I did not push on the swim. The water was super clear and I was entertained just watching the bottom go by. It was a challenge getting out of the water. the bottom was very rocking and I got a bit dizzy standing up. I think I fell 3 times before i got out of the water. I did wear ear plugs to see if this would help with vertigo before getting out of the water, but I don't think this did much.

Nothing.

I took my time in T1. I put on a bunch of sunscreen and took some time cleaning off my feet. Grass and small stones were sticking to my feet.

This race I was not planning on a blistering time so this T1 was not typical.

The bike course was the hardest I've done. There was around 3500 feet of climbing, with elevation between around 6250 and 6800 feet. Not having a compact crank or cassette with more than a 25 tooth cog meant I was grinding pretty hard on some of the grades, which my Garmin had at over 11% in some locations. I'm glad i got new brake pads before the race and had my front fork checked out (bearings need to be replaced, but local shop said i would be safe). I think my speed ranged from around 4mph up to 40.8mph. I actually felt better on the bike than I figured I would.

One more point. There was only one aid station on the bike 41 miles out. The water bottles they had were too skinny and it nearly popped out of the cage several times in the race.

I would have gotten a larger cassette to make pedaling easier.

I took my time in T2. I put on more sunscreen and didn't worry about how long I took.

Nothing.

The wheels really came off the bus on this run. I started out at the pace I wanted. My legs felt pretty good and my HR was right on, but after the first mile, I had trouble breathing. I just couldn't catch my breath. I don't know if it was the dust or the light smoke from distant forest fires, but I started wheezing and was in distress pretty much the entire run. A few times I got dizzy and the lights started to dim. I got the the point where i was "running" for 0.05 miles and deciding if I would extend this an additional 0.05 miles if I was still OK. I think after the first 5 miles I never ran for farther than 0.3 miles at a stretch. It was also interesting that my upper arms were painful from the bike.

I think I would have benefited from taking something like Claritin before the race. I don't think that my breathing was solely due to the altitude.

I was totally wiped after the race. I packed things up and went back to where we were staying and took 2 hour nap. It was interesting that the next day the only thing that was very sore were my arms and upper back. This was likely due to the death grip I had on my handlebars on the downhills.


Altitude.


This was a very tough race. it turns out I was the oldest male finisher. If I knew it would be this much of a challenge, I probably would not have done it, but I'm glad I did now that it is over.