I decided to start in front from the shortest distance to the first bouy, which put me in the middle of where everyone (with the fast swimmers) wanted to be. In the past, I would start to the far left or right and swim the extra yardage, take a wide turn and stay away from the action. It was a good decision as I wasn't in the rough housing. I had a couple people tapping my leg the first 100 yards but after that things start to settle down, but never found a leg to draft from, I keep a good pace and didn't want to blow up on the swim.

As I got closer to the shore about knee deep, I stood up and took my wetsuit off. I had practiced a couple of transition changes and had come to the conclusion that taking my wetsuit off at the shore or using a wetsuit stripper (no wetsuit stripper today) was faster and less stressful than running to T1 and taking it off there.


Pace swim. I can swim faster than what I did.

With WS off running into T1 it was easy on my legs. Got into T1 and dropped my suit, got my glasses on, helmet on, shoe on and grab my bike and I was off. Fastest T1 time in division.

Nothing. It was a good transition.

My plans was stay in the small gear up front and keep my cadence around 80-90 and see what speed that would be. As soon as I started pedaling my computer wasn't registering any cadence count on it. I was disappointed in myself for not checking on that. I went to plan B and just race & watched how fast I was going. There was no headwind or tail wind (at least I didn't notice it). It was nice day to ride. One thing I noticed was I didn't get passed as much as I usually do, in fact I passed several people as well. I got to the hill and expected tons of racers to pass me, but I only counted two that did. I got to the turn around and went into the big gear up front and started to pass some people. Since I know this course and been down the hill many of times, I flew down as fast as I could go and ended up passing a couple more racers that were riding the brakes down the hill. With 1/2 mile to go, I easily upped my pace a little. There were a group of riders bunched up together and I didn't want to use up my energy to pass them.

As I made the last turn up to T2, I felt good, my legs felt good and I wasn't winded or tired. I decided to take my feet out of my shoes and attempt a dismount without them.


Maybe start with the big gear. I dont want to second guess myself, but I felt I had more to give. Maybe go out faster?

With my decision to ride the last section with my feet on top of shoes, I was a little worried I wouldn't have a leg to catch myself or I would fall in front of everyone. It ended up working out great. I got to the dismount line, flew off the bike and ran into T2. Unfortunately I got confused where my rack was, but I was able to regroup and found it and didn't take too much time off.

Racked bike, took helmet off, socks on, shoes on, and grabbe visor, race belt, & watch.

Fastest T2 time in division

Remember where my rack is located!

I flew into T2 and I was out fast. Naturally I was winded coming out of T2. I used the beginning of the run to get my watch, visor, race belt on and get my legs going. I did forget to take my other half bottle of EFS shot out of my bag to have on the run to hydrate. I don’t know if that would have helped any? My goal here was to have a 10-minute mile pace. The nice part of the run coming out of T2, it’s a nice downhill run that flattens out before an incline at mile 1. Two aid stations (3/4 mile into the run & on the way back). I was holding a 9:45 pace, but my legs just couldn’t get faster.

I got to the 1st aid station and grab a cup of water, took a sip and poured the rest on myself. It started to warm up, but with less than 2 mile to go, it wasn’t a major issue. The incline section slowed me down a little, but it also got me closer to the half way mark. As I was heading back, I saw a racer in my division that I knew was always in the running for the podium. At that point I may have been ahead by 40 seconds. I picked up the pace a little and continued running hoping for the best. I got to the last aid station and was right behind a racer. I wasn’t sure if I wanted anything so close to the end, but at the last minute told my self, what the hell at least get a cup to cool myself. As I was running behind that runner all of the volunteers had Gatorade in there hands, BUT the last volunteer hand water. I pointed to her that I wanted water and the runner in front of me took her last two cups. I was mad, but I told myself “I’ll be done in a couple of minutes”. It was than that the guy in my division passed me. I tried to stay up with him, but his pace was much faster than mine. I continued to be positive as I know would be close to my run goal time and that it was possible that I would be in second or third place.

The last section into sand hollow parking was a downhill, now an incline. With the crowd cheering I flew up that section without feeling the pain. With two hundred yards to go, the crowd started cheering again and the PA guys yelled that I better pick the pace up as two guys were coming up fast behind me. I took a quick glance and sure enough I had to sprint the last hundred yards to hold them off.


Dont forgot EFS bottle in my bag. Run more.

I walked around and poured ice water on myself. I had a chocalate milk and banana to eat.


I can honesty say I'm no longer afraid of this distance. I PR'd on my run, my swim & bike time stayed the same. However my conditioning especially on the swim & bike had a big effect on my performance on the run. It was definately a race and not just a finish the distance kind of race.


I went to check the run results and its showed that I was 8th in my division (Clyde). However, it wasn't separated between the 39 and under & 40 and better. I was later told they would separate them and I was in 8th place out of 36. I was placed 8th hoping out of the 7 ahead of me maybe one or two were older than 40. It ended up two were over 40 and that put me in 3rd place.