Tri-ing a co-ed event?

I've only ever done co-ed races. Women generally aren't ranked with the men, so you don' tneed to worry about your times being skewed in the rankings because of lots of fast men (just worry about the fast women). In open water, they tend to send off the fastest, most competitve men first, so you won't get pummelled, plus some smaller races have a "novice" category that makes up the last swim wave. In terms of biking and running, they'll pass you but it's no different than having women pass you. I haven't noticed that during races, the men are mean towards the women or anything.

Really, it's not a big deal at all to do a co-ed race. Plus, it's fun when you DO pass guys... You don't HAVE to be competitive to race with the men. The elites are there to do their thing and aren't paying attention to the rest of us. If you're slow, the fastest people will be way ahead of you and out of your way. Just do it and have fun.

I did two races this summer, one co-ed and one women's only.  The first was a co-ed in June and there was about 400 people in my race.  Having not experienced any other races I was a bit unsettled with the fact that it was co-ed and so large.  I had a blast and it was really fun passing guys!  My second race was a women's only race last weekend and the atmosphere was really different but equally good.  It was a much smaller race (only 170) and the race overall was a little less organized but it was great to have all the warm and fuzzies that a big group of women doing something together have. 

I feel like I prefer co-ed races just because they are larger (around here anyway), and as a result a bit better organized etc.  It also doesn't hurt that there are lots of fit men walking around in spandex!