New England Season Opener - TriathlonSprint

A lot of fast swimmers in the Newbie ladies group - I was surprised. Didn't get whacked too much, but was swimming cautiously since I feared getting beaned on the head by the kayaker who drifted into swimmers in the earlier waves and who was immediately to my right. Nearly hit the first buoy head on, aspirated a lot of water on the last 50. Made it in on the toes of Mav. Felt like I could have over taken some of the ladies ahead of me with a longer course, but glad I made it in the top 10 of the wave.

Nutrition before swim. Realized I was feeling a little sluggish right before the start and not paying attention to how much time flew since I last ate. Take advantage of my Sherpa (could be the last time I race and he doesn't) and make him carry my boots.

Numb feet killed running out on rocks, got into transition and chatted with my neighbors while trying to shiver out of the wetsuit. Came off easier than before, but still a struggle at the bottom as I had to lean on my bike, then my neighbors to the right to keep from falling. Pam helped, but not as much as on my run through since I had to keep getting back into the water to stay warm. Neighbor to my left said I was flying on the swim, but she ended up leaving T1 at before me cause I was not flying there. Hands too shaky to get bike gloves on so ditched em. Freaked out for a moment cause I couldn't find my socks! I forgot that I stuffed them in my sneaks.

Actually get my transition run-thru in that I said I would do. Socks in bike shoes. Try gels since the gummy packages were too hard to open and pull pieces out of. Original plan of having my snowboarding socks if I felt like I needed them, which I DEFINITELY DID. Another item I shouldn't have second guessed myself about being over-prepared.

Feet were TOTALLY FROZEN for the entire ride. They were so much like useless blocks of ice that I couldn't clip in on my second foot for the first several minutes because I couldn't feel anything. I don't think I was comfortable with how my feet were feeling on the bike until close to mile 8 -- it was terribly annoying and the lack of feeling made it near to impossible to stand on hills as I had no balance on them.

Another hard part for me were the sharp turns - I was tentative and lost a lot of speed on the first couple, then just when I was getting the hang of it, I got stuck behind Yellow Shirt. She was worse than me-- slamming on the brakes and swinging wide... I had to nearly stop twice to avoid slamming into her or swinging into traffic, she was such a road block. Also a super pain to pass as she was erratic-- not biking straight and not keeping a constant speed. Never did get past her cause I suck on the uphill, but I also didn't mind keeping my distance from her.

Had a few nice exchanges with some other bikers - what a nice crowd! And as I passed the Boston Marathon start, I thought to myself, "At least I'm not so crazy as to try to run a marathon... yet!" and smiled.

Had a hard time drinking on the bike, first because I haven't done it enough on this bike and second because I was trying to keep my balance in the wind.

Avg pace looks like it sucks, but really is not that bad when I check out other seasoned biker times in comparison. Hit every single gear on the course.

More hill work, work on sharp turns, practicing drinking on the bike. Warmer socks!

Being in the Newbie area was slightly annoying in that there was crap everywhere. My sneaks were buried under someone else's tupperware box lid, I racked my back wheel over someone else's jacket that was stuck in the groove on the other side and made it hard to shove it in there. I wasn't super organized, but I didn't feel like I was in anyone else's space. Feet still frustratingly frozen. Tried warming them with my hands a bit. No dice. Uncoordinated and had a hard time swapping into running shirt. Made sure all my stuff was in my area before I left. Took some Honey Stingers and a little water and went.

Gels. Trying to chew and start running uphill proved difficult. Leave sticky notes with passive aggressive messages for the offending neighbors. Heh, just kidding.

Run sucked. This is arguably the worst 5k run I have ever done. My legs were jello pops after the ride. Frozen at first, then no integrity once they warmed up. My feet were still totally numb until close to mile 2 and was terribly frustrating that I couldn't do anything about it. Running on the grass seemed to sap a lot more energy, I got a mouthful of sand running along the first beach to the right and lost my hat twice. The second time I lost my hat I turned to try to catch it off my head and felt a weird extreme pinching in my knee. Didn't hurt later, but had a brief silent scream to myself and moved on. Pretty much hated the run altogether. My legs were totally non-responsive. Decided to take the opportunity to enjoy the scenery and thank all the super energetic volunteers along the way.

Ditch the hat so I don't have to go chasing it. Get new feet... alternately get foot warmers or something. Those warms socks again were a great idea before I second guessed myself. Stop to stretch at water or stretch during transition.

Guzzle the drink given out by Max Performance at the end to make room in the water bottle for post-race beverage brought by FriendofHarpoon and RedSoxChick. Stretched a bit while listening to awards.


Cold feet. Literally. Should've listened to my gut about my 'extra items' that would have helped keep me warmer. I still believe that I would have been happier about my performance if the swim were the full distance. I know I would have put a little more time between me and the rest of the field on the swim since I was feeling like I was barely getting into my stroke on the return, and I know that it takes me a while to get blood flow back to my feet with my sh!tty circulation and more time in the cold water would have helped me do that.

Little training on hills.


Good, pretty and challenging course. Well organized event.

I know some folks were upset about the delay, but I think Max did the best they could. They made the attempt to keep the swim course the same and if they hadn't folks would probably complain that they jumped the gun on cutting the swim short - they decided based on their previous experience to take the chance to try to fix it and unfortunately, that didn't work out. C'est la vie. Once the delay was announced it would have been best to focus on staying warm rather than milling about on the beach the whole time, but that's what racers chose to do - me included.

I wish I did better than I had all around, especially on the run, but now that all the first-timer anxiety is gone, I can not second-guess myself in my preparation, not be so scattered in transition, and train on my weak areas. I was really glad to have this one as my first - a beautiful day, really nice folks racing, organizing, volunteering and spectating along the challenging and very pretty course that had certainly greened-up a bit since I last trained there. Overall, a pretty awesome day that I was psyched to share with some other BTers.