Lake Havasu Triathlon - TriathlonOlympic

Matt and a swam side by side to the first bouy. I rounded it on the inside and he dropped behind me. The sun was still low in the sky and sighting becam every difficult. I realized a few min. later I was off course and had to try and get back into the main group. I didn't know where Matt was but he sights much better than I do, so I knwo I was in a spot of bother. Once I got into the channel, it's so narrow you can't go wrong. About half way down, I breathed to my right and there was Matt! I was back in it and felt much better. He dropped in behind me but didn't realize it was me. We had to navigate around backmarkers from the previous waves and he lost touch with me. I swam hard to the end and popped up and hit the beach justa as my watch rolled to 22min. I don't knw where the timing matt was, so I am just estimating my time but it was a good swim.

Don't know my T1 time, but it was uneventful. It's a long run to the mount line and I had me shoes clipped in so I could make good time. I got to the mount line and hoped on my bike. I was in both shoes within the first couple 100 yards prior to heading out to the main road.

Got on and into my shoes quickly and out on to the main road. It was about 3 miles down this road you had to make a right hand turn up into a local neighborhood. There were volunteers at the corner directing both Sprint and Olympic bikers to make the turn as well as a cop for traffic control. As I approached the corner, there were 3 other riders in front of me and I got a little anxious and moved to the inside as we began to turn. There was room, but I was forcing the issue when I shouldn't have. As the rider in front made the turn, I stayed closer to the curb...and my rear wheel caught a grove in the pavement where the asphalt met the concrete of the curbing and down I went on my right side. I was in a little bit of shock and then I felt the burning pain of road rash. I got up and the kids volunteering rushed over to help. I got up and they got my bike and I moved over on to the sidewalk. As I stood there thrying to see if I was ok, one of the kids was like, "DUDE!" I looked at the underside of my forearm and I was bleeding heavily from a deep cut. The cop came over and asked if I wanted a paramedic and after a few seconds looking at the cut, I said yes. I couldn't believe it. They took about 15 min to arrive as I stood there feeling sorry for my poor decision and watching everyone go by. That was a first and was very tough. The paramedics washed out my cut and wrapped me in a bandage. They said I would need to got to Urgent Care for stitches and a tetnus shot. I told them I would and checked out my bike to make sure it was rideable. I got back on my bike and rode slowly back to T1. I thought about it and realized if you are going to DNF, better like this than flatting out at the far end of the course as I wasn't carrying a spare. I was also very excited to see how Jamie did, this day would be all about her. :)

As I rode into T1, Jamie was walking to the car to get back to the hotel, check out, and get the dog's. When she saw me, her face said I wonder why he's going so slow! Ten she saw the bandage. I told her what happened and I went back into T1 to get my gear...and for the first time, turn in my timing chip.A lot of people came up to me and see if I was ok and it was great to have a lot of support from my friends in the tri community. It made me feel better and blessed to even be there. We drove over to Urgent Care where they took great care of me and patched me up.

Not be such an idiot. I had no business being where I was, I should have just sat up and cruised the corner nice and easy.

We returned to Transition after leaving Urgent Care and the Olympic race was winding down. I told my tale to everyone and we packed up our gear. Jamie decided she didn't want to wait for the 2:30 awards ceremony so we packed up the car and headed back to Phoenix.


Crashing my bike likely caused my poor performance!


I though about how fortunate I have been in all my races since getting into the sport, with results and races that have always gone my way. I thought about the 1000's of hours training without any serious injury and never having crashed in my bike. I knew it was just a matter of time and that I was due. I could wallow in self pity or learn from my mistake and move forward. I choose the later. I later saw the results and realized that I would have likely been 2nd overall had I managed to finish the race and that was tought to take, but I am so lucky to not have really hurt myself badly and I can get back at it and move forward to the more important races of this season, culminating in IMAZ and hopefully another trip to Kona. :)