The plan was to go out easy and save myself for the rest of the race. I was planning to draft someone as much as possible and cruise the course in about 14 minutes. Unfortunately, I was not fully prepared for a mass start. By the time we go done running over people, getting run over by people, kicked, clobbered, and drowned, I found a nice open lane. Now I was in my element, open water, open lane, and off I went. About 300M into the swim I realized why my swim was so open. I was about 20M off course. Time for a quick adjustment to swim back towards and to get around the buoy. After I got around the buoy, I found I was in a group of about 3 other men. Perfect, draft right along and back for the final 400 back to the beach. I stayed on someone's feet all the way back to the beach and felt great coming out of the water. I found out after the race that somehow I came out of the water around 10th. I was not expecting to do that well at all as I don’t feel that I am a strong swimmer at all.

I definitely need to learn to sight. I was at least 20 M wide of the buoy which added to my race time. I will also likely get a wet suit. Not that I needed one in the nice warm water, but hey, anything to make me a little faster.

T1 didn’t seem all that bad except that they didn’t sweep the parking lot all the bikes were in. Loose gravel on bare feet after being in the water was not comfy. I was setup near the exit of the transition which meant a little longer than most run to the bike. That’s OK T2 really went fast because of that. I wiped off my feet and put on my socks and shoes then ran out and jumped on the bike. All in all, no real issues here.

Next time I will probably bring a small brush to clear any loose gravel from my transition area. I ended up with blisters on my feet from having gravel in my socks. I'll probably try to go without socks next time as well.

I had ridden the bike course a week before the race so I pretty much knew exactly what to expect here. I was shooting for a 37:30 here, so I was a full minute off my pace, but I’ll call that saving myself for the run. In reality, the swim took a little more out of me than I expected, but I suppose shaving 2 minutes off of an 800M swim will do that. The bike basically went exactly as expected except a bit slower. There were a couple hills but I knew they were there and just spun up them. About 2.5 miles into the ride the top women finisher passed me on the bike. It was expected, so I just kept my head down and kept going.

I don't think there would be much to change other than the possibility of getting a triathlon specific bike.

This transition was blazing fast. I had setup right next to the entrance/exit and I had pulled my feet out of my bike shoes before I entered the dismount area so there was very little to be done here. Throw the bike on the rack, drop the helmet, toss the bike repair stuff out of my pocket, slip on my run shoes and out I went.

The run hurt. It hurt much worse than I expected. There was a bit of a blow to the old ego as they started the 5K stand alone race about a minute into my run. By the time I hit a mile people were just passing me right and left. They were fresh of course so I tried to just take it in stride and keep my own pace. I knew from my stop watch I was going to go well under my goal of 1:30 so I wasn’t going to kill myself to keep up with guys running a 5K. It was starting to heat up but not too awful bad really. 2 aid stations on the run and I grabbed water at both. In the end I put in just over 27. Not bad, my PB stand alone 5K is 26:35 so it wasn’t that I killed myself on the bike, I just suck at running.

Lose more weight and get in better shape. The run is my worst event.

Nothing special to speak of. Milled around talking to people and cheering on the rest of the racers.


I feel like I gave everything I had. All there is to do to be faster is be in better shape. I suppose there may be some time to gain in a triathlon specific bike with race wheels and all the bells and whistles, but I doubt much. There is much more time to be gained by losing that last 20 lbs and just being in better condition.


My goal was 1:25. I didn't think there was any real possibility to go under 1:22 based on my individual event performance. I was shocked at my time. I feel like I really gave this race everything I had. Next year, I just need to have more to give. This is a fantastic event and I can't wait to do the next one.