Swim went WAY better than expected. I came out nearly a minute and a half faster than my PR in the pool. The trashing around at the beginning didn't bother me nearly as much as expected. I just kept kicking and pulling. (might help that i'm a little bigger than your average triathlete. Only negative was the navigation. I went about 10m past the first buoy and have a nasty tendency to veer left. Only 'drafting' that occured was when I unintentionally ran into othe swimmers.

Exit the water more slowly. I stood up in the water, got really excited about my time, and sprinted out of the water and up the beach like freakin David Hasselhoff. I was hopping over waves, flying by people. All the Marines helping there went nuts and whooped it up. I was like a rock star for about twenty seconds, until mortality caught up and I started wheezing and shuffling my way to T1. However, if they had timed from when you stand up in the water and the first 30 meters up the beach, I'd have been on the podium today. hah

Decent. I was still a little winded from the aforementioned water-exiting incident. I had my head about me but was a little to tired to move fast.
Did fine mounting the bike.

see above. save david hasselhoff imitations for late night drinking games.

I hate biking. My back always gets sore. I did move pretty well in the aero, when I could stay in it without getting sore. My goal for this was to average 20mph, I fell a little short.

Learn to bike. I also would have liked a little more to drink. Maybe get one of those oddly shaped water bottles that goes between the aerobars.

Actually did the feet on top of shoes thing without munching it. Money. It felt pretty quick, I need to get some of those elastic laces. Oh, and what are the odds that you and the guy across the rack from you arrive at T2 at the exact same time and try to rack your bike in the exact same spot.

elastic laces, keep practicing the feet on shoes-dismount thing.

A little disappointed with my running time, this is my strongest event. I blame the bike, as I do for everything. I got a few blisters, but that was later on and they weren't too bad. My legs actually felt pretty good. I think I was just overall a little worn down.

run faster.
hydrate more. If it was hotter, I would have been hurting.

just walked around, didn't do this correctly


The Marines did a great job with this race. All the motivators out there saying things like... "Everyone ELSE is on the couch right now", "Pain is only temporary!", or my favorite.."You will NOT stop running on my hill!" (picture these being yelled aloud while you are on the verge of triathlon death. Everything started exactly on time too.