Soma Triathlon - Triathlon1/2 Ironman

Two thirds for the swim felt absolutely horrible. The last third generally felt alright but the whole swim felt like a struggle. I ended up by myself for a vast majority of the swim which is always a bummer so I had no draft for the entire distance. Oh well. When I exited the water I checked my time and was astonished. Astonishment was quickly followed by concern because I have not been swimming enough to swim that kind of time without a draft and not expend some serious amounts of energy. Running into transition I was very concerned I was in for a long painful day because I had failed to pace myself.

All things considered it turned out to be a great swim but I was very worried.

Swim more leading up to the event so that I can feel what pace I am swimming and adjust accordingly. Find some feet!

Feet got stuck on my suit. I forgot to grab my emergency nutrition and I had to leave my gloves behing since I forgot to turn them right side out before the race. Given the amount of snot I generated on the bike the gloves would have been nice...I could have wiped my nose on something soft. Aside from that I didn't need them.

Use the wetsuit strippers (my suit got stuck on my heels). Turn my cycling gloves right side out when setting up the transition area. Grab my endurolytes and gels (emergency nutrition) or possibly put the bento box back on my bike so that they are waiting for me when I get on the bike.

1 rode in the aero position for two of the three laps which is amazing for me. It probably also means that had I not I would have been slower on the bike than last year. I was surprised at how comfortable it was...I must be getting used to it.

The bike course was fine the first two laps went relatively smoothly. On the third lap the wind seemed to pick up and I could tell I was getting tired.

On a side note: I'm not quite sure why they started all the quarterman athletes before everyone else it made for some hairy situations on the first lap. The race seemed to have a fair number of large peletons which was a little nervewracking if you were one of the people the peleton was attempting to pass. I understand why people are bunched on the first lap but by the second and third lap there really shouldn't be the large groups that I was seeing, at that point it would seem that people are choosing to draft. I also saw a couple people do the usual look around and then throw something into the bushes. Why? The empty water bottle that weighs basically nothing and was already in one of your cages is not going to slow you down on any type of course especially a flat course. Why not just dump it at the next aid station? Whatever. I guess when you are slower you get all kinds of time to look around and see all this kind of stuff. :)

As usual I was the slowpoke that had everyone flying by him on the bike. The bike leg is definitely something I need to work on and one of the big reasons I have hired a coach. I just don't know what to do to get faster. I can go long but I'm just not that fast compared to all the cycling studs out there.

Nutrition: 2 24oz bottles of water, 1 24oz bottle with 6 scoops perp and 3 scoops endurolyte powder.

Learn to train to go fast on the bike.

Porta potties are great! Remembered everything including my nutrition and race belt. Left the perp flask behind intentionally. It was already clear my stomach was not up for it.

Nothing this was a relatively fast transition.

I passed some people on the run! This had to be a first...I never pass people on the run. I also managed to hold the run together and have a reasonable set of splits.

I don't think I would do anything different. This was the best run I had in me. I'm very happy with it. I guess I could train more but aside from that the run was great.

I ate a lot of pizza and drank a lot of fluids. Then I drove back to LA which took forever since they were repaving 5 miles of the 10 just outside of Phoenix and had closed the freeway. Ugh. That five miles took a very long time as did the normal traffic in the middle of nowhere once you get into San Bernadino. I'm glad someone came up with the ipod!


I need to train to go fast on the bike. I also need to continue working on my run and get back to swimming. While I seemed to have gotten away with it yesterday I believe that my swimming sets me up to work hard on my bike and run so I need to recommit to making it to swimming. Besides swimming is fun so why not make it to practice...oh yeah it is early in the morning and darker than dark outside. I guess I just need to suck it up.


The race was great. The bike course, while the same from last year, had a lot more room on it since some of the streets that were torn up last year had been fixed. I would recommend the race. It can be hot, like in 2005, but it can also be a perfect temperature like it was this year.

My goal at the beginning of the season was to break 5:30 in the half. I have had a very up and down season and that in combination with getting a stomach virus last week caused me to revise my goal down to just going faster than last year (5:43). So I'm ecstatic, I made not only my race day goal but my beginning of year goal that I had given up on. This was a great way to end the season...now if I could only get faster on the bike. :)