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 Swim
Comments: Holy cr@p was that a difficult swim! In previous years doing this race, once you got out to the bouy, the water was calm enough that you could get some kind of stroke going. This year, it felt like the waves were still crashing on top of you. I was not able to do anything that resembled swimming. Anytime I tried to get horizontal and start swimming, I'd get a mouth and nose full of salt water. Just kept plugging along. Based on the fact that my rank was 268 out of 380, I guess I had more trouble than most. I felt like I was standing still. Kept paddling along, but the bouy wasn't getting any closer. When I finally turned the corner and started heading into shore, I inhaled another big gulp of nasty salt water. As soon as I was able to touch the bottom, I stood up and heaved. Coming out of the water I was completely spent and dizzy. My wife was cheering me on and that picked me up big time. I got my bearings and HTFU'd. This year's swim was 5 minutes slower than last year's. Awful... just awful. What would you do differently?: Here's a few thoughts... - Do the duathlon instead of the triathlon - Find a different race - Practice ocean swimming (an impossibility) - Wear a SCUBA tank - Who knows...Train harder I guess  Transition 1
Comments: I was still feeling like a boxer that just got his bell rung. My wife videotaped my T1 and it looked like I was taking my sweet ole' time. It took me 30 seconds to put my freaking Garmin on... and then I fogot to turn the stupid thing on when I started the bike. SHEESH! So T1 was about a minute longer than I would have hoped. But my wife was cheering me on and the guy in transition next to me and I both cursed the swim, so my spirits started to lift a bit. The swim was behind me, time to GOOOO! What would you do differently?: HTFU  Bike
Comments: As soon as I was on the bike, I was feeling much better. Drank a bunch of water and gatorade from my areo bottle and started picking off riders one by one. The course was short, so there was no reason to hold anything back. I'd estimate I passed 30-40 riders and didn't get passed once. Felt great on the bike. Was very psyched pulling into T2. What would you do differently?: Nothing... killed it. First race ever in which I averaged over 20mph. Transition 2
Comments: This was much better than T1, but still could have been :20 or so faster. My feet were still numb from the swim, so I had a little trouble getting my shoes on. What would you do differently?: HTFU  Run
Comments: Had trouble getting my legs under me in the beginning. The first mile was a struggle and my HR was way high. Probably because I pushed the bike so hard. But I kept plugging away even though I was tempted to walk once or twice. After the first mile or so, I started to feel better. At about the 1.5 mile mark, there were kids handing out water and offering a spray down with the hose... gladly accepted both and that energized me. Felt like I picked up the pace significantly the 2nd half of the race and left everything I had out on the course. Sprinted the last couple hundred yards. At least in my head it felt like sprinting, but what my wife videotaped looked more like an "old man sprint". It t'warnt purty. But I was very happy with the effort I put in and 9 min/mi is a pretty good pace for me, but I was surprised by how low my rank was in the grand scheme of things... must be some fast runners out there. What would you do differently?: Plain and simple... more training and more sprint intervals. Also, lose some more weight. Post race
Warm down: Walked around, chatted with my wife and a few other athletes. Met up with a couple friends that ran in the duathlon. Wife and I went and had an ENORMOUS breakfast, watched some of the awards and then went for a walk on the beach and the boardwalk. It was nice that we had overnight babysitters so we could combined the triathlon with a date night. Overall, I'd have to say I'm happy about how I performed. The swim sucked, but I've always said that the swim in this race is more about survival and less about swimming. Not 100% sure if I'll be back next year. The race is pretty well organized and the timing is great to start off the season, but the swim kills me every year. May look for an alternative. What limited your ability to perform faster: Um, the swim maybe? Event comments: There should have been more rescue craft out in the water... there were only 2 and this swim is brutal. The timing of this race is great and it's a nice way to start the summer and the triathlon season, but I may pass next year because the ocean swim this early in the season is too tough for my liking. It's just not fun. Profile Album Last updated: 2009-11-09 12:00 AM
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United States
Piranha Sports
65F / 18C
Overcast
Overall Rank = 199/380
Age Group = Clydesdale
Age Group Rank = 16/41
My wife and I got down to Sea Isle the night before the race so I could pick up my packet. We walked around the race area and then went to dinner. We were both starving becuase it took about 3 1/2 hours to get to Sea Isle due to holiday shore traffic. After dinner, we checked into the hotel and it was an early night. Slept reasonably well and got up at 5:20am and headed to the race.
We had gotten quite a bit of rain overnight, so the ocean was pretty rough. The event organizers were having trouble locating the swim bouys and many people in the transition area were thinking the swim might be cancelled. They then announced that the swim was still on and we all continued our preparations. Chatted with some other racers, drank some water, ate a banana an tried to relax.
Got down to the beach and put my feet in the water. Holy *$^*#@! that's cold! Oh well, nothing I can do about that. Got in the water and tried to get used to the temp. I don't own a full-sleeve wetsuit, so my arms were numb right from the start. Got out of the water, did some stretching and tried to keep positive thoughts in my head. I'm a nervous open water swimmer to start with, but the ocean was looking pretty rough.
I was in the 4th wave and in the 3 waves that went off before me, no less than 5 swimmers were pulled out by the rescue boat in each wave. That made me pretty nervous, but I just kept thinking about my training and that fact that I've done this same swim twice before.