Midwest Mayhem Triathlon - Long Course - TriathlonOlympic

This was my first Olympic distance tri, so I was apprehensive about how hard to push myself. The water was amazingly warm! As I explained to others, it felt like I was swimming in a lake of hot butter. I found a comfortable pace early on and stuck with it. I stayed with the same 2-3 guys nearly the entire time and jockeyed for position for the first half of the race before finally settling in behind another competitor and drafting til the final buoy. I felt great coming out of the water.

Not much. I'm not a fast swimmer and my goal is to be consistent and not drown! I do wish, in hindsight, that I would have pushed a little harder.

This is my PR for T1. Coming out of the water was difficult as the path to transition was a steeply graded and very sandy hill, but I guess it didn't hurt me that bad. Second fastest T1 in my age group.

Nothing

Wow. This was a pretty slow day for me on the bike. Biking is already my weakest discipline, partially because I'm new to it, but I just had a off day. What hurt my time the worst was losing my chain coming up a big hill after the turnaround. I started the hill in too high of a gear, and then tried to downshift with a lot of tension on the chain. It took me a solid 5-6 minutes of screwing with the chain before I could fix it. But still, the chain wasn't the main problem.

Spend more time in the saddle. Biking is my least favorite event, and I tend to cut short longer rides and slow down on the hills.

A decent transition. Pedaled in with my feet outside of the shoes. This was my first race using elastic shoestrings (don't have to tie shoes!) and it made a huge difference in my time. Putting on socks was the biggest time waste. Threw on the race belt and I'm off.

Ditch the socks? I'm not sure.

About this time in the race, the heat became a major factor. I expected to run this at an 8:00 min/mile pace. I came out of the gate on pace, but the course was completely exposed to the sunlight and heat. I had tried to train in the heat, but it wasn't enough. The heat was absolutely brutal. I have never seen so many people laid up on the side of the course. I walked every aid station, drank water, and doused myself with water. The good (?) thing was that it must have affected everyone else, because my crappy 9:18 min/mile was good enough for fourth in my age group.

Who knows? I had really high hopes for this run, but the heat was too much.

Finished the race, drank as much water as I could handle and sat in the shade for ten or so minutes.


The heat.


The biggest factor you should consider in deciding to compete in this race is the heat. It is painfully hot in Lawrence this time of year. That said, I felt really good about myself after struggling through the heat and competing as hard as I could. Despite the pain, I'm considering this one for 2012.