Warning: this post will probably only be interesting to me. It is a lot of me. I'm writing this down so that I don't forget how the race went and all the mistakes I made. I figure if I write them down, there is no way I can forget them for future races.
I can't believe it is June. In January, after years of harassing from Bill, I signed up for a triathlon. He has been bugging me to do one for a long time and I'm not sure why I haven't. I guess I've just felt the need to get my running under control, then when I was somewhat satisfied with that, then I could try some other things. So in January, I signed up for a June triathlon, that way, I could get some good spring road races in before I focused on 2 other events.
I was really nervous going into this. There was always guilt about not getting in more workouts. I felt like my scheduled bike rides got rained out every week, fitting in two a days was hard (or I was lazy), Bill tends to work a little bit later with this new job, yada yada yada. I'm full of excuses. Plus I always felt like my running was getting the shaft, which made me grumpy since I like running the most.
I felt pretty confident in my swimming and running skills. My biking is weak. I'm the first to admit it. I hate riding, I don't hate it, it just stresses me out. There is way less control, you could get a flat tire, gears aren't shifting properly, cars don't share the road, etc. But I was as ready as I was going to get. And the morning of the race, after looking at the swim course, I was little panicked. It was 1,000 meter swim and it was really far out - in the Chesapeake Bay (waves and salt water). But I got over it all and it was really fun.
Anyway, after the first 200 meters of the swim, I felt like I got in a good rhythm and didn't feel like there was too much jostling for position and hung on for the ride. I came out of the water in 11th place (of the women's wave) and was happy with the results, especially since the 10 people in front of me were all within less than a minute.
My transition was super slow, I fumbled around, I lost my Gu that I shoved in my pocket, and turned around to place my wetsuit out of the way. It was ridiculous. Lost lots of time on the transition.
And I lost even more time on the bike. I know that cycling is my weak
event. But everyone was passing me left and right and they were all on
awesome/expensive triathlon bikes. I'm sure they already had a lot of
skill, but I think having an amazing bike could have helped me, even just a little
bit. I still would have been destroyed but maybe not quite as bad. The
leading women were about 10 minutes ahead of me. And the
Athena's were flying past me too.
Above, the home stretch, the announcer called my name and said I was looking strong - thus I gave the pose which Bill managed to catch. Below, though I dislike posting pictures of my backside, Bill wanted to document how salty I was - literally, not figuratively.
Luckily, I'm a runner. I had yet another ridiculously slow transition from bike to run. But overall, I was feeling fine. I grabbed a Gu and my water bottle because it was getting hot and that salt water made me really thirsty. In the end, yes, it was one more thing to haul along, but I think it paid off not having to grab water at an aid station. Anyway, I flew through the 2 lap 5 miles course. Felt great and was surprised at the pace that I was able to hold through the whole thing. Passed a lot of people and made up some time.
My run time was number 1 of all the women, by about a minute. So I guess I learned that my running wasn't suffering by having to split up my workout between swimming and biking.
Anyway, the race was awesome. Loved the distance, it was between a sprint and an olympic - with the distances being 1,000 meter swim, 20 mile bike, and 5 mile run. Bill loved it way more than watching road races. And, he was a great support. I spotted him a couple times running around to different locations with Asher in one arm and the camera in the other. Asher was a good sport kind of. He woke up at 5:30 and didn't fall asleep the night before until around 11pm. So by 9:30 after the race, he was just crying. A sippy cup full of sprite can only do so much. I definitely think I'll have to do more tris. Lots of fun and a good little challenge.
