My anticipated swim time for the race when registering was 27 minutes, so to have done a sub 25 minute swim I would say is pretty good. Also, Ive been in the pool once since the last race, on account of my bruised sternum, so I didn't feel very prepared going into the swim. Well turns out I was fine. Sighting was spot on, didnt run into people but maybe a handful of times, and when I did I was able to draft a good bit till I decided to pull ahead and pass. I had a good song stuck in my head to swim to and mentally detach from the swim, so that definitely helped.

Find a cure for my chicken arms and just swim more, don't collide with other racers in events which can put you out of commission for 2 weeks.

Fastest T1 in age group, one of the fastest overall. Everything went perfect, no complaints.

None

Nothing too much to say here, I finally broke the 20 mph barrier that has gotten me for the past year, so that was a good thing. A shoe was extremely loose at around halfway through till the end. Turns out I lost a screw in my cleat, making it very unstable. Nutrition was good till the last 15 minutes when I was supposed to take my final gel. This mistake proved to cost me in the run.

Check equipment before the race (ie shoes), follow nutrition! Dont get lazy and overconfident, remember you still have 6 miles to run after

Once again, fastest T2 time in age group. Lost maybe 5 seconds with loosing my sunglasses, but no big deal.

More bricks?

This is where it got ugly. When I got off the bike, I knew it was typical for it to be difficult to get the legs moving, even more so on an oly distance bike. So around mile 1 I began to feel pretty good and tried to settle into a pace, but soon realized that I was not getting faster. Running at a snails pace (or so it seemed) raised a lot of concerns, and then I realized that I didn't do nutrition before getting off the bike and was simply running low on fuel. But this is where I made the big mistake. Instead of taking a gel immediately when I made this realization, I continued to run, thinking to myself "this will just upset my GI tract" or "its ok, I can make it another few miles like this, HTFU". Wrong. I continued to get slower and slower until I straight up hit a f**king brick wall. I couldn't move forward, and I began to see spots. This was around mile 3, and I knew I was in trouble if I expected to finish. This is where I made mistake number 2: instead of gelling then, on a second chance, I thought "no point, the race will be over by the time the gell kicks in and I start using it". This may be true, but I was still a fool for not going with what I knew I should have done. I had to stop to walk a few times (embarrassing for me) and almost straight up blacked out at mile 5 (I lost all sense of balance at one point). The worst part were those damn tunnels. When running through basically out of your mind, you seriously feel like you are dead and "heading towards the light". Not a fun experience. In the end I was at least able to run through the finishers chute and immediately passed out on the ground. Slowly took in nutrition for the next 45 minutes (I now have a new found respect for oranges) and I felt fine after (confirming my nutrition theories)

Dont be an idiot, follow nutrition exactly, practice running more.

Took in nutrition and got a quick massage.


I think this is pretty obvious. Looking at my times, turns out I lost an age group podium spot by 2 minutes. My run times are normally closer to 45 for a 10k, so move that into my time averages and you can reduce it down by 8 minutes. Doing this would have moved me up a good 25 places in the overall ranking and into 3rd in my age group. Epic fail.

After wallowing for a good bit about my defeat, I came to the understanding that this is not an easy sport. Hear me out for a minute. Ive been doing this for less than 2 years, and this is only my 3rd oly distance, and I set a PR in EVERYTHING except for the run. In a way, the day was a total success, even in the face of defeat. I learned that olys and sprints are two different games, and you cant prepare for the two the same. I know now that getting an age group spot is not going to be a cakewalk like at Langley Pond, and as time goes on things will get more and more difficult. Bottom line, I learned from the mistakes I made, and its safe to say I will never forget to take a gel again (regardless of how bad they may taste)


Very well done race, these people know how to do it right. I will be back in the fall to do the sprint, and back this time next year to conquer this course.