Mooseman Triathlon Festival - Olympic - TriathlonOlympic

My goal on the swim was for 2min 100's which I just beat by 7sec. My primary goal was to get out of the water and NOT be totally exhasusted. To accomplish this I focused on keeping a stroke rate of 3 strokes per breath. This meant starting slowly and building to my maximum rate. This worked well, I exited feeling well and I beat my time goal. One thing I didn't pay attention to was navigation and I sufferd a bit by zigzagging too much. One other thing I didn't take into account was the effect other swimmers would have on me. I would slow or stop when I was overtaken or when I approached someone.

Try to stay on course and don't let other swimmers slow me down.

Mud, mud, mud and lots of water. I was suprised at how much the rain and mud affected my transition. I spent too much time trying to decide to wear the jacket or not. In the end it's a good thing I wore it, as I was chilled during the bike and run, even w/it.

Pray for no rain, transition is no fun in the rain....Actually I won't let the rain interfere w/my plans next time. I need to rethink wearing electronics during the race. I hardly monitored my HR during the bike and run, so why bother? No need to drink during transition if there are bike aid stations in the race. No drinking during transition.

Cold hard ride in the rain. First time riding in the rain and it was difficult emotionally. And I was chilled the whole ride. My time goal was 17mph for a 1:34 bike time. Although I only hit 16.8mph it was slightly better than last years 16.3mph. My main goal was to keep a higher cadence throughout the bike to avoid the dreaded heavy leg syndrome at the start of the run. This worked well.

More hill training. Try and determine where the stiff back came from.

Better than the first

Maybe try and get into the shoes on the bike.

My legs felt pretty fresh after riding the bike. It didn't seem as hard to get going, compared to other events. Although, my back was pretty sore/tight, which I never experienced before. Stretching it helped quite a bit. But, at about the 2mi mark I was starting to feel pretty tired and I just felt like stopping. But the plan called for a faster pace for the second half, how was I going to deal with that? I started talking with folks and that seemed to ease the suffering. If no one was around to talk to I just let out a few good YeeHaa's. That work real well.

Skip the electronics. Nothing worked anyway. As far as sticking to the plan. I think I was pretty close, I did feel faster on the second half. What I didn't do was the body scanning, as desribed in ChiRunning, for losing tension.

Eat a bananna and drank some Gatorade Endurance, then proceeded to walked around to keep the legs from cramping. Suprisingly, I felt pretty good, despite being totally soaked and gritty. I then proceeded to the car to get into some dry clothes. Then gathered the rest of my stuff. Once that was done, I headed to the food line for a cheeseburger and potatoe salad. That hit the spot.


Back felt a little stiff/sore when I got off the bike and started to run. I stopped once to stretch it and that helped a lot. The rain was pretty hard on me emotionally, especially since I like running in the rain. But after biking in it for 1.5 hrs all I could think about during the run we was getting to the end so I could dry off. Overall I was happy w/the bike portion, but I need to be stronger on the hills. I kept to my hydration plan (20oz cytomax b4 swim, 20oz cytomax in T1, 40 water on the bike, 4-5 half cups of water during the run). I had 3 gels for the bike but I didn't take any except for the prerace one. My stomach was not up for anything in the way of nutrition, maybe the prerace meal was enough.


Excellent event overall, Keith Jordan runs the best events I've attended. I especially like the way sends off the waves. It's nice to be in the m45-49 group going off 3rd. Because there are folks around me, I feel like I'm in the race the whole way.