I thoroughly enjoyed this swim and felt strong. That said, my time was pretty bad. (Although my rank was best... hm...) There was some current and the longest stretch was against the current. I only really noticed the current when it was a cross current coming into shore, though.

I think I enjoyed it too much and just sort of floated along. The swells were very soothing. The second half or so, I made more of an effort to speed things up. I started wide, and didn't encounter anyone the first leg. Ran into people at the buoy and on the back/longest leg. Occasionally ended up swimming next to someone where we had differing opinions on direction. That was annoying. I think my sighting was mostly decent. At least I didn't have trouble seeing. I did almost no breaststroke. I breathed mostly bilaterally.


Apparently I lost the race during the swim (to my one other Athena competitor.) That's a bummer. I would have tried harder if I had known. (Although it's possible her time is wrong too.)

Funny thing - usually my form goes bad because I'm freaking out in the water. Didn't freak out this time, but I think my form was still bad, and my effort was terrible. SO, I think I need to focus more on my stroke and moving water. I get distracted in OW and lose form. I could have worked quite a bit harder, too. (I'm only the tiniest bit sore in my triceps day after.)

Gravelly beach was not fun but short. Nice not to have to put on a shirt for once!! I think my time is not shorter because there is a long run from transition to bike mount. Just before the bike mount, I saw my hubby and boys cheering for me, which was great. Except I started to mount the bike on the street, and not 5 yds down, so the volunteers started yelling at me. Lost a few seconds there.


Pay attention to where to mount the bike.

Bike was nice. Took it fairly easy at first. Picked up the pace on the second half. My cadence sensor has been acting weird, so I put my compu on time instead. On the second half there were some cars stuck behind bikes. One car passed me, then got stuck, and I actually passed the car back, haha. Got passed by a guy on a hybrid, so I had to work to pass him back. Had a few hill buddies (they passed me going up, I passed them going down.) Hills were not bad.


I had frozen my water bottles: 1 water, the other gatorade/TRS. They were still partially frozen for this ride, however, it was not all that hot yet, so I didn't need all the liquid.

I ate 2/3rds of a Clif bar at 15 min, and then did a Gu at 45 min. I had another gel, but I couldn't bring myself to take it. I felt full and I was worried about the run.

Need to work on nutrition for going into the run...

Legs felt very jello-y getting off the bike. Again, longish run into transition. Grabbed a gel and a handkerchief and got going. Saw my boys again. :)


Maybe look for the run exit before the race. Someone had to tell me where it was.

Started out with wobbly legs. Knew it would pass. Also got an abdominal cramp pretty quickly. Told myself it was normal; it would pass. I saw on the first out-and-back spur that another athena was a little ahead of me. So I worked on passing her. (But she's not in the race results, which is weird.) Was happy to see first mile was under 12 min. Tried to keep that pace. The 3rd mile had 2 water stops, and for each stop I got two cups water and an ice cold cloth (those were nice!). It was getting hot, although there was occasional cloud or tree cover. The cramp didn't bother me too much, got better, moved, and mostly went away. I did have some time in the middle where I was starting to feel like I needed a port-o-potty, but didn't recall if there were any on the course. Was kicking myself for not looking more at the map pre-race. But in the end it was just gas. I had 1 gel with me, but was really afraid of eating anything, so I stuck to water. Felt good w/respect to hydration and temp. After mile 3, I tried to pick up the pace. Was able to a little bit. Oh, and my legs, hamstrings especially were really tight and threatening to cramp most of the run. They were tight on the bike, too, come to think of it.


Need to figure out nutrition.

My boys cheered me to the finish line. Leaned against a post. Volunteer quizzed me on heat stroke symptoms. Said, no, I'm just tired. Looked for a place in the shade to sit. Hubby got me water. I got a banana and muffin. 4 yr old promptly stole the muffin. We hung out in the shade and ate. Then I wanted to go back to the finish to cheer in Kristen. Hubby helped me stand up. Ugh! Then the kids insisted on going to the playground. I listened to the awards, but they skipped athena and then they got it all wrong in the end anyway. Oh well.



Nutrition/stomach. Tight muscles? Being in la-la land on the swim.



VTS always does a decent job. However, they had some issues with communicating waves and then with printing results. So there were some annoying snafus.