I elected not to wear a wetsuit. The water temperature was 74. I figured any time saved on the swim would be lost in transition pealing the wetsuit off. There were some people with shorty wetsuits. The wave starts were by age groups. If I don't have a good warmup then my swimming sucks; even in the pool. The first 250 meters I struggled to find a rhythm and to get my breathing working. After rounding the bouy, I got into a good rhythm and I think the second 250 was faster than the first.

Go out slower at the start in order to warm up. Build speed through the race to the finish.

No problems here. Decided to not wear socks since this was a sprint. No socks worked OK for the bike.

Practice the "shoes on the bike" technique. In sprint tri's, all of these time saving techniques seem to make a difference.

The bike went great. I felt strong. Kept HR at LT ~160. I wasn't expecting the long hill. This is an example of where pre riding the course is beneficial. Had I known how long the hill was and how steep I may have gone at it harder. Overall it was a good ride. Good practice for the BSL HIM.

Not much, maybe ride harder...it's a sprint.

This transition went OK.

Need to practice "riding feet on top of shoes" and "jumping off moving bike". This would save a few seconds in transition. Didn't bother putting on socks. Scrafed down a GU and headed out.

The transition to the run was great. I didn't even feel like I had been riding a bike. I grabbed some water to wash down the GU at the aid station just out side of the timing mat. Kept my HR in Z3 for the first mile. At this point an athlete with '44' (my age group) on his calf passed me. Not wearing socks probably wasn't a good idea. Like they say 'Race like you train'. I could feel the blisters developing on my feet. It wasn't extremely uncomfortable and if I had trained without socks then I would have been OK. After Mr. '44' passed me, I made my new goal to stay in contact with him and at some point pass him. At the half way point I picked up the pace. HR climbed into z4. I started gaining on '44'. With 1/2 mile left I tried to make a move to pass him. HR was now in z5 ~170. Well, I couldn't pass him. I finished about 5 seconds behind him.

Run harder....it's a sprint.

Walked around and drank water. Ate ice cream!!! This is afterall the Milkman Triathlon. The bins with iced down water also had bottles of milk and chocolate milk. I'm not sure I could stomach milk after a race.

I was looking at the race results and noticed a name I recognized from BT - JoeM. So I remembered his race number and started looking for someone with that number. And I found him. Joe and I talked for a long time about everything triathlon. We watched the awards ceremony. It was great meeting a fellow BT'er.


Open water swimming - go out slower and build to the finish. Run harder, it's a sprint and only 5k.


This was the 21st year for the Milkman Triathlon. The venue and the course are great. The race was well organized. The tophies given out are porcelin milk jugs. A great event and I would highly recommend it.