Mullet Man Triathlon - Triathlon

I knew days in advance it was going to be cold. Living in south Alabama I've never needed a wetsuit but now was the time I would need one. I have a surfing wetsuit that would take an eternity to get off in T1 or I could use my 2mm wetsuit top, and it worked out ok.

I don't have a problem with open water swimming but the cold got to me on this one. I hate cold water, I've known this for years. I couldn't get in my groove until about the 1/2 way mark. My breathing was off and I seemed to be going really slow. Also, I think the course may have been a little long. My wetsuit top held a lot of water in it and slowed me down. I started to get cold around the 3/4 mark. I was nervous about the wetsuit top beging too cold, but it wasn't unbearable. It did save some time in transition because I took it off while running on the beach between the swim and T1.

The only problem with T1 was the gravel. There are few things I hate more than rocks in my shoes when biking or running and I had plenty for both. I also put a long sleeve shirt on because I thought I would be cold. I never got cold and shouldn't have put the shirt on.

Go faster!

The bike course was nice and flat. There is one bridge you have to climb on the way out and again on the way back. The only problem was the NNE winds. It made for a lttle tailwind on the way out with the ocassional crosswind. After the turnaround It was a headwind with some crosswinds which doesn't work out well with deep carbon wheels. I drank ~16 ounces of perform for the bike which was my only nutrition for the whole race and I felt fine throughout. Overall I felt good on the bike and passed a lot of people.

They did have cops at the major intersections blocking traffic and at the turnaround. I rode 90% of the route in the road instead of the bike lane because there were regular runners/cyclists out.

Not much I would change. It was my first time racing with aero wheels and an aero helmet and I feel like they helped me.

Not much to report here. Everything was fairly smooth. There was more running on gravel and jumping over a puddle which was less than ideal. I somehow managed to hit my foot on the plastic matts they had in transition, which bruised later in the evening. I could have gone faster though.

Go faster!

The only good thing about the cold air temps and wind from earlier in the morning is that I never got too hot on the run. I felt strong the whole time. I passed a lot more people on the run. I've been running a lot all winter and feel like it's finally paying off. I never stopped to drink, but never felt I needed to with the lower temps. I haven't done many hard bricks this year in training so the pace was better than I expected.

I'm happy with the run. The 2nd place guy was 18 seconds behind me. I looked behind me when I was getting towards the finish and didn't see anyone so I continued at the same pace through the finish line.

Drank some water and walked around. After waiting for my friend to finish I had a few bushwackers and would definitely recommend them. The post race food was also very good.


Cold water, and a headwind/crosswinds on the way back on the bike.


Overall it was good. It's a low-key race. There were no emails leading up to the race which was kinda off and made me question if I actually registered. There isn't a lot of info leading up to the start. No national anthem or announcements. Before the race we were standing around and I quietly heard someone say "ready" "set" "GO" which kinda threw me off.