Over The Mountain Triathlon - TriathlonOlympic

Long, steep run from water to T1.

Was fine.

Hill was so long and steep, HR was *172* when I got to bike. Long T1 time due to run and having to put wetsuit/etc. into plastic bag for volunteer transfer to T2. Actually reasonable T1 time considering.

I haven't done a lot of long workouts recently and wasn't sure how I would hold up toward the end. So I took about 5% off the effort level here to make sure I had enough gas to finish. As a result I crushed about five folks (who'd recently passed me) during the climb up Pinnacle.

Also, because most of my rides recently have been hourlong interval sessions on the trainer, started feeling some saddle discomfort halfway through the ride.

There was a guy in my age group (Steve Risley from Wilmington) that I traded back and forth with a lot on this bike. I passed him for the last time somewhere before Pinnacle and didn't see him any more until the run.

Fumbled a bit here. Generally feel like I lost a few seconds getting bike shoes switched to run shoes.

Think I managed the effort level reasonably well here. Steve Risley passed me just over halfway through; I asked some volunteers to trip him and they politely declined. He joked that we'd been racing for over an hour, why stop now. I let him go, though; he just seemed too fast for me right then. He got maybe 100 yards in front of me.

4.5 miles in we started the long gradual climb back up to the finish. Another gentlemen in my age group passed me. I decided to try to match this guy for as long as I could. We did the long gradual incline at about a 7:20 pace and I started to hurt pretty bad. Think he was trying to drop me, but I stayed about 2' behind him with our steps perfectly in synch.

With about half a mile to go we caught back up to Steve. I joked, "You again!" and we started to chat. My HR monitor started to beep, warning me that I was going anaerobic. Forgot to turn that off - sorry guys. I cracked a joke that I guess that meant that we knew who had no gas left. Steve said that he was from Wilmington and all these hills on the bike/run were hard for him.

Don't know if my easily chatting with Steve broke him or if he'd overdone it trying to drop me up the hill, but the other gentleman in our age group just fell behind. Steve and I chatted until about 200 yards before the finish and he told me to, "go ahead." Wasn't sure if it was a trap so he could come back across, so I decided I'd just floor it and see what happened. Must've convinced him not to try, because I finished a full ~4 seconds ahead of him, with another ~8 back to the the other guy.

Really well run race, lots of volunteers. Thank you Kings Mountain!