USAT Age Group National Championship - Sprint Distance - Triathlon

Better swim than Saturday, but still not a good swim. Shoulders were tired and found it hard to find a good pair of feet. No near arm breaks or anything else epic though, so uneventful really. Contact of course, but nothing serious.

Signed up for some lessons to improve my swim already.

About the same speed as the Olympic T1, I had a bit better position. Long run into transition and a very long run out but overall I think I did fair. At the line was of course a disaster waiting to happen so I took it nice and easy. Lost a few seconds but not as many as if I had gotten tangled in the mass of people trying to mount.

Practice makes perfect.

Didn't know what I'd have after Saturday, so I decided not to look at my Powertap and just give it what I had. Since we were the first wave and there were multiple turnarounds I got to see the competition a few times. Sad to say there were two fairly large (7+) pelotons that were together both times I saw them... Not sure how there weren't a good number of penalties in our wave.

Regardless, my ride went pretty well. Slower than my Avg for the Olympic (which was admittedly too fast) but I came off feeling pretty good.

Need more long sets at higher power to help me get the "feel" of holding high watts when cadence changes.

Again, a little faster than the olympic thanks to my better transition spot. Unfortunately I ran right by my spot (couldn't see my shoes for some reason) and had to backtrack. Cost me a couple of seconds in an otherwise great transition.

Take a few more minutes the day before to get the lay of the land.

Had no idea how the run would go so again, no electronics to look at. I was ready for the inevitable passes that were going to happen and didn't let it get in my head... just kept moving forward... hell I might have even smiled once or twice. Toward the end I even managed to pick off one or two guys, felt good. Cruised into the finish almost exactly in the time I had predicted for a "good" day. Not great mind you, but considering how I felt at the start, good had exceeded my expectations.

Better than Saturday for sure, much better bike/run combo. I was still off pace, but think that was largely in part due to fatigue doubling up. I think it was a fairly good run for my fitness on the day.

Cooled off and checked my ranking. I knew 1:10 was top 25 in 2013, so I had held out a little hope, although I thought I had counted much more than that on the run turnaround.

Turns out in 2014 it was only good enough for 50th. Nonetheless, I was not upset. Obviously I wasn't worlds material yet anyways.


I have long looked at triathlon as a cycling race with two events sandwiching it. It works fairly well in the "small ponds" where having a 23-25mph bike split really puts a gap in people... but when those splits are firmly back of the front to mid pack, the weakness in my other two sports really shows.

I'm a stubborn b@stard though, so it's back in the water to become a real swimmer, longer bike sets and motor pacing to help me hold watts throughout terrain changes, and more speed work to add some pep to my legs.

2015 will be a whole new ball game.


Again, not a huge venue to be Nationals. Also, WHY do organizers insist on barbecue as post race fare? Keep it simple please... Fruit, Cokes, Beer, Sandwiches... things that don't make me ill just looking at it.

This is a great race, and I actually liked the entirety of the sprint more than the olympic, although both were great. If you get to go...go!