This was my first competitive swim in the wetsuit and I felt great. I started right on the start line with a more or less straight shot to the first turn buoy. I didn't lead out the swim but I maintained a very steady pace throughout. With the current pushing I hit the turn buoy more quickly than expected and then got pushed slightly off course crossing the river. Swimming into the current I moved away from the field towards the bank as I've been told that minimizes the amount of current your experience. I swam hard for the entire course and came out of the water near the front of the sprinters. At the turn we mixed in the many of the OD swimmers (we were :15 minutes behind there start so there were lots of swimmers for the last half of our swim) but I was suprised afterwards looking at pictures at how many bikes were still in transition when I got out of the water. I wasn't able to find any good drafting targets, I kept catching people but then would drop them in short order. I came out of the water feeling like I had paced myself perfectly in the swim.

Nothing

As I came out of the water I ran to transition I felt strong throughout. Immediately upon exiting the water I started searching for the zipper, got the suit down around my waist and goggles and cap off long before hitting transition. I ran past my stall (by about two yards) and had to backtrack. Got out of the suit and grabbed my helmet and glasses and was off running with the bike. The only problem that I had was that after I crossed the mount line I couldn't get my shoe to flip (I had forgotten elastics) and this led to troulbe getting on. In fact one of the shoes got knocked out of the pedals so I had to drop my bike, get the shoe on and then make it on the bike. This probably only cost me :30 or so but it is an easy fix.

Remember elastics and make sure I spot my bike as soon as I enter transition.

I really pushed on the bike course. As well, as I put my other foot in the pedal I popped the strap from the shoe and didn't bother fixing it. So I did the whole bike leg with on shoe unfastened. After being frustrated by the start to the bike I wasn't feeling great for the first 3km or so. I couldn't find my cadence and everything felt too easy or too hard. I passed a couple of racers and then got passed a couple of times. After that I found a good comfortable/hard pace that I could maintain for the remainder of the race. I traded positions with several other racers until the turnaround and then started dropping most people on the return leg. I didn't notice until part way through the first half of the bike that the majority of people I was racing with were in the OD race. It was a great feeling to be dropping people on bikes that cost 10 times as much as mine! On the return leg I was passed by a couple of OD athletes. Coming back into transition I was able to get my feet out of my shoes and hit the ground running.

Bring elastics, use vaseline in my shoes and make sure that I tape the end of the straps so they can't pull through their loops.

The only problems that I had with T2 was that I overran my stall again and I didn't have vaseline in my shoes to help them slide on. Beyond that, I had a great transition.

Make sure I see my stall on the way in and use vaseline in the shoes.

It took me a while to settle into my pace on the run - overall my pace was good but I felt like I was really pushing it for the first couple of kms. After the first aid station (1.5km) I really started to fall into my pace and was able maintain a steady pace. I started counting people in front of me as I approached the turnaround - realized that I was number ten so I really concentrated on running the second half solid so that I could finish top ten. Also, they only had Gatorade at the turnaround and I would have greatly preferred water at this point. With around 1km to go, I got passed by another athlete and tried hard to stay with him but I couldn't. I ended up finishing 11th, and am very happy with the how I finished the run!

Vaseline in the shoes and possibly use my fuel belt so I can have water throughout.

Walked and stretched for about twenty minutes. Got some food and something to drink and felt pretty good after about five minutes of warmdown.


I think I had an almost perfect race. There were a couple of hiccups with running past my stall in T1 and T2 (stupid!), forgetting to bring elastics to support my shoes on the bike and not using vaseline in my shoes but overall I think this was an incredibly successful race. By far this was the hardest that I have pushed myself yet and am extremely happy with how things turned out!


This is my last sprint of the season and I am very satisfied with how everything went. I pushed myself as hard as I could without blowing up and managed to finish just within what I would expect my skills and abilities allow.