Seeing as I was the king of the YMCA pool in my training up to this race, I had no idea what I was doing. That was evidenced by my treading into the middle of the start. I don't know what I was thinking. I started to get tired, and overheated, had to back stroke for a bit. Longest 6:50 of my life!

Swim somewhere other than a pool, with my wetsuit, prior to the next race. I also would not jump into the middle of the pack, but stay on the outside. I was really unrealistic on what outcomes I expected

I realized as I was waiting for the swim to start that I had forgotten to put body glide on my ankles. I dont know if that would have mattered, but I did have a hard time getting my wetsuit off. It could have helped with body glide, or the fact that it got stuck on my timing chip.

Body Glide

OK, so the swim kind of screwed me up, I am glad I didnt have a HR monitor on, I probably would have slowed down. I was huffing and puffing and couldn't get into a rhythm. I didn't think the course was too bad, coming out of transition, the hill was mild, followed by a pretty big downhill. The second hill was the more menacing and longer! I don't remember exactly where, but the road was pretty rough for a stretch of it too. The big downhill coming back to T2 was nice

I would be a bit more relaxed coming out of the swim, and would probably hit the hills a little harder on the way up. I passed most of the people on the climbs.

Almost did a digger getting off the bike and then had to jump to the side to get on the timing mat. Other than that, it was good, shoes off and on pretty quick

Not bad, passed by 2 people on the run, and caught one of them on the way back. I was reeling one guy in, but ended about 10 seconds behind him. I liked my pace, but I think I could have turned it up a little more at the end. I didnt study the run course as much as the bike, so I wasnt sure how far I had left.

Moved off to the side and the family brought me water!


Open water swimming.


My first race in over 20 years, it wasnt bad. I will practice some OWS and pick up my pace a bit more, next time a 20+ mph bike and sub 7 min 5k and that along with a better swim puts me definitely in the top 20.