Cactus Challenge - TriathlonOlympic

Water temp was perfect at 67 degrees for a wet suit swim. However, the distance from the swim finish to T1 is too long to run in a wetsuit so I took off the suit right after the swim exit and ran the remaining 250 yards to T1. The race started an HOUR late due to no show lifeguards and general disorganization by 3D racing. They changed the wave start order and had no volunteers to help the Sprint finishers out of the water so some of the Olympic racers got in the water on the boat ramp and helped the Sprint racers out. Having the wetsuit on for an hour in the sun and helping racers out of water tired me out a bit and threw-off my nutrition timing. That said, I had a decent swim and felt great the whole way and even had some left to bring it in strong the last 100 yards.

Not sure, what happened was out of my control.

Long run uphill to T1 was cause for 5 minute transition. Also had alot of stickers in the grass. Definately need shoes/flip flops.

Use running shoes from Swim finish to T1 instead of sandles.

Hard bike course and bad roads. I struggled to get going with all the rolling hills and the big climbs, especially with my 235lbs dragging on the bike.

Lose 50lbs and train in the mountains!

Took time off bike to stretch quads and drink.

Hydrate more on bike.

I didn't have anything left in my legs after the bike and partly due to not enough time for recovery and retraining after the Marathon in February. I couldn't get into a pace with all the uphills and undulating surfaces.

Hill training and maybe add more weight traing to the legs.

Stretch, hydrate and jump in lake.


Not enough recovery time after Marathon and then enough time to peak into this race. It's just too early in the season and too hard. Still, I improved my best Olympic distance time by 12 minutes (2004 Cap Tex/Americas Tri) and by 15 minutes on my 1st Olympic (2004 St. Anthony's).


I wound'nt do this race again and don't think many others who did it in 2005 would as well. It's not USAT sactioned (they lost their license due to issues with following USAT rules). The race coordination, course prep, volunteer coordination and general treatment by the racing company (3D Productions) was not what we expect in Austin. They are from out of town and seemed to have come to town and ignored the locals as they tried to milk the triathlon community for as much profit as they could take. The race shirts were terrible and severly too small unless you were 5'2" and 95 lbs. I tried to exchange my shirt and the race director told me it was too bad! What? I paid money for this and that's the answer that I got. Good luck 3D, you won't get me in a race of yours again.