Time is off of my watch when leaving the water; don't know the official times yet.

That's a Looonngg swim! Several people said it was likely longer than advertised (1500m). Having said that, I felt great and just cruised along. Coming back toward shore you were swimming straight into the rising sun, and I couldn't see squat. I had to ask the kayak guy if I was headed generally in the right direction...he said "swim toward the sun". :)

take a better line in toward shore..hard when you can't see the buoys or much of anything else.

The start of my curse, apparently. Ran the bike toward the exit and my sensor fell off and was swinging in the spokes. Had to wait for a couple of zip ties.

Bring the damn road bike, rack and all!

Well, here's where it came unglued. I was cruising along, about 10 miles into the first loop, passing people, averaging 20 mph and feeling good. Then.. I felt my pedal wobble. Looked down..my crank arm had loosened and I'd lost the bolt. I got off, looked for the bolt, no luck. Started to walk back, and after a few feet, figured out that hey, maybe I could one-leg it back. So I got on the bike, left leg hanging and crank arm in hand, and proceeded to pedal 3 miles back to transition with one foot. :)

When I got there, the bike SAG had already left, and nobody had a bolt for me. I had to pull my chip; no official time for me. At this point, I wasn't going to stop though. I figured pedaling one-legged for 3 miles had to count for something, even if I didn't get to complete the second bike loop, so I racked my bike and headed out to do the run.

Avoid having to pedal with one leg...it leaves something to be desired.

Time is off of my watch again, for obvious reasons I won't have an official time. Run went fine..the iced sponges on the head saved me. It was very hot but I never felt in serious difficulty. In retrospect, I think I could've pushed harder..

leave it all on the course!

Lack of two pedals!


This was my "A" race, the one I've trained all season for. I was very nervous last night about the long swim, and that combined with an upset stomach meant I didn't sleep at all. I am glad to say that it was actually easy after all that! I just cruised along through the swim; felt like I could easily go do it again.

Of course, I wish I'd gotten an official time, but I've never worried about biking 26 miles; I was cruising through that. I could extrapolate, guess, whatever, and figure what my time would've been but you know what? Who cares. I'm in this for the training and the experience, and I had a good time today.

The post-race party was nice; lots of food, good BBQ, and even a beer after I'd cooled down enough to enjoy it.