Long Beach Triathlon - Triathlon

This was the first triathlon I chose to be aggressive at the start rather than wait until the mass of people went first. I found that the chaos was tolerable, and I was able to hold my own and get through the wash pretty effectively. Lots of contact, but around the first buoy I was able to break away from the middle of the pack and move toward the front. I surprised myself that I was able to even catch up to many of the previous wave swimmers (20-29). I kept my pace fast (for me) throughout the whole swim, and I was shocked to see my time when I crossed the mat. I was expecting to take about 15 minutes, but beat that goal by 2 minutes.

Honestly, I need to learn to pee while swimming. I know it sounds weird, but I would have to stop completely to pee. Fortunately I held it for the whole race, but it could become problematic in future races :-)

Wanted to do it under 2 minutes and I succeeded. I could have gone a bit faster, but I forgot to turn on my GoPro, and had to fidgit around with that a bit. Probably lost about 15 to 20 seconds there.

Turn on my camera before hand, or not bring one. Silly mistake.

My Garmin had a total distance of about 11.5 miles, and I'm inclined to believe it. I know that I was averaging over 20 mph. I chose to take the bike portion of the race very conservatively, since I was coming off of a pretty bad bike crash a month prior at Camp Pendleton. At that race, I was very aggressive, and was run off the road by another racer at a sharp turn. I think my strategy was wise, as I was cut off twice by aggressive riders at this race on sharp turns and ended up passing them on the straights. The first lap was fantastic, since it was relatively empty. The second lap we joined other cyclists from later waves so it got much more congested, especially over the bridge.

Not much, pretty happy with my choice to take it a little more conservatively.

Got in and out of transition just about as fast as I could.

Not much I could do differently. Everything went smoothly in transition.

Run was great, but I felt like I was dragging just a little. I wanted to hold a 7 minute mile pace, but was behind that a little bit. First lap I had two gus, and carried my own water bottle. I was happy with this decision, as I can drink much more easily from the bottle than the cups provided. I didn't have to bother with the cups, so I could maintain my pace. Second lap I picked it up, but probably took it a little too conservatively, as I hit the gas too soon in a previous triathlon. This time I think I hit the gas to late.

Be more aggressive on the run. It's only three miles! Bring on the pain!

Walked around a bit after the race and high fived a bunch of other competitors


My own mind, and previous experience with a crash.


Fun race, and I was very surprised with how well I did this time around. Despite the fact that I went around all the buoys and completed two laps on the bike and the run, I found it hard to believe that I was at the front of the pack. In T1 I looked at the racks and noticed they were all full and wondered if I was in the wrong wave. Then in T2 I had the same feeling with no bikes being present. But it turns out that this was just a good race for me, and not too competitive.