OK people, no laughing!!! Listen, the course WAS long. (See my post below, but I have now been told swim was 2100!! Yippee!!) Even I can't swim THAT slow. The fastest swim time of the day was 29 minutes (one person) and everyone else was over 30 minutes. I had a few other problems too. For some reason my feet kept cramping. And then the sun started to come up and was directly in our line of sight. I had to stop and tread water a million times just to try to figure out where I was going. You couldn't see the bouys till you passed them. Also, it was a seeded start, one person every 5 seconds, so there was no pack of swimmers to follow. After the first lap you had to get out of the water and round a cone. My time was already 23 minutes at this point so I realized right away there was no hope for a PR today. So I spent the second lap feeling terrible and trying to decide what to do with the rest of the race. Decided my only goal at that point was to stay under 3 hours. No way in HELL was I going to go over 3 for an Oly.

Everything.

There was a long run from the lake to transition.

Nada.

My bike split was the fastest among all the girls in the race. I beat my PR from Chicago by 1:25 without trying. There were so few people in this race that I had a hard time pushing myself. There was nobody to chase down. Some cars got in my way and slowed me down twice. There was a Boy Scout Jamboree going on in the park so there a lot of cars. Sometimes they stopped and let you go by and sometimes they didn't. I saw a deer too. There was this one point in the bike that was so, so beautiful. I was going through a clearing and was about to enter a densly treed area. The dew was still on everything, and you could see the rays of sunshine cutting through the trees and onto the grass. It looked like the entrance to heaven. So wonderful.

Try harder. I just made sure my speed stayed around 20 and didn't really push too, too hard.

They lumped tranistion 2 time in with the run time so I used my watch time for the run.
Decided not to use socks. Bad call. My shoes were totally bloody by the end.

Use socks.

My run. Wow. Major PR here. My run time in Chicago was 55:51. I started out OK for the first 1/2 mile then started to feel bad. Stomach hurt, legs were very tight. I was thinking I might have a shitty run. But I knew I had to match my Chicago time if I wanted to stay under 3 hours. So I told myself to just suck it up, bitch! By the 2 mile mark I was feeling much better and started picking it up a bit. I was trying to figure out how many girls were in front of me. As we got to mile 3 I started in on a girl in my AG...she was worried. She looked over her shoulder to see where I was...I had a huge evil grin on my face. I've never had that feeling before, of knowing I was gonna chew someone up on the run course. It was AWESOME!! So I blew past her and didn't want to look back and give her that satisfaction, so I just kept going. At the water station at mile 4 I asked how far back she was and they looked confused so I looked and she was nowhere to be seen!! At that point I told myself I deserved an award..even after that awful swim, because I beat someone on the run!! I'm not used to that. And after that I just got faster and faster! Here are the splits:
mile 1..8:44 Avg.HR 164
mile 2 8:44 HR 168
mile 3 8:43 HR 171
mile 4 8:10 HR 178
mile 5 8:14 HR 181
mile 6 7:44 HR 184

2 1:24 HR 187

My LT is 188 so I never got there! I am so, so happy with this run!! Thank you Mother Nature for giving me good weather today!

Go faster sooner.

Walked around. Ate a cookie, banana, gatorade, water, diet coke. Talked to Sue and ex on the phone. Checked results. I thought I was first in my AG but didn't see my name. Then I realized I was in the overall ranking! 3rd girl overall!! I got a trophy. The AG winners didn't get trophies so I was happy!
There were only 45 people in the Oly distance today! And only 10 girls I think. Small races with alligators, little publicity, and poor race info are great!!!!!!!


Me.


I wonder how it can be that I did so much better than Chicago, which was my "A" race and only 1 1/2 months ago, without a taper or anything. My swim was obviously worse, but the bike and run were better. I think it's the weather. I lost one of my gels right as I started the bike too so I only had one gel the whole race, plus one bottle of water, 3/4 bottle of Gatorade, and the gatorade on the run course. Had Endurox after the race and after my second ride. Thank you Chipmunk Heart for the idea to put the gel between the girls. I put my one gel there after I lost the first one.
Very small, disorganized race. After the race I met Sue at the bike trail and we went about 25 miles at an easy pace. Then we headed back to my neighborhood and hopped in the pool. I swam 1000 yards while she watched and gave me some suggestions. It was great. Then we had lunch. Now it is nap time.
Oh, Marmadaddy.....gimme my present!!!!