Texas Man (Half) - Triathlon1/2 Ironman

The start was really screwed up. The handicap athlete was supposed to start 2min ahead of us and then we would go. But the announcer didn't know he was already out there. So they shot the gun off for him to go and about 30 people from our wave took off. I started to run out there but then hesitated and came back. Then he realized the handicap athlete was already out there and that they weren't getting the 30 people back. So he just said "1st wave go" and shot the gun off. This probably waisted about close to a minute. So I think my swim time was about a minute faster than what the official time said. When I got out of the water my watch said 35:##.

I had a super great swim. Since I never do swim training anymore, I was super happy with my time. I was calculating I was going to swim around 40min. I sure was glad it was wetsuit legal. I drafted a couple of times. On the way back into the beach, there was a guy that was going about my speed and he kept zig zagging right in front of me and I kept running into his legs. He must have been the worst sighter ever. He was really pissing me off. I was so close to grabbing his ankles and pulling him back. Also on the way out to the first buoy, I started hitting the bottom of the lake with my hands. After about 15 seconds of this I thought screw this, I'm gonna stand up and run. So I took a couple more strokes and then went to stand up and went strait under water. HAHAHA! Must have been a drop off. I just started laughing. I looked back behind me and there were people running. Must have been pretty funny to see people running in the middle of the lake.

Swim over the idiot that kept running into me.

T1 was ok. I thought I would give the strippers a try this year after a horrible experience in 2007. Well, needless to say, it didn't go well again. At least this time it was on a mat in the grass. They tried to pull it off and it just sticks so much. No matter how hard they try, they have a hell of a time stripping it off of me. I really gooped on the body glide too. I guess I just need a new wetsuit.

I threw my googles and wetuit on my bag, put my 2 Fuel belt bottles in my jersey, put my helmet on and took off.

Nothing

Had a decent bike. The first lap I was feeling great. I was really pushing it on the few flat parts and also on the hills. When I got to the halfway point I realized how off pace I was. I knew there was no way that I was going to hit my sub 5hr goal. The second lap wasn't that great. Wasn't really feeling motivated to really push myself, but still knew I needed to to PR. The sun started coming out and it was getting pretty humid. At the start of the second lap my chain popped off. That took about 30sec to put that back on. There wasn't much wind today, so that was a huge bonus. I calculated how far I was behind Drew on the second lap when I saw him at one of the turnarounds. At that point it was about 12min. I knew I was going to need a hell of a run to catch him. I also saw Chris Wong not to far behind me and knew I had to still pull out a decent bike because Chris is a pretty good runner.

Nutrition
45:00 - 8oz Ensure
1:00:00 - Salt cap
1:15:00 - Clif Shot
1:45:00 - 8oz Ensure
2:00:00 - Salt cap
2:15:00 - Clif Shot
Gatorade Endurance in aerodrink.
One water bottle in cage. Threw out bottle at handup and replaced with another water bottle.

Try to keep myself motivated for the second lap.

Came into my transition and the guy next to me had thrown his wetsuit all on top of my stuff. I just took his wetsuit and threw it. What a dumbass.

Racked the bike, took off helmet, took out fuelbelts from jersey, put gel flask in jersey, put shoes on, grabed number belt and hat and took off.

Nothing. Really smooth transition.

The run didn't start out too well. For about the first 5 miles my stomach was kind of upset. This was affecting my pace a little. I really felt like I couldn't push it to hard. I was just trying to hang in there and not make myself too sick. At about mile 6, my stomach felt better and I found my pace. I knew I was going to have a good rest of the run and I really started to push it. Since I wasn't going to hit my sub 5hr, my new goal was to catch Drew. We passed eachother on the first lap, and I made note so when we passed eachother again on the second lap, I could see how much ground I was making up. I slowly but surely started getting faster and faster. I came up to the point where Drew and I passed eachother on the first lap and I couldn't see him at all. I finally saw him at the last aid station right before the turnaround. I was making good pace but also knew Drew wasn't having a good run at all. I had 3 miles to catch him and I knew it was still going to be tough to run him down. Also I finally saw Chris Wong when I hit the last turnaround and knew I was going to be able to hold him off. He seemed to be running about the same pace as I was. I really pushed the last 3 miles. As I saw the last mile approaching I knew I had to turn it on. So I did and I finally saw Drew. Man this was going to be close. I knew the finish was just around the corner, so I gave it all I had and I passed Drew with about a few hundred yards left. I was really pleased with my run.

It seemed like everything and all the volunteers were disappearing after the Olympic race. Only powerade at one station. What the heck. I was really disappointed with that.