Buck Creek Triathlon - Olympic Distance - TriathlonOlympic

A fine swim. The water was very warm -- 76.7 degrees at the start according to HFP, and thus just barely wetsuit legal. I was a bit concerned at the start that I was going to overheat in my fullsleeve wetsuit, but it was fine. I didn't feel too warm at all.

Stayed calm at the beginning, even though I caught a kick in the eye from a guy swimming THE WRONG WAY at the second left turn. He wasn't just swimming the wrong way, he was 180 degrees wrong: swimming one way in the midst of swimmers going the exact opposite direction. How far off course do you have to get to do that? Whatever; I caught the kick in the eye and had to stop to reseat my goggles.

Much like a race of mine last year, the first lap of this race, it seemed like I was grabbing someone's ass on every stroke. I hope to god they were different asses, otherwise someone's got a really sore ass out there. I swear, it was like every stroke, I'd put my hand down and slap someone's ass! I thought for a while that it was going to be like this all through the race. I was worried to reach into my bento box for fear that someone's ass would be in there.

Got out of the water 29th out of 90 overall -- not bad, not bad.

See below.

no socks on bike, but still haven't practiced the shoes-on-bike trick

do the shoes-on-bike trick

What in the HECK happened here? I got passed SIX TIMES on the bike by my age group. In fact, I got my ass handed to me on this leg of the race. I went from 6th out of 12 to DEAD LAST in my AG, and from 29 of 90 to 56 of 90. What in the hell? I thought I was doing well on this bike, and I thought in fact that my bike was my favorite part of the sport. Damn, I just have no idea what happened. Frankly, I was just trying to make an average of 20mph, and I either did that or got close to it, depending upon how you do the math. And I had done a lot of long group rides inthe month before this race, so I was thinking I was up to it.

Bike faster.

Good T. Remembered to hold race belt and visor in my hand as I ran out of T. Ran without a shirt for the first time in a race; it was an okay choice for the day.

This was okay; I wasn't really killing myself on the run, in retrospect. I walked through the water stations, but ran pretty hard on the second loop. Talked to some people, had fun.

run faster

sat in the massage tent and drank water to cool down.


Weeeeeeellll, that's the $60,000 question, isn't it?

I don't know. I didn't know after the race that I had ended up so BOP. I thought that I had my usual race, or my usual race this year -- good swim, solid bike, and not-so-hot run. But instead I had a great swim, a dismal bike, and a dismal run.

What the heck happened here, and should I be concerned? My goals are to be MOP -- I think I want to keep myself doing this sport, and the best way I can keep myself interested is to feel competitive, at least vaguely MOP.

The thing is, this year was the first year doing Oly's, and I figured that this, my fourth Oly after all and third this year, would be a race I could actually compete in. I figured I had to have gotten over the challenge of racing the oly distance by now, and this race I could actually race.

Instead, once again, I ended up feeling left behind by the end of the race. It's a real psychological challenge of the oly distance -- once you're done, everyone else is long gone, and it feels like a ghost town.



I still like HFP. There were a few people wandering around asking if there were any post-race activities, but that's about it for these wheelie-fun series races -- they're kinda stripped down. The price is right, though.

No race photography? I didn't see anyone on the course, and can't find a link . . .

I still need to decided what, if any, race I'm going to do in October. Is this it for my season?