Lone Star Triathlon Festival - Sprint - TriathlonSprint

Started at the far edge ofvthe group, and right at the gun, found that I was passing a lot of people. I drafted off a couple of people until they slowed, and, basically ran out of people to draft off of. Missed one buoy, but kept a good pace until I found myself passing people from the previous two waves. Ran out of the water behind only a couple of other guys from my wave, and heard my family cheering.

Maybe if I had been in my AG, instead of the newbie wave, I might have swum faster, since the overall pace would have been faster, but what the hell? When else am I going to be able to say I finished 4th in my wave? No complaints.

Wetsuit strippers were a bunch of really enthusiastic Texas high School girls. That was fun.

No, the time isn't a misprint. I got to T1, and couldn't find my sock, and, like an idiot (granted, I was maybe a little disoriented), I puzzled over where they could have gone, instead of just saying "f-it", getting on the bike, and going. Silly.

Not hunted around for socks that I didn't even end up finding (or needing).

Headed out in a nice high-cadence gear. Went to shift into a smaller cog, and....nothing. Tried again. Nothing. I don't know what was up w/my rear der, but it wouldn't budge. So I spent the race in the same gear the whole way. Lucky it was a decent gear and a flat course. I kept as high a cadence as I could, and still passed lots of people, but I definitely left a lot of speed out there. Bummer.
Had one gu when I got settled, and one at the turn. Also, I was able to ride almost the whole course in aero, which was nice, since it was pretty windy.

Ok, but here's where it got weird. About 3/4 mile from the finish, I felt this blast of freezing cold air. Ever been out shopping on a hot day, and walk by the door of a store w/it's door open and the a/c on? That's what it felt like. The woman I was passing and I looked at each other and said, "What the F was THAT?" That, my friends, was a cold front. Read on.

Tried out my bike before the race. Silly newbie. Also, again, I felt compelled to bring my fuel belt, for some reason. So I had way too much fluid considering the temps.

Better this time.

Get faster. Learn to leave my shoes on the pedals.

Started pretty fast, passing lots of tired looking people, and felt great. Knew I was going to finish, etc. Then, at about mile 2, I felt a couple of drops. Then suddenly, the skies opened up and it started to rain, down, sideways, and all around. Within minutes, I was completely soaked, and running, literally through flooded paths with water up over my shoe-tops. I could barely see the course in front of me a couple of times. Just incredible. Never seen anything quite like it before. I was feeling great, though, so I just kep chugging along, making the same silly jokes to everyone I passed ("shoulda kept my wetsuit on!", or "are we running, or are we still swimming?"). I made sure to especially thank the vols, who were standing out in the rain. As a goof, I took a cup of water from an aid station and dumped it on my head.
As I neared the line, I could see my family under a tent yelling. I waved, and then sprinted to the line.

I don't think anything. The run is a PR for me, and, considering it was in the insane conditions, I'm pretty happy with it.

Ran into the tent, got some pizza, found my family. Dropped off my bike, and headed home. It was still pouring, so everyone was packed into the tent, and it was too chaotic to be there w/a little kid.


Other than my brain-freeze in T-1, my mechanical issue w/the bike was the only thing. I'm really happy with my swim and run times. And I beat my goal by almost 5 minutes, so I'm pretty happy. If I had run in my AG, I would have been 33rd out of 66. Pretty respectable for my first actual tri.


I can't say enough what a great race this was to run. Keith and his team did an amazing job.