My main goal for this swim was to take it fairly easy, since I knew I had a day of racing today and the full Savageman 70 tomorrow. For me, I sighted and drafted really well. I swam straight, and rounded the bouys without a lot of problems. The only real difficulty I had was about ~80% into the swim, some guy decided to frog kick which connected with my mouth. Ouch. Thanks, buddy. I was in the first wave, and was getting caught by the wave behind me near the end of the swim (7min delay). I'm a slow swimmer, so am used to this.

Not much that I can think of.

A very average T1 for me. I just have a lot of trouble getting my wetsuit over my heels. Other than that, there were no major issues. I did forget to take the cleat covers off of my shoes. One of them had come off in the bag, but the other was still attached to my shoe. Obviously, I couldn't clip in at the bike dismount, and it took a second or two to figure out why. I put the cover in my tri shirt, but eventually lost it. I was 86th overall, 9th in my AG

Take off my cleat covers! Duh

My main goal was to pace the bike conservatively, so that I would have legs left for the run and more importantly the 70 race the next day. I think I did a pretty good job at that - I took the up hills easy and coasted on many of the downs. Being a slow swimmer, I passed a ton of people in the early stage of the race. "On your left!" becomes a pretty common statement from me. I was pleased that not a single person passed me on the bike.

5 mile splits: 19, 19, 19, 17, 20 (2.73miles)

Possibly put the arm warmers on before the swim on in T1. I was cold!

A quick, uneventful T1. I was 47th overall, 6th in my AG.

N/A

I wanted to take the run fairly easy as well to save strength for the 70 the next day. But I love running, so it is hard to hold back at times. I started fairly conservatively, but near the end pushed the pace. I ran up firetower road, and once I crested it I killed the rest of the run. I passed 3 guys in the final 1.2 miles, and every one of them said "$hit!". By the third time, it was quite funny, actually. The first guy try to catch up, but I was able to drop the hammer and pass him quite easily. Two of these 3 guys were in my AG, so speeding up at the end got me on the podium. Not a single person passed me on the run, either.

Mile splits: 7:13, 7:32, 7:18, 7:13, 7:50, 6:44, 6:29 (.2 miles)

N/A

After finishing, I put on my my arm warmers and jacket, and wrapped up in a space blanket. I was freezing! After I grabbed lunch and some drinks, B and I just chilled for a while. I would have left earlier and come back to rack my bike for the 70 later in the afternoon, but once the results were posted I wanted to stay and get my AG award. After the race B and I were able to talk to 6x Ironman champ Dave Scott, who seemed like a really great guy. After the AG awards, we hung out in the warm car for a while, then racked my bike for the 70.


Saving energy for the 70.0 race the next day. I could have definitely done all 3 legs a bit faster, though it probably wouldn't have changed my overall or AG placings a whole heck of a lot.


As far as the course goes, this is the "mini-me" Savageman. It's challenging, but pales in comparison to the 70.0. But the race itself is awesome. The race is well run, organized, well stocked, and any other good thing you can think of. The post race food is also good. The pre-race handout was a pair of quite nice cycling gloves, which I used for both races. Pre-race goodies you can actually use are excellent in my book. I said it last year, and feel the same this year, is that my only MINOR quibble is the lack of medals. Finisher tees are nice (especially tech tees), but there's something I really like about a medal. I would also like to see the 30.0 finishers get a different shirt than the 70 (again, a MINOR quibble). All in all, I can't recommend this race enough, it's really one of the best I've done. Schedule permitting, I'll be back.