Anthem Holiday Classic - TriathlonSprint

I HAD A GOOD SWIM!!! Can you believe I am saying that???? Well, it was good for me! I decided to really push myself, and not be such a wimp. Take 2 breaths at the wall and push off. NO hanging on the wall, and NO getting all worked up in my head about it all. JUST DO IT! So I did! It helped that the pool was 4ft deep all the way (no super deep end to freak out over!) I actually passed 3 people!!! I felt good and had nothing to beat myself up over when I was done. That was something new!!! Swim time includes the run out of the pool and down a slipery grass hill to the T1 timing mat.

Well, I can always be faster...but that will come with time.

T1 went well EXCEPT....I took off running with my bike and jumped on (a good jumping mount if I do say so myself) HOWEVER....I mounted before I was supposed to. I was probably 10 feet away from the line. This chick come running out with her hands wailing screaming at me that I cannot mount my bike until the line! I was like Sorry!!!! I totally wasn't even thinking about where the line was and that I had to wait. The funning thing was Sterling (JSTTRI) was right there cheering me on. He must have thought "Stupid woman!!" Oh well...I will try to remember next time! :-) (See pic below for the action photo of all this)

Um....wait to mount my bike at the right spot!

The men's race was at 9 and they had nice, calm weather. We started at 11:30...right when the wind started to pick up. The little flags hanging over the pool were flying sideways!!! Nice. So this caused a nice headwind on most of the course. It sucked. This was the hardest bike I have done yet.

OMG!!! After the winds on the bike, I was toast. THEN the run was like 80% up hill. Right away it was up hill, and seemed like forever before you had any down hill. It just seemed that there was way more up than down. I felt like crap, and actually stopped to stretch my calves early on. It wasn't until the last mile that I felt good. Coming down the last stretch to the finish line I came up on these two girls. I was starting to take them, and one would not let me. I could tell she wanted to have a run down. So we just kept going neck and neck and finally, about 50 ft from the finish I took off. She took off too and I REALLY had to kick in the afterburners to beat her. BEEYOTCH! haha! Made for a fun finish as the crowd ate it up. I gave her a high 5 afterwards, so no hard feelings. (But I still beat her!) Haha!

I think the 2 weeks in a row of traveling did not help me. All I have been doing is eating. Blah.... Time to get back on the training pony and make it though the holidays without obtaining too much extra junk in my trunk!


The only BAD thing about this race is that this is how they get you organized for the swim. They yell out "Fast people start first, slow people in the back. Form a line and let's go." I'm like WTF????? So there I was towards the back. It started to all go down hill fast as bad swimmers were getting in the water too soon causing congestion and a total mess. The fact that I passed 3 people had more to do with them being bad than me being good. Other than this debacle, it was a good race. 7th in my AG out of 24. I'll take it!