Capital of Texas Triathlon - Olympic - TriathlonOlympic

Much better swim than last weekend! Only second open water swim ever (first was last weekend at Silverlake). I wasn't freaking out about not being able to see. I found a point ahead of me and looked for it every 4 strokes or so. Having something to see ahead of me made a HUGE difference. Goggles fogged up after about 200 meters, so I had to stop and unfog them. After that everything was fine. I saw my husband after getting out of the water so that was cool.

Practice more in open water. Swim more!

Long run from swim exit to bike. My feet were caked with dirt and grass by the time I got there. I didn't plan on that and I ended up spending way too much time trying to get the yuckiness off. I got sick of doing that so I ended up putting on my socks with some dirt and grass still on my feet. Put on my shoes and helmet and then had a gel. Grabbed my bike and jogged the long way out to the bike start.

Have a bucket of water there to put my feet in before drying them off. Have the gel on the bike.

Quads were pretty tight at the beginning (not sure why- I've never had that feeling before), but they loosened up thank goodness. Dreaded the hills considering I hadn't gone up a single one on my bike before the race! Once I got to them I just kept pedaling as fast as I could! They sucked, yes, but not as bad as I thought they were going to. Going down hill was great! I've never reached the speeds I reached going down the hills. It was so much fun! It was also fun watching all the pretty bikes go by and wishing I was on one! I enjoyed the four loops (even though that meant I had to deal with those hills 4 times) because I saw my husband quite a bit.

Find some hills to train on. Get in more miles on the bike. Having only ridden 1 30 miler and 2 25 milers before hand played a big role in things.

For some reason, the official results don't have my T2 time listed. It combined my T2 and run time together. I got 2:43 on my watch. I racked my bike, took off my helmet, put on my shoes, put on my running shorts (my shorts had a gel and an endurolyte in them), grabbed my race belt and left. I had to stop to fix the tongue in one of my shoes.

Move faster. Try to stay standing up instead of sitting down.

Like I said, my T2 and run times were combined, but on my watch I got my run time as being 58:30. That would've put me at 35th in my age group for the run. I was pretty conservative the first 3 miles. I know what it's like to ride 25 miles and then run 3 (I did that during a brick), but not 6 so I was holding back a bit because I was scared. I ran until each water stop and then walked through them. At the halfway point I had a gel and looked at my watch to see if I was still on track to break 3:05 and I was. I pushed a little harder the last 3 miles and the last 2 miles really sucked. I kept up my pace but I just kept telling myself 2 more miles, 2 more miles, that's nothing. I only got passed by a couple of girl on the run, but when I looked at their bibs I saw they were doing the sprint. I passed a lot of people and even passed some guys, but at the same time LOTS of guys were passing me.

Do more bricks. I would love to have been able to ride 25 miles and then run 6 once a week if I could, but I just didn't have the time. Now that school's out I may do a couple of those before Ironhead to get my confidence up so I'm able to push harder on the run. My goal for Ironhead is to average 18 mph and run under 9 minute miles.

Walked around looking for Nick. Found him so I grabbed a bottle of water and we sat under a tree and talked for a bit. I looked through all the pictures he took then got up to get my bike out of transition.


The swim and lack of time on the bike.


The bike was a bit crowded and there were no mile markers on the run. Everything else was great!