Becky Lavelle

Rebecca "Becky" Lavelle ( Gibbs, born December 5, 1974) is an American former professional triathlete, race director, competitive runner, and coach. As a professional triathlete, she has had over 50 career wins in Olympic and Half-Ironman distance races.

Early life
Lavelle began competing athletically from a young age. She started swimming competitively in Minnesota when she was nine and continued throughout high school.

At the age of 12, Lavelle was named best swimmer of her age group in Minnesota, a title she maintained for seven years. In 1993, during her senior year of high school, she was named (overall) Female Swimmer of the Year for Minnesota.

Lavelle went on to swim competitively at Louisiana State University (LSU) in college, where she became a ten-time NCAA All-American swimmer. In1997, she was named NCAA state-level "Woman of the Year" (Louisiana).

In 1998 Lavelle graduated summa cum laude with a B.Sc. in kinesiology.

Triathlon career highlights

 * 2003: Pan Am Games bronze medalist
 * 2005: winner US National Championships and Chicago Triathlon
 * 2005: named "Comeback Athlete of the Year" by Triathlete Magazine
 * 2006 and 2008: named Multi-sport Athlete of the Year by USA Triathlon
 * 2007: winner of US Long Distance Triathlon National Championships
 * 2008: named the Overall Lifetime Fitness Triathlon Series winner
 * 2012: winner of Rev3 Florida Half-Ironman in Venice, FL

Philanthropy
In 2008, Lavelle co-founded the non-profit organization Jenny's Light in honor of her late sister Jenny and her sister's infant son, Graham. The mission of Jenny's Light was to improve and save lives by raising awareness of perinatal mood disorders, including postpartum depression. Jenny's Light Run events were held annually in Los Gatos, CA until 2022 in order to raise funds for organizations working on the issue.

Running after triathlon
Following her official retirement from triathlon, Lavelle began running with Arete, a women's running club based in Santa Cruz, CA.