Chicago Triathlon - Olympic Distance - TriathlonOlympic

This swim is always fun. The first couple hundred yards are a battle. As usual it took at least that long to clear and get some water. Breathing was all good and nbody around me really freaked out though I saw one dude make a beeline for the safety of the ropes on the wall. When we got to the buoy it was a nightmare. Everybody was stopping and trying to figure out how to get around it, as if swimming suddenly became a bad idear. What the fu** people! Get out of the way if you're not going to swim. So after that it was mostly smooth sailing. Lots of contact, caught a few feet, got ran over by the wave behind me eventually. The usual.

Start more in the middle rather than the back.

The transitions are HUGE here so that was fun to run from swim exit, about 500 yards to transition, get changed then find transition exit and get to it. Not bad, though. Nothing went wrong other than having grass all over my feet and having to clean them off a couple times before putting on socks.

Not a bad bike considering it's the Chicago Tri and it's on Lake Shore Drive. I did see one dude who'd crashed being loaded into an ambulance. I learned later it was an NYPD officer who'd hit a pothole and went saddle over handlebars and was OUT when paramedics arrived. As usual people were doing stupid things. I, and no joke, saw one girl on a cell phone. One guy after the turnaround was trying to get back to northbound Lake Shore (he'd missed the turnaround and decided to just flip a U-turn in front of four of us who were flying, nearly wiping us all out). People must not know their left from their right because very few people were adhering to the `stay to your left and pass on your right' policy. I just stayed mostly all the way left and cruised.

Mount some sort of deathray on my bike to eliminate stupid people.

Good transition. Again it's HUGE so trying to find the rack and run-out is always fun. I did take a second to wash off my hands as Infinit had splashed all over everything coming into T2.

The run was FRICKIN HOT! A couple times I was thinking `I need some frickin' water NOW!' so when I got to the well-timed aid stations I was all about one cup of water in the mouth and two over the head. I was putting off heat like a champ. I decided to dial it back a notch after mile one because I was worried about bonking. So I just picked a comfortable pace and got it done. I was surprised at my time, I felt as if I was going a LOT slower.

Run faster?

Got a soaking by the kids at the finish line who were drenching people with cold water. That was nice. A bit shocking. Then waited for Louis to finish (he came in about 10 minutes after me) and got our photos taken together. We met up with his girl and then went to the food area and got some grub. Then walked back to the CPD tent, got our stuff and then to transition and packed up and rode home.


A crowded swim, stupid people on the bike and the heat on the run. Oh and a severe lack of swim and bike training this year may have had something to do with it. ;)


This one was actually fun. Knowing it's the last time I'll do it for a long time really made me sit back and appreciate my adoptive city. Coming south along Lake Shore and seeing the skyline really energized me. And the beauty of the lake and even ugly ol' Soldier Field -- I'm going to miss all of it a lot. Chicago's been good to me and I'm glad I did this race one last time. I was singing this song for at least part of the race, not as well as Clapton or Guy, but I was still singing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7dNeI74DlA