Big Rock Olympic Triathlon - Triathlon

As my wave started (last one, all women), my goggles filled up with water when I jumped in. Stopped real quick to fix them. It was impossible to tell where we were supposed to go, so I just tried keeping the kayakers and other swimmers in my view. First loop went pretty well. Second loop was a disaster. There were WAY fewer swimmers in the second loop (sprint was one loop and I imagine there were a lot of sprinter), so no one to follow. As I turned to head out from shore, I must've been swimming toward my left because at some point a kayaker told me I was swimming the wrong way. I then tried veering back to the right and stopped at some point to sight, but there was absolutely no one around me except a kayaker. I yelled at her, where's the second yellow buoy and she had no idea. I was completely disoriented at that point. Eventually a kayaker pointed the direction of the buoy to me and I made it over there. I must've wasted a ton of time and swam way more than 1.5K.

Get goggles that allowed me to see through fog...at least my goggles weren't tinted!

As I left the lake and made the long run up to transition, I was trying to get my watch to work. It was apparently in bike mode and not multisport mode. Not sure what happened. Went to transition, changed gear...as I was just about to leave transition to hop on the bike, I realized I forgot to take my watch off to put on the bike, so I stood there for who knows how long doing that.

As I left on the bike, I had my sunglasses on...and it was way too foggy to see anything with the sunglasses so I took them off and tried sticking them in my back pockets of the tri top, but it was too tight. Ended up putting them on my aerobars. They clattered a little, but it wasn't too bad. As we left transition, there was a short hill inside Lake Perris SRA. After that was a long descent out. On the main roads, it was pretty much flat. Not the best road surfaces, but wasn't too bad. Olympic bike course was 2 loops. Towards the end of the first loop, there was a pretty significant hill that slowed everyone down. Not sure what the RD was thinking, but he put a water stop right in the middle of it. On the uphill climb, I caught a ton of cyclists and was never passed. :) After that was a nice downhill past transition and start the loop all over again. At the beginning of the second loop, a girl with 25 on her calf passed me. Thought crossed my mind that she might be in my age group! Second half of the second loop, I was going back and forth with a 44-year old guy. As I passed one older lady (on her first loop), she said I was the second girl to pass her, so I might be in second. I highly doubted it, but the thought was there. I ended up dropping the 44-year old on the hill climb. As I came back into transition, I was feeling okay. Nutrition-wise had a bottle of water w/ Skratch and one Gu at mile 2ish and another at mile 20ish.

T2 was pretty uneventful. :)

As I started the run, I didn't feel great, but didn't feel too bad. An older guy passed me at the beginning and I ended up pacing off him about 10 feet behind him for the entire run. Other than that guy, I was never passed on the run. :) Had a Gu at the first water stop (1 mile in). Caught the 25-year old girl who passed me on the bike pretty early in the run. Kept looking for Chris's red tri shirt on the run (out and back), but didn't see him at the beginning. Run course was a paved trail with lots of little rollers, eventually reaching a straightaway run on the dam. As I ran, I saw lots of women, but realized they were all sprinters because of their red race numbers. The only Olympic runners I saw heading in the other direction (towards the finish) were men, so I started wondering if indeed I might place overall for women. After I reached the dam (about 2 miles into the run), I ran into the first woman who was heading the other direction. She gave me a high five and a good job yell. Okay, so I'm obviously not going to be the first woman. Eventually came across the second female runner heading back to the finish. Okay, maybe I'm third. Once I was about 0.5 mile from the turnaround, I was pretty sure I was at least third. That's also about when I saw Chris heading the other direction. He looked miserable. :( After I turned around, I kept looking for the next woman behind me to see how much of a cushion I had...enough to hold onto third I think! I could see myself catching up to Chris, which sucked. At about mile 4 or 4.5, I passed him. :( Wasn't happy to do that. Throughout the second half of the run, my left calf was tightening a little. I did my best to hope that it wasn't going to cramp up! Passed a few more runners here and there, tried my best to pick it up the last mile. As I headed to the finish line, I was feeling pretty good...and glad it was all over.

Was hoping the run would be a little faster. Desert tri run was 10 seconds/mile faster and even though that was only 6 miles. Bike and the swim for the Desert Tri were also shorter, but I doubt those would've made a difference.

Had some fig newtons and bananas after I crossed. Waited a few minutes and there was Chris crossing the finish. After he was able to recover, we grabbed some veggie burgers they had for all the participants and waited for the results and award. Was happy to confirm that I did indeed get third overall for women. Placed second in my age group (30-34). The girl who won overall for women was in my age group. I suppose I'll always get second. Can't complain about that!

Was generally happy with the race. Swim sucked because of the fog. Really wish I could've swam the course a bit better with sighting. Oh well. Bike was pretty good overall (only bad part was the sunglasses). Was relatively happy with the run.

On our drive home, we went for Korean tofu in Buena Park...and had greasy Chinese food delivery for dinner. Yum!!


I wouldn't do the race again. It was cheaper than most Olympic races, but a few drawbacks. 1) Turns out some sort of Christian organization puts the race together. No indication of this on the website, but we had a prayer before the race started and there's a biblical passage on the race t-shirts (which we didn't keep). 2) Fact that the kayaker couldn't direct me to the buoy during the swim wasn't very helpful. 3) Who puts a water stop on a steep hill during the bike?