First 200 yards was fine (3:55), felt like crap the last 200. Don't know why. Alternated between freestyle and breast. Took over 5 minutes to swim the second 200.

Don't know, since I'm not sure why I felt so badly. I'll eat differently next time (had a breakfast burrito pre-race) and see if that helps.

Had a hell of a time getting my feet into the shoes, enough that I lost my concentration and rode into a curb right outside of T1 (naturally, right after I got my second foot into the shoe, so I was clipped in when the bike fell).

Not sure. It was my first time trying to get pseudo-wet feet into my shoes like that, so the way I had practiced it all the times leading up to today wasn't really helpful.

The fall on the bike also stopped my timer, which I did not notice until about 4 miles in. So, my cadence and HR data is incomplete. The hills were harder than I expected, and my overall pace was way below what I was hoping for (and way below what I've been averaging in training)

Train harder on hills. Also, I didn't taper at all for this race, since I was just doing it for the experience/practice, and had a very hard leg conditioning workout yesterday at kung fu. If I were doing this race "for real," all of those things would be different as well.

Some jackass had racked their bike right in the middle of my transition area, so I had to move it a little to make room for my bike, and to be able to get to my shoes (which otherwise had been very strategically placed). I tried to take to much stuff with me as I set out moving (hat, number belt) and dropped the belt.

Next time, I'll put my hat on on before I get moving so I have two hands to deal with the race belt.

Slower than I wanted, but as fast as my legs were going to let me go today.

Same as the bike. If I were really worried about my time, I'd taper and I wouldn't workout the day prior.

My first one, but seemed extremely well organized. The bike course was especially well run, considering that none of the roads were closed, and we had to move from right to left across several multi-lane roads in order to make turns. Plenty of Police/volunteer support to keep us safe. I would highly recommend this race to others. It's hard (they kept saying it's one of the hardest sprint distance races in the state), but it was fun and well put together.