Kansas City Triathlon - TriathlonSprint

tough swim, it was a mass start and I started at the front toward the inside. I made some tactical errors and backed down too quickly when contact was made, should've just HTFU'd and swam. Eventually worked my way to clear water on the outside and made back a lot of the spots I gave up at the start. Didn't sight real well either. There was a 100 or 200 yard run from the beach to the timing mat so my pace actually wasn't that bad. On the bright side, after the start cleared up it was a pretty good swim.

need more swim confidence, I've got some stroke problems that give me occasional shoulder pain, whenever that happens I'll stay out of the pool for several days or a week. fix stroke so I can swim more, more focused swim warmup so I'm ready to rumble when the cannon goes off.

long run from entrance to exit, put on socks and bike shoes due to blisters. Little slow getting wetsuit off, it didn't stick I just didn't pull my feet out far enough or step on the leg close enough. Put Garmin on wrist.

practice getting out of wetsuit and flying mount with shoes on bike. Also watch out for blisters and take care of them early so they don't get so bad. Look into alternative mounts for the 305, maybe velcro so it can be on the bike and swapped to wrist easily, I like the HR and pace data it gives but time in transition is time on the clock. Really I just need to approach transitions with a sense of urgency and get out on the bike.

great bike course, started hard and hit 170 bpm on the rolling hills within the first mile, settled down to a more sustainable low 160's. Lots of traffic from the Olympic, especially through the technical section on the campus and neighborhood. Fought an unsettled stomach the whole way from taking in too much lake water. Drank 2 bottles of water on the bike.

not much, drink less of the lake during the swim.

First time ever that I've actually blazed through a transition. Had socks on from T1, pulled feet out of shoes before dismount and ran in socks to rack.

spot on end of rack would have shaved a couple mroe seconds and I should unbuckle helmet while running with bike.

Once we got on the park road I could see 5 guys within a few hundred yards ahead of me. I reeled 2 of them in within the first 1/2 to 3/4 mile, the 3rd guy stayed 50-100 yards ahead of me the whole run, and the other 2 were out of sight by 1 mile. I definately noticed the heat.

Not much, other than more training. Pacing could probably be improved a little, after passing the 2 guys in the first mile and not making much visible ground on the next guy I let the pace and effort slide from about mile 1 to 1.5, HR dropped to 158.

stretched, jogged, ate, drank, and chatted.


poor swim start and T1. Hip didn't bother me at all during race and still feels fine.


First year for event but they pulled it off very well. I was told transition racks were numbered so I arrived at 6:15 but with family rather than driving separately and arriving at 5am. Surprise, transition is first come, first served, but there really were no bad spots with the flow through layout. Would've liked a bit more communication, i.e. site map with parking but I everything about the event was well run, I'll be back next year. Really liked the mass start, it's nice knowing that you're racing someone, not 5 minutes up or 5 minutes back.