XTERRA - Fort Yargo

In April 2008, I signed up for my first triathlon. It was for the Fort. Yargo Tri.

Very fun race. The mass start wasn't bad. I think there was a total of 170 triathletes.

The swim wasn't bad...it seemed looooong, but then again, it was my first tri (with 2 weeks of swim training prior to that). I was dead last out of the water with a flotilla of kayaks behind me.

The bike was the funnest part of the whole tri. Since I was dead last out of the water, I didn't have to fight for position on the trail until 3/4 through. There are some places along that trail where you can absolutely FLY! There are also some places where you have to be pretty strong or be good at jumping off your bike and running up some hills.

The run was around the lake and it was good. Not really all that bad, with just a few places you had to run up steep hills.

Since this was my first tri, I hope to do it again...maybe this spring.

I've done this race twice and it's a good race to test Xterra racing. Compared to some of the other Xterra triathlons I've heard this one is pretty tame. You can read both of my race reports if you're interested. That being said, I'm skipping this year.

I have no idea what kind of mountain biking background you have but I would ride trails at least once, probably twice, a week in the months leading up to the race. MOST of the trail is not very technical but there is a new part they added last year, the Monster Mile, that is definitely more technical. (think intermediate/advanced trails at Chicopee)