Yet another bad swim. Started off ok but then my goggles came loose and I almost lost one of my contacts. That would have ended my day because the spares were back at the hotel. Kinda scared me because I didn't want my day to end like that. My goggles never did get a great seal and then once I rounded the first corner the waves had picked up and were bothering me and making it hard to breath. Did a lot of backstroke to get through it.

The swim is my weakest point however I am a better swimmer than this. Need to get over the bad open water swims. Should have been closer to 40 minutes.

I was having a horrible time with my zipper. One of the wetsuit strippers was finally able to get it down. The got my suit off in a flash then i stopped and got some sunscreen put on. wasn't overly fast.

hurry a little bit more. My bag was giving me problems when I was trying to get everything into it.

I was worried about this portion because of the amount of pain I had last year. I told myself to shift a lot, keep my head down to rest my neck, etc. The wind never bothered me mentally. I shifted great to accomodate the conditions. Took in lots of gatorade and 3 gels. There were times when the wind bothered me but mostly when it was a cross wind that caused me to get out of my aero position. I had a fairly good pace going and was continuosly passing people when I put my head down to rest and smacked a large rock. It gave me a flat. Never used my CO2 cartridge before. After I got the new tube in and inflated I pulled connector because I didn't twist it on(how it filled up is beyond me). This pulled the inner part of the valve out and I had to try again. I got the new tube back in, filled it, and then kept twisting the connecting piece trying to get it loose. I finally tried the other direction and it came right off. I was a little flustered. lol. The tire is new and really tight and took me forever to get it on and off as well.

It took me 20 minutes to fix my flat. My garmin had my bike as 3:05. I need to be familiar with my equipment and keep calm. My bike time was not what it could have been. I never really pushed it because I was worried about the bike leg because of last year.

The run was pretty good. We only had a couple of days in the 60's here so it was a little warm for me. My first mile was 6:20 then my lower back started bothering me and I slowed it down. Used the sponges at every aid station and usually stopped for some gatorade, water, and cola on the last few stations. tried a gel and that didn't sit too well with my stomach

I run 6:20 in long bricks at home so I know I can do better. Not too bad though

I sat down and proceded to continuously cough for 30 minutes. wierd. not sure why. I didn't realyy eat that night. My stomach was a tad tender.


I need to be prepared to hurt and push myself a little more. I want to be comfortable all the time and to be good at the sport that just isn't the way its done. Learned a lot from this race and took more than 50 minutes off of last years time even though I had a flat. Looking forward to my next half.


great volunteers. just a great race in general. Wish they would have had a better spot for the one aid station on the bike rather than part way up a hill.