Craven-Genki Triathlon at Pike lake - TriathlonOlympic

This was one of my slowest swims. My sighting was terrible, but it was not because of lack of buoys. Ugh. Lack of swim practice and speed drills left me very flat on this swim. Not finding someone to draft off of didn't help.

I need to swim longer in the pool and do more speed drills.

Because of the honking big timing chip, this was the first time I had trouble getting my wetsuit off. I was dizzy coming out of the swim and had an extremely difficult time getting my wetsuit off. I almost pulled a muscle doing so. The big timing chips are not liked. Helmet, glasses and race belt went on quick, though.

Ask that we go back to smaller timing chips that work as well under the wetsuit.

I worked too hard on this bike. I felt slow. I haven't had the kind of bike training time due to my Scottish trip, so I figured I'd be a bit slow this year.

Get more bike training in.

I got my shoes on a little slower than normal, but they are relatively new and I just put the speed laces on. Otherwise, I felt that this was a really quick transition for me.

Practice with the shoes a bit. Practice taking off bike shoes or learn to do it on the bike. I may ask one of the Junior elites to practice this with me.

This is where my Scottish Run Across the Highland really helped. This run was less work than any other year. My interval training and high volume through Scotland, not to mention the hills there, left me with extremely good run strength.

My last lap I had to calm myself down a couple of times because I could tell that I was strong in 2nd place for the Women's Overall. I didn't put on a huge burst of speed for the end of the run because there was no one behind me, and I already knew I wasn't going to catch up with the first women.

I took it at a good pace, not too easy, but was able to enjoy the run and the people cheering me on.

Nothing, except go to Scotland every year to run across the country! Or Wales, as my runs there were particularly hilly and hard.

I stood around and talked to a lot of people post-race and waited for all my friends to finish. When Crystal got in, we stood in the lake to cool our legs a bit, then we showered.


I should have done longer swims and bikes and more speed training in those areas. Ask STAC to never use those stupid large timing chips again.


Finishing 1st in my age group and 2nd Female Overall for the Standard Distance made this a very special event for me. The organization was fantastic and the race package jerseys totally rocked!!! The volunteers were fantastic, and I tried to say thank you to every volunteer I passed. I could hear a lot of people cheering me on, and I think there were a lot of JTI women out there as well. These cheers really gave me a great boost.