The dive off of the dock was fun, no cannon balls. I actually drafted someone for the first time for a minute or so. Since I haven't been in the pool enough lately I had to let them go. I would swim freestyle as long as I could and then do some breast stroke to catch my breath. The water was calm so the breathing and sighting was pretty good. The turns around the buoys were pretty good. The end of the swim had people helping you up the ramp on the dock from the lake. The long run (about 200 yards or maybe a little longer) from the dock back to the TA was part of the swim time based on where the timing mat was placed at the edge of the TA.

I need to just swim more and then I will be able to do the freestyle the whole time without slowing down to breast stroke.

Felt pretty good about my T1. I was in and out of the area pretty quickly. I did fumble a little with my helmet and sunglasses.

Hills. I was not expecting there to be many hills around this course. Most of my rides in this area are mostly flat with some rollers. Now this wasn't anything like Natchez Trace, but I wasn't expecting it. So, I went out pretty hard and most of the hills were in the second half of the course. My pace was very good and in the first half I was averaging well over 19 MPH and spent a good part of my time in the 20+ range. I think (I know) I cooked myself by pushing too hard. This would affect my run by a lot.

If it is a local race (since this was) I should scout the course ahead of time by riding it. At the least I should have driven it beforehand. Then I could have paced myself better and not pushed quite so hard on the first half.

Very good overall. I was able to slip off bike shoes pretty quickly take off helmet, put on run shoes and grab my hat and race belt and put those on while running.

I need to work on taking my feet out of my shoes before I come to a stop so I can run through transition barefoot and rack my bike, put on shoes and go.

I blew up during the run. I started out okay and had a fairly decent pace, but it didn't last. Before the first mile marker I had to walk to catch my breath. I ended up doing this several times throughout the whole run. In the last half of the run I would try to only walk during the water stations (approximately at the mile markers), but that didn't work either, so I found someone who passed (running only, no walking) and I tried to keep him in my sights and even when I had to walk I didn't let him get out of my sight and when I started running again I would reel him back in. At the last mile since I had been pacing off of him I led the way for awhile to push myself a little and help him push his pace some as well. When we got back to the levy to come in for the finish line I let him go around me and finish ahead since he had pulled me through the last half of the run.

Pace better on the bike to leave more for the run. Also, my overall fitness in the last month or two was not where it needed to be to push as hard as I did back in May and June. I need to be more conistent with my training.

I grabbed a gatorade at the finish. Walked around to catch my breath. Found some of the people I talked to before the race and talked to them.


Fitness level.