Door County Triathlon - Half Iron Course - Triathlon

This time includes a 3+ minute wait at the second to last bouy... I'd estimate my time to be around 39 min, maybe a smidge less.

The plan was to wait for Dad at the second to last bouy so I knew I would be able to take this swim very easy. That was also good because my shoulder is still sore especially with the restriction of a wetsiut.

I started to the outside near the back. The swim out to the first bouy was a bit rough and congested, but I didn't really have too much contact. Sighting was tough though because we were swimming straight into some pretty big waves. I just followed the group.
Took a right at the first right bouy and headed out. The waves were pretty big and I got a mouthfull a few times, but since i was swimming at such an easy pace, it wasn't too much of a problem. I've never seen so many people hanging on in all the years I've done this race - it was the roughest water i've swam in during this race. a few times I felt like I was getting kind of dizzy from going up and down in the swells, but it wasn't too bad. I kinda drifted to the right but never got too far off the line and corrected. About 10 min into the swim it started to rain lightly.
Rounded the second yellow bouy and kept on at the same easy tempo. I got into a better rhythm along that back stretch. Sighted off a coast guard boat that was about halfway then once I got to that, was able to see the yellow bouy and sighted off that.
Rounded that last yellow bouy and headed to the finish. Stopped at the second to last bouy, checked my watch and waited for dad. When he got there, we swam into the finish. I swam all the way till my hands touched the sand. Was stripped by the handy strippers as they like to be called (very handy!) and jogged to my transition.

Overalll, it was a 3 -4 on the effort scale (0- no effort, 10 - all out). And the shoulder never screamed at me! Win!

put a little more effort in for that distance, but because of the plan to meet up with dad, this worked out great. The effort felt more like a full IM swim effort (or even easier). Still happy with what would have been my time without the wait seeing as my shoulder injury has kept me from swimming! :)

The plan was to ride out of T1 with dad. My T1 is quick so I was ready to go fast, I looked up and Dad was just getting to his spot. I didn't want the family to know I was waiting, so i crouched down and pretended to be working on my bike shoe just in case they saw me. I knew where they were going to be standing and I couldn't see them from the crouched position so i figured I was good. I kept my eye on dad and waited for prob 3 minutes while he got his socks and shoes on and got the sign all situated up the back of his jersey. Then I saw him jogging out and I joined him, we left T1 together.

in this case, nothing - proposal to come!! If i hadn't waited, it would have been a very good transition.

Here's where the fun is. We walked our bikes out of T1 and saw the family ( Mom, sister Katie, her boyfriend Nick, brother Chris, DH Josh, friends Dan and Nancy) standing at the designated spot. Dad and I set down our bikes, jogged over to infront of them and tried to hold up the sign. Dad handed me one end and I was going to unroll it while he hung on, but I kept ripping it out of his hands as we were walking and he kept having to chase it, it was funny but stressful! I felt rushed! finally we stopped and got the sign unrolled and held it abofe our heads. It said: "Katelyn - hurry up and say yes, we have to get on with this race!!" Kate read it and her confused face (she was wondering what the heck we were doing!) melted and she turned to Nick. He got down on one knee - we couldn't hear him, but we saw her shake her head. Dad and I ran over to the fence to give them the sign and hug them quick, then jogged back ot our bikes, got on and ran off. it was AWESOME! the people around were cheering, she was crying, it was great!

OK, now to start this race! The bike leg to Sturgeon Bay is fast. but it was raining so I avoided all the puddles as best I could - you couldn't tell if they were just depressions, or huge potholes that were filled with water... Still a fast leg though. My goal for the bike was to keep my HR between 150 and 155. I kept a close eye on it and slowed a bit whenever it crept above 155. I ate a 1/4 stinger every 20 min and a gu on the top of the hour - that worked well. I drank alot (but not too much) water, but hardly ANY energy and felt just fine. it was cool and i wasn't craving the gatorade, so i just didn't drink it. I think that worked out fine.

The mile 16 water stop was crazy, there were lots of men around (they started after the women) and there were FLYING through there - swerving, dropping bottles - crazy! one guy nearly crashed right in front of me - thankfully he didn't because it would have caused a huge pileup! Dad was right behind me up till that point and we chatted about the crazyness for a while, and rode near eachother for a few miles after that, then I think he fell off at some of the hills (he was trying to keep his HR super low so was spinning up the hills) The rest of that leg went well - same story at the water stops. I was getting passed by a ton go guys - I didn't mind, it's fun to be out on a busy course, but holy cow i was getting passed alot!! That leg was steady though Made it back to the bridge waterstop feeling good. Kept my HR in range, felt good at the top of the big hill. The only thing to get a bit tired/sore was my butt - I wore tri shorts with zero padding. fine for a half, but not going to work for the full. I think I dropped the effort off a but near the end of the bike, but I'm ok with that. It felt like a solid bike and right in the ballpark of most of my past bikes for this race. That made me happy as I took 3.5 weeks off in june. Overall, I felt good about the bike.

Keep the effort up the last 10 miles - I think my uncomfy butt distracted my and I was adjusting alot = coasting.

slowed to right before the line, got off, ran down the right path, but ran past my spot - woops, took a few seconds to backtrack and find it. bike shoes off, chamois butter on my toes, socks on, shoes on and tied, gu in pocket, helmet off, grapped my number and visor and jogged out. putting the chamois butter on my toes took a few more seconds, but prevented blisters so worth it!

Oh jeez, I suck at running. So I ran to each water stop, walked through the stop and kept on running. I was doing about 9:50 pace while running plus the walking at the stops. I felt pretty consistent until the first hill. i walked up that, then ran into Egg Harbor. IT was there that I started to not have fun. I even started counting to try to distract myself. was able to run between stations and only walk by them though. Walked up the monster bluff hill and through the aid station at the top. it was just hard but I think it's more mental then physical. My HR wasn't too crazy high (and with 3 miles left, who cares if it was) - i should have been running harder, but just couldn't convince myself that I should. They added a freezie pop stop about 1.5 miles from the finish - AWESOME! i grabbed an orange one and walked afor a couple hundred yards and enjoyed a couple inches of that! YUM! Then I started running again, skipped the last water stop and tried to push to the end. I flew down the bluff and was thinking "legs, dont give out, dont trip!" the whole time - that's a steep hill that late in the game! Ran hard down the finish shoot and crossed the line. I felt like CRAP, but it was gone withing a minute. they had cold towels and water right there at the finish and that was sooo nice. Verna finished a few minutes after me and Audrey a few minutes after that. it was fun!

I stood around in the finish area because Josh said dad was only about 20 min behind me. He finished lookin great and I got to put on his medal - his FIRST HALF IRON FINISH!! yay dad!

Get out of my head and run harder - especially the last 4-5 miles. I need to do this race again next year and get that down!

proposal (worth it!) - I'm going to estimate that the waiting for dad and the sign holding,etc added 7 - 8 min to my time. I may have gone under 6 otherswise... maybe next year will be the year!!

shoulder and lack of training as a result of the injury. But I'm happy to get to the start of this race and happy with the performance over all. It is what it is!

AND - even with the proposal and the sore shoulder, this was a PR for me by about 5 minutes - so that's cool. :)


I love this race, very organized, tons of volunteers. The race director listens to suggestions and changes stuff slightly for the better every year. LOVED the freezie pop station on the run!!! This was my 5th consecutive year and I'll be back for number 6!!