They started all of the females together in one wave (2nd wave, 4 min. behind the 49 and under males), but we had plenty of room to spread out, so no problems with being knocked around. I wanted to try my Roadkill top and tri-shorts to see how comfortable they would be on the bike and run. The top is a little loose so was probably dragging a little bit, but it won't be a problem at Buffalo Springs since I will have my wetsuit on (the outfit felt great on the bike and run, so I am definitely wearing what I wore today rather than my skinsuit, it's so much cooler this way). Like I said, we swam downstream, but the wind was blowing upriver so the top of the water was moving in the other direction, so don't think the downstream part helped any. I kept finding myself drifting out towards the middle of the river and having to work my way back towards the shoreline( guess I was worried about alligators, lol), however, I certainly was not alone and there were people even farther out than me. So, probably wasted a lot of time swimming back in towards shore. Sighting was easy though because you could always see the banks when breathing. Swimming a straight point to point is kind of disheartening, not that it felt super long, but when you get to round bouys, you at least feel like you are accomplishing something and moving forward...today it was like, stroke, stroke, bank, stroke, stroke, bank...it got old quickly. I did pass several of the men that started ahead of us, so that's always a positive. Overall rank for the swim was 113/169 (men and women).

Not swim to the other side of the river!! My time was slow, but I finished MOP, which is good for me in the swim, I'm usually way BOP so I'm not complaining too much. Average times for just about everyone looked pretty slow. Like I said, my top probably wasn't ideal for swimming, but I'm glad I got to race in it before BSL.

No issues with my transition. Not much I could have done to go faster.

Nothing

Bleh! Not happy about today's bike. I only had like the 5th or 6th fastest time out of the women and I was 48/169 overall. Getting going was a little tough because there was so many of us and we were all trying to move at the same speed, hard to keep from drafting and very frustrating that it was hard to pass someone within 15 sec. even though they were moving slightly slower than what I wanted to do. There were race officials all over the course, so didn't want to do anything to risk getting a penalty...luckily, I didn't. However, once we got going, things got spread out. The road surface was your typical crappy Louisiana road...it was smooth pavement but had ridges like a sidewalk so it was a constant, bump-bump, bump-bump, very annoying. Anyways, I had no speed on the bike. It was super windy today so everytime we headed south into the wind it just downright sucked! The first part into the wind I just tried to keep my speed above 19, but on the next couple of times in the wind I was grasping to stay in the 17-18 mph range, just had nothing. Even into the wind I was only going 22-24 mph. I just felt like I couldn't move. There weren't really any hills other than the overpasses so I don't even have that as an excuse. However, I have found that I am stronger on hills than most women, so perhaps the flat was to my disadvantage. A couple of the turn arounds were pretty tight, so really had to slow down there, which I didn't like. At least with all of the looping back and forth, you were never into the wind for an extended period of time. I passed several guys, especially in the beginning and passed a few women. I was passed by a couple of guys (boo!), but no women.

Pedal!! That, and I don't think running my fastest 10k ever the day before helped any, but oh well. After this bike, I'm really nervous about BSL because it's going to be just as windy, if not windier, and I really crashed and burned today. I'm just really not happy about my bike today. Oh, and I've got to do better about my nutrition on the bike, only went through about 3/4 of my hammergel water and a little bit of water only. I've got to take in more, especially with it being as hot as it was today.

Guess it was a decent time after all, felt like I did the sock dance forever.

Not much, just calm down when putting my socks on.

Okay, before you get on to me about my slowest run ever, let me explain...it was your typical deep down south weather, HOT and MUGGGGGY. Holy cow did I want to die! However, apparently everyone else did too. I placed 25/169 total, can you believe that?? That just proves how bad the heat was getting to everyone. I passed tons and tons of guys on the run and three women. Only one guy passed me on the run. So, I'm happy that for once, no women passed me and that I was actually able to pass some women. I was just in total shock at how wimpy the guys were, people were just dropping like flys. Running on that trail down by the river sucked because we had trees on one side and the road bank on the other so there was no breeze down there. They said this was a challenging run...I thought they were referring to hills, didn't realize they meant suffocation! The hills weren't bad, just rolling...easier than what I run on around here. It was weird, my legs actually hurt more running downhill today. I normally hate having water on me during the run, but today, everytime I came to an aid station I would take a sip then pour the rest on my head and if I had time to grab a second cup, I did. Man, if there had been a tub or pool out there, I would have rolled around in it like a pig in mud. When we crossed under the highway over on to the other side, you could feel the wind which helped tremendously. I ran by this one guy and we felt this breeze go by at the same time, he let out this uuughhh. I knew exactly what he was thinking. We crossed back over to the riverside for the last mile, but it was into the wind and you were able to feel it; felt so good. I continued to pass guys the entire way. I got within the last .2 of the course and there is this guy a little ways up in front of me. This woman is yelling at me to pass him on the straight away into the finish. I'm thinking, lady, I don't care about passing this guy, this is all I'm doing. Then I was like, now what kind of attitude is that?? I'm passing him on the curve before the straight away! So I actually kicked with all I had and beat the guy, so proud of myself for giving it my all in the end. Coming into the finish the announcer said, "And here comes lucky number 13, Gina Vandiver from Longview, Tx. Guess it ended up not being so bad after all. As I watched people finish I saw lots of people going to the medical tent and even saw one lady come across the finish and collapse, needless to say, she went out on a stretcher in an ambulance to the hospital.

The usual, just freakin' run harder! However, today with the conditions as they were, I honestly think I ran a smart run. I took in the right amount of fluids, I kept calm and just kept moving forward. I actually felt better on the second half of the run rather than the first half.

Water! Give me water!! I don't know how I possbily crammed so much water into my stomach, but I did. I pretty much camped out at the water cooler and just kept chugging the stuff down. Then I heard an announcement about food over on the pavillion, so, made a beeline for the food. I ate a hamburger, chips, banana, and two bagels, I'm a bottomless pit after a race! I then picked up my stuff from transition and then drove over to the Red River district where the awards ceremony was going to be held. The awards weren't until 1 and I got there around 12:15. I was so tired and all I wanted to do was lay down, but I didn't want people to think I was a bum by sleeping on the benches. The trophies that they gave out were really nice, can't believe they were so nice for just age grouop awards. I somehow managed to survive the hour drive home (It's funny how this is my closest race, yet I went out of state for it). I came in the door and fell into bed, didn't even take a shower first. Woke up and took a shower and boy am I sunburned!! Oh, but this is the best part, my 13's are branded in my arms from the marker (well, the numbers are white, while the rest of me is beet red). I went to the store today and everyone was just staring at me.


Several things today limited my ability:

1) Hard couple of days of work in the field on Thursday and Friday
2) The extreme lack of sleep I've been getting from my sleeping schedule being all out of whack.
3) The fact that I'm peaking for BSL and not this race, so it was supposed to be a training race; therefore I shouldn't get upset at myself.
4) The 10k race the day before. Okay, I knew I shouldn't have, but I don't regret it either.
5) The extreme heat and humidity. The water was 84 degrees if that's any indication of the temperatures today. So even the swim was hot, swimming in a bath tub.

So, all things considered, I'm giving myself a pat on the back for this one (well, still giving myself a beating for the bike portion, no excuse for that pitiful effort). It's funny, I'm usually so mad at myself for my run efforts, but that is what I am most proud of today, even though it was my slowest of my three oly times. When the going got tough, I just kept on pushing.


Sports Spectrum puts on an awesome race. It's amazing how efficient they are at settig up and tearing down. Got lots of goodies in the race packet and the age group trophies were really nice. Tons of volunteers, water stops at every mile of the run. Good food and beer after the race. Nice finishers medals. Only complaint...the awards were held at a separate location in the Red River District, which, since I've been to Shreveport before, I knew where to go, but several of the other out of towners didn't.

A couple more stats:
The next female in my age group was 3:00:06
Brandon and Mike (longview bike club guys), who said that they couldn't do the Alleyrun because they had Tinman the next day, didn't show up. What a waste of money! Perhaps, they didn't want to get beat by a girl (just kidding, they probably accidentally slept in or something).
Jeff and Shelly Beaty (other longview peeps) did come, but I kicked their tails! Jeff: 3:01:36, Shelly: 3:15:22. What's ammusing about this is that they spend $700 a month for their coach...I only pay a little over that for a year!

I'm probably forgetting lots of details, so I'll update as they come to me.