Johans Tri-Fest - TriathlonOlympic

I started in the middle toward the front as I'm gaining confidence with my swim. This time, I took it relatively easy through the first couple hundred meters and fell into a rhythm quickly. I still am more comfortable swimming in open water vs. in a group. I just don't do well drafting.

Nothing.

Much better than last year. However, I had trouble with my suit hanging up on my ankles. 23rd out of 41 in age group.

The battery on my bike computer died. However, not a big deal on the race. I kept my HR on the low end of Z4, staying aerobic on the hills.

Nothing.

Everything went well except for loosing some seconds to go back and get race belt/number. Still, much better than last year. 23rd out of 41 in age group.

Use my head...

I felt OK coming off the bike. The legs were good. I started running at what I thought was a strong pace. However, I hit the 1-mile mark at a much slower time than expected (8:35 vs. 7:30). I was feeling a little crappy and resolved to get water and GU and slow down a bit for mile two. However, that split came at 7:56? I began to settle and miles 4-6 were all about 7:20-7:30. I later determined that mile 1 was closer to 7:20, as my split included T2, due to not hitting the lap function on my watch.

time pace Avg HR End HR
7:20 7:20 162 166
7:52 7:52 160 161
7:57 7:57 161 161
7:28 7:28 162 165
7:20 7:20 165 167
7:20 7:20 168 167
1:20 6:40 170 175
6.2 0:46:37 7:31 163

Again, remember to bring my head...

walk, eat, drive home


I had a tough two weeks leading to race. Overseas travel and back-to-back 70-hour work weeks did me in...

I did Johan's in 2007 as my first Oly in 2:39:42 (20th out of 38). So, I was nearly 11 minutes faster this year! My swim was 3:17 faster, bike was 1:54 faster, run was 3:06 faster and transitions were 2:28 faster.


Definitely a great race for beginners and experienced triathletes. The race tends to get really fast people to show up (overall winner was 1:59:44), yet it is extremely beginner-friendly.