Galena Triathlon - TriathlonSprint

Not hyperventilate near the end...in order to navigate around the swimmers in the pack I overtook I went into shorter, choppy strokes which pumped up my breathing rate, [bad] so when I exited I was too dizzy. not take water just as I was exiting, that was stupid, and with only 9 minutes into it I didn't need any hydration at that point and it just made me cough.

The gravel [c'mon, GRAVEL?] on the way and into the bike transition was a little rough on the feet and made me slow down a bit. Some people had sandals hidden just off the path to grab and slip on so they could run to their bikes [good idea!]. As this was my first Tri I definitely wanted to wear socks, so that took an extra minute as I had to completely dry my feet off twice, then scrape off the pea gravel a few times. Plus I slipped on a long sleeve layer over my sleeveless Tri top because I was unsure of the wind temps on the ridges. This turned out to be a good move because for me it was pretty gosh darn cold when those gusts hit. Didn't know whether running was OK in T1 [I thought I had read it wasn't] so I walked and was trying to see what other people were doing [which didn't work well as I was trying to navigate down a crowded lane filled with protruding bikes and people, with gear flying in all directions] some were trotting/running and some were walking.

Not sure, still mulling over this.....but need to practice this transition more at home more than I did!

Weakest area. Need to get more comfortable on my Tri bike next time just to get more aero [I used my commuter/road bike this time just because I'm extremely comfortable on it]. Lost my chain off the front gear ring shifting up a hill too aggressively; will have to address the mechanical aspect of that sometime as it's happened [although rarely] before, lost about 2-3 minutes there trying to get it back on without snapping it. Although I ride the Fox Valley Hills almost daily, they're nothing compared to what Galena has to offer up. But still was a blast!

Better quality Tri shorts, the thin pad on the Zoots I used didn't cut it. Don't know why? I wore these in training for similar amounts of time and more, but still was sore in the derriere near the end near Eagle Ridge. My HR and cadence were both pretty good.

Again, didn't know if running in a Transition zone was OK or not so I walked. In blogs I hear people writing about how it hard to get their legs going out of the chute from T2 but I didn't have that problem this time. Shoes went on quick with the socks already on, so I was glad I did that at T1. Probably took too long a time swigging out of my water bottle just before I left.

Not sure why I was so slow here, I'll have to watch some YouTube's of other people's transitions to see why it took me so long. Seems like the organizers have a very circuitous way of routing you into T2 which adds a lot of time/steps and really didn't seem necessary [but what do I know!].

Felt pretty good to pick off a few guys in my age group I know passed me on the bike portion. As I went by and saw the 4X's on their calf I was cheering myself on! What Fun!

Hit the downhills a little more smoothly.

Gatorade, bananna, stretching and a short walk. Then it was off to the food the resort has prepared as part of the athlete's post-race meal, which wasn't half bad!


Obviously, lack of knowledge of how to perform certain technical aspects [the Transitions], and of course the biking skills.


I hear this was new course this year so I have no prior experience to compare it to. But what cracked me up was the amount of people [5, by actual count] I entered into small talk with at the beginning of the race, and they said "and you chose THIS for your first race?" like I was out of my mind. I can take their point, but what better way than to jump right into the sport. Apart from that, the logistics from the Friday evening before was a little tiring, trying to get all my gear at the right place was a little bit of a pain, [thank goodness for GPS]. Overall great first race for me I think, and with experience it'll get better. And yeah, Galena was tough, but it was FUN!