FAIRHOPE – Rob Felty of Daphne and Mobile native Hallie Blunck, now of Mountain Brook, claimed the overall championships Saturday in the 2010 Springhill Medical Center Grandman Triathlon in Fairhope.

Finishing 21st overall last year in his first Grandman, Felty, 24, now has seven triathlons under his belt and is training for the Iron Man in Hawaii this November.

"I've been doing a lot more training," he said. "Because I have the Iron Man in November." A sales rep, Felty likes to think through the transition from swim to bike to running. "Other than just training more, I pretty much kept the same strategies as usual. I like to think out my transitions before hand. Today, my bike was really close to the end of the transition zone so I put my shoes on before I jumped on the bike. Normally I'll put the shoes on after I get on the bike, but because of the short transition, I think I saved some time that way. Also I got after the swim a little better this year. The tide was higher than it was last year and, I'm a swimmer, so with the high tide I think I got more benefit from it this time."

A former runner for the UMS-Wright Lady Bulldogs, Blunck is a veteran of the Fairhope event who started a more rounded training regimen after a top-10 finish in 2009. She has four or five Grandman races to her credit finishing high last year in spite of a flat tire during the bike portion.

"Over the years I've entered when I could because of school," she said. "I was doing well last year until the flat. I think I was fifth. But this is the first time to win it. It feels great."

The third-year medical student at UAB in Birmingham is taking a year off to complete a masters in public health and also to race and train for more triathlons.

She credits trainer Craig Cecil with her improvements since last year. "Well, I was a runner before and I used to just save everything for the run and that served me well but I'm a lot stronger on the swim and the bike now. So, I can pace myself through all of that a lot better and I'm getting stronger in all three.

I've been working with Craig who has Peak Performers out of Birmingham."

Others in Blunck's family also did well as Merrie Blunck won the female grandmaster title while brothers Hans (24) and Conrad (21) took 2nd and 3rd in their age division. The female master winner was Ludmila Cosio-Lima of Pensacola. Last year's women's champion Erica Hemmy won her age division (30-34).

The men's grandmaster winner was last year's overall winner Johnny Harrison of Fairhope and the masters champ was Chad Hon of Mobile. Harrison and Hon were second and third overall as well.

In team competition, First was team HOUGH/BLACK/MCFARLAND with a total time of 1:14:48; 2. HUDSON/ JARMAN/HUDSON in 1:22:35 and 3. GARDNER/KELLEY/YEAGER in 1:27:51.

For more results go to:http://www.thegrandman.com/uploads/result/agegroups.txt

The Grandman event is a a 1/3-mile swim into Mobile Bay and back to the Fairhope Municipal Pier followed by a 16.4-mile cycle ride and a 3.1-mile run.

It benefits four local non-profit organizations: Mobile Baykeeper, The Gulf Coast Area Triathletes, The Baldwin County Trailblazers and Camp Rap-A-Hope.

With concerns over the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, The Environmental Protection Agency confirmed the air was safe before the start for the 676 entrants who registered and the 550 who completed the event.