Los Angeles Triathlon - TriathlonOlympic

Normally I kick butt in the swim, but this time I wasn't feeling it. It was the one part of the workout that I thought I was prepared for, but for whatever reason didn't bring my "A" game. Last year my time was 36:44, so I dropped nearly nine minutes. I'm very happy about that.

I need to do more open water swims leading up to the race. I thought I had enough experience to get me through it, but it was clear that something was missing.

Last year I had a 3:39 transition. Shaved a minute here. I still think it was too long.

I have to just practice tranitions and peeling the wetsuit off. Looking at other times, I think I should be able to shave another 30 seconds.

I knew the ride would be the weekest part of this race for me. I have maybe ridden a half dozen times since Ralph's and I knew I had to take it easy. Not only did I know I didn't have the strength and endurance for a hard bike, but I also knew that in practically every race I've done, I've blown my legs out on the bike by going to hard. So this time I kicked back, enjoyed the ride, and went at a moderate pace. Oddly, I still shaved five minutes off of last years pace.

Get in some more bike workouts :)

This transition was much better than last years as far as the organizers having their shit together. This is a point to point race, so you don't know where the staff will put your bag. Well this year they had people point out your run gear so that you didn't have to find it. This would have been a faster transition, but I had to pee, so I think half of this time was spent in the port-a-potty.

Nothing, this was smooth.

I loved this run. I had save my legs and was having the best run of all my races. My pace this year was 8:21 and my pace last year was 12:33. That's over a four minute improvement. I'm VERY happy about that.

I should have put socks on. I hadn't finished breaking in the pair of shoes I was wearing (I had worn them for only about two weeks) and as a result the last mile started bleeding in my shoes.

Lack of training. I gave a good month of training to this race, and it was almost all swimming and running. I should have done more time on the bike. I knew this would be my limiter, but it would seem that I had enough fitness left over from Ralph's to keep me going. The sad thing for me was that I didn't leave it all out on the course. I cam in, thinking I should have ran faster.


They really fixed some things about this race that were annoying. One thing they didn't fix which was VERY annoying is not having bathrooms in the T1 area. There is nothing more annoying than having to stand in huge twenty minute line with spectators thirty minutes before the race to go to the bathroom. Don't need that stress. FIX IT!!!