Very choppy, difficult to sight forward, felt like a fishing float, and on last section back to shore I kept getting blown off course by the wind.

Still better than last years swim was.

Had to rack my bike handle bars 1st due to the rack being so low.

They took the tight turns though the neighborhood out, which was great. Felt great the entire bike other than having stability problems on the long down hill section of View High road into a cross wind. Still not quite used to my 404's light weight and had to leave the aero bars to feel safe both trips down the hill.

It was nice to pass nice bikes with nice wheels on a nice bike with nice wheels. Especially love to pass the egomaniacs with disks only going 18 mph. Don't they know a disk doesn't help when going that slow?

When I passed a group of racers on my 1st loop going north on Raytown road (about 28 mph) they asked me , "what I was on?". I said, "my bike"

Happy that I was able to squeeze another 1/2 mph faster average over last year after missing 14 days of key training with a cold and bronchitis.

Push it harder. I would like to be in the 23 to 24 mph zone next year for this race and I think that is very doable!

Transition 2 went well.

Even though I ran through a lot of mud on the new gravel path surface it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be and I managed to be last years time.

I should have opened it up more on the 2nd lap. I didn't have my HRM but my breath rate would have put my HR rate at about 155 bpm and I can go 6 miles in the 160 to 170 range.

Water, gatorade, stretch, and pizza.


Being sick 3 weeks before the race and my slow swim.


This was my 1st trip to the podium at a big race, which was very cool indeed!