1) Grow and unify team.
2) Have a presence at at least 3 Triathlons.
a. Jetton Park Tri: 5/9
b. Latta Tri Sunday: 6/14
c. Lake Norman Sunday: 8/23
3) Get hooked up with Run For Your Life and explore having presence at road race events.
4) Get our own Tent, tables & stuff to run a booth.
5) Train together, but remember to stay outwardly focused.

Ryan also lead a devotion out of Mark 4. Out there at races, our job is to sow the seed. No matter
what kind of ground that seed lands on, it is our job at FCAE to throw it.

Ryan and I also met with Slick and Donna Douglass, the SC FCAE rockstars, and got a lot of good
information and direction. More on that to come!

Blessings on the team,
- Nick

First Huddle Meeting

We’ve scheduled our very first Huddle meeting for next Sunday, Dec. 14th at 6PM. Venue is Starbucks @ 1401 East Blvd. (map here) Everyone is invited and all current huddle members are encouraged to come. This first meeting will be a meet-and-greet to get to know the huddle leaders and fellow teammates. Ryan and I would like to cast the vision we have for getting things going in 2009. Hope to see everyone there! Please comment here if you have any questions or concerns.
– Nick

Photos & Race Calc

The Photos and Race Calc sections linked above have been completed! Please go check them out! Also, teammates are welcome to e-mail any photos racing in FCAE colors! Our very first huddle meeting is on the horizon, so stay tuned for updates. We’ll most likely post something tonight about it, as well as send out an e-mail.
– Nick

Join Us is Ready

We have completed the Join Us section above! If you are new here, welcome! Have a look around, and if you decide to join up with the Charlotte huddle, the joining process is free, quick and easy. Any comments are greatly appreciated. Our next order of business is to complete the Members section and the Race Calc. Stay tuned. Oh, and have you checked out the FCA Endurance team gear? Blessings to all of God’s competitors.

– Nick

In the Press

FCA Enduance Charlotte was recently featured in the “FCA Endurance Aid Station” newsletter for November. We’re the first Huddle in North Carolina, and were mentioned alongside of Utah who also just started up their first huddle. Blessings to you guys!

Also, we’re still working on the “Join Us” section above. If you’d like to join the huddle and become an FCAE TEAMMATE, please visit this site (FCA Endurance National), have a read, and fill out the Teammate Form. Shoot us an e-mail after you sign up so we can touch base! Also, check out the FCAE team gear.

We are organizing our first Huddle meeting for late November / early December. Stay tuned.

Welcomed

Thanks so much to all the national FCA-Endurance Huddle leaders that e-mailed and sent kind words this way. I truly feel welcomed. Also, thanks goes out to Chris Anderson for his great introduction e-mail, and for linking us to the FCAEndurance.org website.

I’m hoping to have the content all filled in over the next week. Thanks for stopping by!
- Nick

Hello world!

As of 10/15/2008, this site is officially a work in progress. Don’t let all the scary colors and weird graphics and fonts spook you. I’m playing with (read hacking apart) the wordpress stylesheets trying to get the FCA Endurance colors to look decent. Red, Yellow, Orange and Black. That’s my palette. Stay tuned.
- Nick