Morgan Hill Sprint Triathlon at Uvas Reservoir - TriathlonSprint

This was a point to point course, but there was a zig-zag in there. At first I was swimming toward a buoy out the right of me, then I see one on the left. WTF!? Where we supposed to swim!? 3 other girls I was near, we all stop and looked at the buoys, and we all asked eachother "which one are we supposed to go around?" Most people were swimming to the far one, but some were going to closer one...ugg...we all swam toward the far one, but there were girls in my wave that went to the closer one. So whatever my swim rank is, I have to be higher on it, because I know not all of them went around the correct buoy!

The good news...I passed some people on the swim, granted 2 of them were doing the back-stroke, but I still passed them! I also passed a few people in the waves in front of me that were swimming free-style, yay!

Sang a few random songs in my head and was excited to get out of the water. I enjoy swimming, but I HATE SWIMMING IN MY WETSUIT! Wound up drafting a bit from a people who passed me from the waves the started after mine.

Check the swim course map

I have finally figured out why my helmet always looks 2 big for me...it's my ponytail placement! If it's too high the helmet does not sit well on my head. So I took took the elastic out and re-did the ponytail in transition. Everything else went well, but this caused me to have a S-L-O-W transition

Figure out proper ponytail placement prior to the start of the race.

Still did not have my race mojo, and my quads were tight almost from the start of the bike portion. The course had a bunch of rollers and few tight turns. The bummer was that most of the tight turns were after a nice downhill, so I had to break considerably to make the turns.

I passed a few people along the way and then hit mile 11...I was dreading this section because I had read that this was a steep half mile climb. Mix that with tight quads and it's quite a party! Turns out the climb was not as horrible as I had expected. I saw 4 people get off of their bikes and walk up the hill. Part of me really wanted to do that, hell part of me really did not even want to continue on with the race. Like I said, mentally I was just out of it today.

Crested the hill and was rewarded by and awesome downhill, I think I hit 35 MPH! Finished with a few more rollers and headed to T2.

Not ride the day before a race? But I really wanted to do this race on tired legs to test myself and see what my body was capable of.

No problems here. Pony-tail was a non-issue :) Slow T2 for me, not sure what the heck I was doing in there!

Flash the spectators as I exit T2? They should have some reward for standing in 97 degree heat, right?

Despite my tight quads on the bike, my run felt pretty good. There are a lot of fast runners out there, I was passed, as usual. But I did some passing of my own! YAY! I picked off a few girls in my AG, which made me happy.

It's a straight out 2.5 miles and back. On my way out, right before the turn-around I realized "sh-t, this is about how far I swim for IM! I''m no swimmer, why the heck do I want to swim 2.4 miles?" Yep, I'm constantly thinking about my IMs.

Anyway, stayed with my HIM strategy, walk the aid stations to hydrate. It seemed to works well for me. At the half mark on the run, I realized that I could probably meet my goal of going 2:15 on the course and was pumped. Not much shade on the course, which was tough in 97 degrees (good training for IMKY). At mile 3 I started to feel the start of a possible bonk, I immediately grabbed a GU and felt better. At mile 4 I looked at my watch and thought I could go sub-2:15!

During that last mile I was really hot and legs were starting to not feel too great. So I pictured myself getting a leg transplant! Literally, I imagined, getting brand new, fresh legs for the last mile. I was able to push a bit more and went for an all out sprint with a girl in front of me at the finish line! The announced yelled "oh here comes a battle of the ladies!" Too funny, we wound up crossing together, I think. I tapped her on the should and said, "nice race."

This was a good run for me, no complaints.

Walked around a bit and ate.


Tight quads


This was a good race for me. Mentally I was not there and my body was a bit sore, but I would up exceeding my goal of 2:15.

Plus Macca (pic below) and Lieto were there! How often can you race a sprint with the pros!