Ok, I swear that I'm not this slow of a swimmer. My average 1.2 mile pace has been around 40 minutes. Not blazing speed, but generally in the area of 2 min per 100 yds. Looking at the results of this swim you'd think that I doggy paddled the entire way.

I started out fairly strong, passing a few people and getting into some open water, but then my shoulders really started to burn and I could tell that I was fighting a bit of current. Every time I looked up to see the buoy it looked like it was just as far away as the last time I looked - this is not good. After awhile I had to switch to breast stroke to let my shoulders rest - I was wishing at that time that I'd worn my sleeveless wetsuit cuz I the full was making me work a lot harder than I'm used to.

I kept thinking though that the return trip downstream would be good, that I'd make it up there.....Not. Turning at the buoy I found that the wind was coming upstream causing some pretty choppy water. I kept taking on water and a few times ended up throwing up a bit and my left calf started cramping - not a good sign - now I'm not sure which way was easier, upstream or down. Apparently both were bad cuz I ended up with the absolute worst swim time I've ever done. I was a good 15 minutes off of my normal time for that distance - I couldn't believe it when I looked at my watch and saw how long it took. That pretty much set the tone for the rest of the race....I knew this would not be easy.

The end of the swim was interesting. Again, I hadn't done this course before, or even previewed it so I wasn't sure what to expect. I thought that maybe there would be steps in water or a submerged dock. Nope, had to pull myself out of the water. They had volunteers there helping pull people out of the drink but I was able to handle it ok.

Now a longish run up the dock, across the road and into T1. The guy next to me was having issues getting his suit off so I helped him, then he pulled mine off for me too since it got stuck on my heals. He was amazed by how hard the swim was too - at least it wasn't just me. But, looking at my rankings, not everyone had issues...but scanning through some of the times in my age group, no one had killer times, so I'm going to say this was a hard swim!


Wear my sleeveless wetsuit.

Nothing stellar here - took my time putting on my socks, ate a Gu and took off.

Nothing.

Son of a b.....This was hard, much harder than I expected. I knew it was going to be hilly, but this much climbing I definitely wasn't prepared for. I'm not sure how this compares to other races like Louisville or Lake Placid, but get this....Near the end of the course I was talking with a girl who had done Ironman Austria and she said that over the 56 miles of Knoxville there were more climbs than all 112 miles of Austria. I'm gonna say that based on that comment, Knoxville is a tad hilly.

The first hour was pretty bad for me. I wasn't feeling that great - stomach was queasy and I kept throwing up in my mouth - at one point I thought I was going to fully spew...yes, gross. But I just rinsed my mouth out and pushed on.

At around 8 miles or so we hit our first big hill. There was a huge caravan of us going up it and we were topped out at a solid 4mph. Now to put this into perspective for those of you who know Kensington, the hill that runs by the main head quarters of is one of the steepest and I usually average about 9mph on it without standing up. The long uphill climb by Maple beach I usually am able to do about the same. After 1 hour I looked down and I'd only gone just under 17 miles, not a good start as I'm normally in the 20-21 mile range at that point...and that was the easy part of the course.

After that my stomach calmed down, but I wasn't hungry at all. I forced myself to drink a lot and eventually ate a couple of Gu's and had a Payday candy bar (much tastier than a Cliff bar), but that was about it.

Mile 48 brought a monster hill that just kept going up and up for about a mile. I never thought it'd end. At this point I was fried. The lack of outdoor bike training really hit me hard - my hamstrings were killing me and my quads were on fire. But we weren't done. Coming back into town there was one last hill - not real long but where it lacked length it made up in steepness. I was forced to stand up in saddle and give it everything I had just to keep it over 3mph and not fall over.

So after 3 dropped chains (lots and lots of shifting here) I finally rolled back into transition.


Train more....like go up the hills at Kensington towing a sled loaded with weights!

Again, just took my time here. At this point I knew that my run would be really long and painful. I told Sue that at that point the only reason I was finishing was so that Sarah could see her pic up on the JumboTron!

Right outside of T2 were a series of steps....Seriously?!! Oy vey! The first mile went by pretty slowly - my legs felt like lead - I'd totally burned them out on the bike. The first 3 miles of the course was flat, just some small hills, nothing big, but even so my legs never loosened up one bit. My cardio was fine - it was just my legs that decided they'd had it. Then we entered a beautiful subdivision - huge mansions, nice big trees, and yes, nice rolling hills, just what I was hoping for! Needless to say I did a lot of walking.

Got a lot of "Go Navy" shout outs as I had on my Navy jersey - about all I could respond with was a hearty grunt that would have made my drill instructor proud. Ran for a while with a girl that had on her Army jersey. I'd paced her husband on the bike until I dropped a chain and had to stop.

I finally came back up to the World Fair Park for the last .5 miles of the run. Some small hills there that I seriously wanted to stop and walk, but with all of the people also on the walking around and urging me on I couldn't - so I just hunkered down and sucked it up. Finally I came out of the park and saw Sue and Sarah. I grabbed Sarah's hand and she and I ran the rest of the way across the finish line. Actually Sarah was pulling me cuz I could barely keep up with her as she really wanted to run for real! Was a good feeling hearing the loudspeaker announce that the United States Navy was crossing the finish line!

Grabbed a water and Sue, Sarah and I walked back down to transition to get my bike.


Conditioning. No amount of trainer rides can prepare you for something like this. Ya, you can ride a computrainer or jack up the resistance, but its really hard to simulate the conditions that you face when you're outside going up real hills and feeling real wind. The weather here in MI hasn't cooperated at all - its been so flipping cold out till lately that I wasn't able to get out as much as I should have for a race like this. Not sure what I could have done about the swim. I'm in pretty good condition for that having kept up on all my training with the MAC team. I'm just not as strong a swimmer as I was when I was younger.


Rev3 did an awesome job. I can't complain at all about their organization or the venue itself. The course was beautiful and it was challenging. The issues I had were self-inflicted due to not enough training. I'm pretty sure that I could have gotten away with doing Steelhead with the training I'd had, but then there's simply no comparison in terms of course difficulty with those two venues. Knoxville is very hard and not for the faint of heart. If you're looking for a challenge or are gearing up for an IM like Lake Placid or Louisville, I'd say this is a great race to practice with.