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 Swim
Comments: Swim is my weakest event, by far. I positioned myself middle of the pack and to the left and hoped for the best. There was a fair amount of body contact, none of it too rough or violent, but enough to throw me off my comfort zone. I ended up swimming freestyle half of the time and breaststroke the other half - which I don't think hurt my time since I can do both at about the same speed and I'm much more comfortable breathing and sighting on the breaststroke. In the end, I'm a slow swimmer and my time of 11:50 reflects that. BOP on the swim, I passed some swimmers from the wave ahead (clearly the ones that were having trouble) and was passed by the fast swimmers on the wave after mine. What would you do differently?: Practice more swimming. Clearly this is my weakness and I hope to make big improvements here before my next race.  Transition 1
Comments: An ok transition - I had to put on shirt, socks and shoes since I ride in toe cages which cost me some extra time, but I ran in and ran out and had lots of energy. I forgot to put a gel in my back pocket as I had planned but I don't think this really hurt me. What would you do differently?: Tape gel on bike. Go clipless.  Bike
Comments: This is where I started making up ground. I passed lots and lots of people, some on much fancier hardware than I was riding, and was only passed by 3, 2 of which I passed back later on the course. I was very comfortable on the bike and went hard. Whenever my speed dipped below 20mph I pushed a bit harder and brought it back up. I drank my accelerade during the ride and finished with still some energy left for the run. What would you do differently?: Nothing, this went better than I had expected. Transition 2
Comments: Fairly easy transition since I already had my running shoes on. Racked the bike, took off helmet, put on race belt, grabbed a GU, took a quick drink and was off. What would you do differently?: Nothing.  Run
Comments: I felt strong going to the run. I made a decision to run without my garmin, so I didn't really know how fast I was going but I was pushing hard. Again I passed several people on the run, but not as many as on the bike, and was only passed by a couple. I would lock on the runner ahead of me and would push ahead one at the time. During the run I also started paying attention at the age of the runners ahead of me (marked on the right calf), and would push just a bit harder to pass runners on my age group (6-8 total during the run). At this point I didn't know how my overall time or my run time was going to be. My best case goal was 1:15, and I would have been happy with 1:25. Imagine my surprise when I crossed the finish line at 1:!7:xx (don't remember the seconds) minus 4 minutes for the second wave start - overall time 1:13:39, better than I had ever expected, AND a 5K time faster than any standalone 5K races I've done to boot. Needless to say, I'm hooked and looking forward to my second race in September (the Endless Summer tri at LBI). What would you do differently?: Nothing. Maybe next time I'll wear my garmin, not sure. Post race
Warm down: Found my family, all of them very excited. My 10-year-old son announced that he wants to do triathlons too! He also wanted to buy a Specialized bike at the bike tent but we put that off for another day. I stretched a bit, then went to the food court and grabbed some chow but only ate half a pretzel and the lemon ice that was in the bag. My kids ate the rest. Found the massage tent but there were lots of athletes in line and I didn't feel like waiting. Cheered some finishers, watched the kids play at the playground. What limited your ability to perform faster: My weak swim ability. Having not fully recovered from a cold. Event comments: This was an superbly organized race. It was my first, but I would love it if every subsequent one that I do is as well organized. Events started on time, TONS of volunteers, the course was well marked and everyone on the course was super friendly. Special thanks to the guy handing out the soaked cold towels on the run course. I was also surprised to see how quickly the results appeared on line. I left without knowing my overall placement and splits, and the first thing I did when I got home was to check the website for results, not thinking they'd be there - I was very surprised to see them. Last updated: 2008-07-27 12:00 AM
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United States
CGI Racing
80F / 27C
Sunny
Overall Rank = 174/1027
Age Group = M40-44
Age Group Rank = 20/76
This was my first triathlon. 2 weeks ago I was freaking out nervous. A week ago I had calmed myself down and convinced myself that I had trained well and I didn't have anything to worry about, and that worked, until Thursday. I haven't had a cold in at least a couple of years, and what happens 3 days before my first race? I get a cold. By Friday is was full-blown, achiness, sore throat, running nose, the works. At that point I was thinking that if it didn't let up, I may have to DNS. I guess taking lots of vitamin C and zinc helped since I felt better (but not completely well) by Saturday. On Saturday afternoon, driving to packet pickup with my 3 kids, I started feeling excited again, but by later that evening I was again coughing and had a severe migrane headache. Regardless, put kids to bed early, popped some ivyprophen and went to bed around 9:00 hoping for the best. I managed to get some sleep, and once I even woke up around 2:00AM feeling pretty refreshed and I still had a couple of hours to sleep.
Race morning, I get up at 3:50. I still coughed a bit and nose was still a bit runny but overall I didn't feel bad. The morning routine consisted of taking dog for short walk, shower, get wife and kids up, eat pb&j on white bread (a bit bothered because I was out of health nut bread that I always eat), double-check transition bag, pump bike tires, set up rear bike mount on car, mount bike, pack family, and go. We got on the road around 5:00 for a 1:15 ride from Long Beach Island, a bit later than I would have liked since on the race meeting we were told that around 6:30 the traffic gets heavy, but we got in at 6:15 and didn't really have any problem parking. I kissed my wife and kids and headed to transition. I found my designated rack, laid everything out, and found THE CAMERA in my transition bag. Uh oh gotta find my wife and give her the camera. It took me a good 20 minutes until I tracked her down, which got me back in transition only about 5 minutes before it closed. But no worries, I got my cap and goggles, headed out of transition, gave hugs to the family one more time and headed to the swim start, where I was starting in the second wave.
I got to the swim start, heard the national anthem, watched the first wave take off, and then it was show time!
Walking around at a brisk pace looking for my wife to give her the camera!