Big Foot Triathlon - Olympic Distance - TriathlonOlympic

In a sprint race my mental state towards the swim has always been "Get this over with! It's only 10-12 minutes and then you can hit the bike. Swim to get out of the water. You don't want to be in the water, you want to be on the bike. Get this over with and be done with it. Perferably as quickly as possible." My physical plan has been to just swim hard to get out of the water, no real strategy. Clearly this mental attitude and physical approach wasn't going to work here. On the longer swim you can't squeak out of it. You can't get it over with. It's not just 10 minutes. You need to have a plan. My plan was simple - keep my breathing under control. It didn't matter how slow I went I was going to keep my breathing in check. My goal was to freestyle to the sprint turn around and then breast stroke to take inventory of my situation. I got to the sprint bouy just as the next wave was approaching. I was feeling really good, my breathing was right on and I knew I could continue. After moving towards shore to breast stroke for a few minutes I began to freestyle again. My sighting wasn't good so I decided to do 10 strokes and sight. This rhythm worked fabulous. When I sighted I found I was making excellent progress. I made it to the turn around no problem. I kept going. 10 strokes and sight, 10 strokes and sight, 10 strokes and sight.....next thing I knew I was back at the sprint turn around and feeling great. I couldn't believe it. Just like Dori I just kept swimming and, shocking, was actually enjoying it. The water was great, not too much body contact, my breathing was steady and I was doing it! I wasn't fast but it didn't matter I was freestyling the entire course without problem. I got to the finish and feeling great. Some dude got out of the water looked at me exhausted and said "Urmpf. Glad that is over, that was tough". Funny thing is that I didn't think so. I really enjoyed the swim. Crazy, huh?

Absolutely nothing. The next time I approach a sprint swim I'm going to remember everything I learned here. It turned out to be a great experience. Changing my mental attitude towards the swim made a world of difference on how to approach this challenge. I actually enjoyed the swim. WOW! Unbelievable.

The race had these stupid orange snaps for the chips (not velcro) and mine broke off before the race even started so I was worried it would break when I took off my wetsuit. I was really gentle taking off my wetsuit.

This course is fairly flat and fast. I was reallly enjoying the bike, as usual. I went hard but not too hard since, technically, this was still a training race for me. The small hills were really fun to ride. The other bikers were courteous.

Probably drink more and eat a gu.

This is a trail run which I normally do not prefer but, without beating a dead horse, I still couldn't believe I enjoyed the swim so this running course didn't really matter to me. Here I wanted to stay disciplined to not screw up my marathon training too much. I ran 15 miles on Friday and my legs were still a little tired. I wanted to keep my pace around 8:45, which I did, so I could get to my dreaded track repeats on Tuesday without too much fatigue.

My first Oly was a success and I really enjoyed it. My husband was awesome at getting me to do this and getting me to the swim. The hurdle of the swim, turns out, wasn't in the water but in my head. My husband saw this but not me. I had to do it myself. I have no doubt that I'll do this distance again and continue to enjoy it. My swim training and swim in races will be totally different now. I might sound like a dope but a mental attitude adjustment really makes a positive difference. Now, if only our kids would believe me when it comes to doing their homework.