The Tri2 Remember Triathlon - TriathlonSprint

Having never done a Tri before and being a poor swimmer, I was most apprehensive of my swim performance. I knew I'd finish, but I wasn't sure how I would do all around in the swim. Overall, in the end, I was just glad to be done with that part. Initially, my heart raced (as I expected it would), but after probably 100 yards I settled into my slow sidestroke and got more comfortable (although I continued to swallow more fish water than I would have liked). Sometime before rounding the first bouy, I heard the next wave start and here they came. I think they caught me by about the 200 meter mark. Since I knew I was 'slower' and I was using a scissor kick, I waited near the back of my wave to start. I checked the watch and 30+ seconds had passed before I got in the water, even so, my time was about a minute slower than it should have been.

Need to work on becoming a better swimmer and start training with the crawl stroke. This being my first and only having about 5 weeks to work on my swimming, I decided to just use the sidestroke. This winter, I'll work on my crawl and hope to get this near 12 minute time down 3 or 4 minutes.

First Tri and had not done any transition practice, so I was just hoping for something under 2:30. So, I'm happy. No wetsuit, cap and goggles off on the run from water to transition area, socks and shoes on, sweatband and helmet on, took about 5 seconds to collect myself and drink some G2, grabbed the bike and go. My plan was to use socks (which I did), but it was senseless due to all the rain - everything was wet from the get go. Don't believe I could shave much more time from this.

Not much, maybe forget the socks.

Started off feeling strong, never really got a feel for the pace, just went as hard as I could. I had grabbed my sunglasses in T1 - big mistake. The rain made them wet, fogged and useless. I had to hold them the whole ride. On that second hill (the brutal one) it crossed my mind whether or not I would make it to the top, but I did. I am riding a 20+ year old 12 speed road bike that was nothing special to start with. I could really tell on those climbs when those newer, lighter bikes would pass me. But I usually kept up pretty well or even passed some on the downhills & flats.

Need to train more for the bike. Need a better bike. Forget the sunglasses when it's overcast and raining.

I don't have clipless bike pedals so I basically hopped off the bike, ran into transition, racked the bike, tossed off the helmet and ran out.

Running out of transition, of course I could really get my legs under me. And then to add to my troubles, I started having some asthmatic breathing response (wheezing) that started to concern me. I pushed through it and after about 1/2 mile I started feeling better. Ran pretty strong. I was afraid to blow it near the end, so I didn't push as hard as hard in the last 1/2 mile as I probably could have.

Leave it all on the course in the last half mile.

Walk, some stretching.


Need to lose about 15 more lbs. Need a better bike. Need to become a better swimmer.


I had a blast. I was hoping to get at or under 1:30 total, so I was really pleased with 1:23.