Redskin Romp Sprint Triathlon - Triathlon

Since Masters is all people over 40, I don't know how to classify age group rank. 22nd overall is really good for me, though. I'm sure I gained several seconds on most of the field because of the run to transition. There was one 17 yr old there who is on Rachel's swim team who only beat me by 6 seconds on the swim leg, and I know he's a lot more than 6 seconds faster in the water.

I never caught anybody, and never got caught, and did a good job of just swimming and breathing. Because it was only 3 lengths of the pool and the pool is 6 lanes wide, the first lane was more like 3 lanes wide, and the second one was about 2 lanes wide. I did a good job on the first length of gradually moving over, but on the 2nd length I didn't realize I needed to do the same thing, and just followed the black line on the bottom. When I got to the wall to turn, I realized I was nowhere close to the lane for the 3rd length, so I had to diagonal pretty good to get there. Also, the lane markers were just ropes, so they weren't easy to see. No big deal, though, I thought I'd be around 3 min out of the water and I was just over that.

Pay a little more attention to the lane layout. I did try to start closer to the front in this one since it was a smaller field and some of the top names weren't there. I was shooting for a top 10 finish and wanted to be close enough to try to catch some people on the bike and hold them off on the run.

Ran hard down the hill and into transition, tried to rub a little grass off the feet quickly on the mat, put on the helmet, grab the bike and go. Decent bike mount, no faceplant (yay, one in a row!), and off we go.

3rd fastest T1 overall

Still need lots of practice on the bike mount.

Another reason I wanted to start closer to the front on the swim was so that I wouldn't get behind cars behind slow bikes on the big hill on both laps. Worked really well on the first lap, but caught a car on the second lap who kept getting over like they were going to pass, and had room to pass, but wouldn't. I (and a guy in front of me) ended up passing him on the inside to keep from stopping, I think that car is still waiting on that bike.

I passed a few people on the first lap, and then several first lappers on the second lap. I also passed a couple people that I knew were ahead of me from the swim and were faster runners than me, so I knew I needed to try to get as much gap as possible to try to hold them off.

I felt totally lost without my meter, but just kept telling myself to go as hard as I can. I did check my time on my watch a couple times and was able to guess pretty close to my pace based on that.

I don't know what else I could do differently, I was 5th overall, and 4th overall was over a minute ahead of me. Just keep getting faster.

Another good dismount, but one of my shoes drug a little and made the bike bounce a little bit. Got the bike racked, helmet off, shoes on, and go. I forgot to get my gel, and realized it about 1/4 mile into the run. Oops.

12th fastest T2 overall

Not forget my gel. I need all the energy boost I can get on the run. Also, I need to start putting my belt on as I'm leaving transition rather than standing at my rack. It's not much, but it's a few seconds doing something standing still that I should be able to do while moving.

Reality is that I'm just not good enough at the run, and I certainly don't enjoy it. An 8 min/mile pace is a good goal for me in a tri, and that's just not very good when the people around me are running 6:30s and 7:00s. Marsha Morton, a lady who wins a lot of the races for the women, has been right ahead of me in a couple races this year, she's a great runner. She's one that I passed on the bike, knowing she would catch me on the run, but hoping I could stay close enough to her to finish ahead of her overall. She caught me about 4 minutes into my run, so I tried to stay as close to her as I could. The 17 year old swimmer was the same way, he caught me with about a mile to go, and I tried to stay close to him. Both of those started ahead of me in the swim, but I didn't know by how much. At that point I didn't think I could stay close enough to either one to finish ahead of them overall. Then when I had about 3/4 mile or so to go, I met Jeff Wade, who I talked about earlier, on his way out. He is also better than me on the run, and knew he was gaining on me because he started behind me in the pool. I just pushed as hard as I could, then picked up the pace the last couple hundred yards to the finish. Felt like I gave it all I had, but wasn't sure it would be enough.

Not leave my gel in transition.
Keep practicing/improving on the run.

Water on the head, water down the throat, try to catch my breath and cool off. Was really happy with my time, beat my goal, and felt like I had a chance to be top 3 in Masters. Eventually found out I was 7th overall, 6th overall male, and 2nd masters. I ended up finishing 17 seconds ahead of Marsha (2nd overall female), 29 seconds ahead of Jeff (3rd overall masters), and 2 1/2 minutes ahead of Taylor, the 17 yr old swimmer. My philosophy on triathlons is that I'm racing against myself and the clock, so I can't beat other people so to speak, but I can use them as benchmarks to compare myself, especially from year-to-year and race-to-race. To even be in the same range as people like Marsha and Jeff Wade is quite an accomplishment for me, and the shorter run certainly works to my advantage.


My running ability, and maybe having the gel for the run would have given me a few seconds of extra burst.

I beat my goal by a minute, and I'm extremely happy with that. I think I did about as good as I could. I haven't really had a "bad" race this year, and feel like I've done about as well as I could most races.


Smaller turnout this year, but another good race. The course was well marked, lots of volunteers, and another good job by Kevin and crew.