You did do a good job for a 3 week layoff!

Sometimes however you do need to tell yourself to shut the F up during the tough times.

Laying off and coming back can be too ... in terms of the voices in your head, it is hard to drown them out so don't kick yourself too hard.

I play mental games when faced with something like this (which frequently happens when doing a long swim).  I divide whatever I am doing into section and then tick them off while telling myself "... okay, another one down.  I am 30% done ... here comes another, 40% and almost halfway."

Works me most of the time ... but probably because my brain is so oxygen starved by then that almost anything would work.

I tend to have issues with negative self-talk too. For me, it helped to just take it a mile at a time - breaking it down so I didn't think about all 6 miles I had to run. Not sure if that will help you or not, but it's worth a shot!

You really did great overall - races after 3 weeks off would be tough! Now, get to training, so you can really race Chattanooga!!

That was a great effort with all of the time off beforehand.  Good to see you back out there racing again.  Just remember, tris have 3 parts...it is 50% mental, 50% physical, and 50% mental.

So here's the thing... I give you mad props for doing this race.  You had a lot going on before the race and 3 weeks of limited training gets in your head whether or not you have a race right afterwards.  I think there are a lot of people that would have opted out of racing but you stuck it out and got through.  You finished it and it sounds like in doing so you learne a few things that ultimately will be more valuable to you as an athlete than another experience might have been.  So there .  FWIW, you had a good race all things considered!