This was one of my better race swims. My swim here 3 years ago was a little faster but there was a much stronger current that year. Sighted well and swam a great straight line, caught a few feet to draft, and kept a good steady pace. Stopped my watch when I got to the top of the swim exit ramp but the official race time doesn't stop your swim time until after a 150 yard run from the water to T1. This is my real swim time but the official race swim time was 11:40.

Nothing

Kept my own T1 time since the official time was skewed by the timing mat being so far from the water. T1 time includes the run from the water and about a 60-70 yard run to the bike mount line. Other than the longer than usual runs, a pretty routine T1

Nothing

The bike start is uphill for about a block, then levels out into the really turny part of the course. Got into my shoes pretty quickly and took off. HR was pretty high after the swim but I just kept pushing, knowing that it would calm down after about 5 miles...and it did. A good share of the second mile of the loop is a mild uphill on really rough road so that keeps your attention. Saw one bad crash just a bit ahead of me. A guy doing about 25-27 mph got clipped by a slower rider drifting into him on a corner and it looked like he just exploded. Bike with him attached was flipping through the air then he landed and did a couple more flips before his bike came loose. I went by him and he was screaming and holding his arm. Then just ahead of him, a guy was turned to look at him and ran right into the curb at 20mph plus and he went flipping off into the grass. Craziness. The guy who wrecked badly finished the race though...kudos to him. Kept pushing at a good effort through the 11 miles.

Nothing. Pretty happy with the bike considering the technical course and crowds.

Here's where I had a little hiccup. Coming into T2, ready to do a flying dismount and standing on one pedal, I touched my brakes a little too hard and the front brake grabbed...and sent me flying over the handle bars and crashing. Great. Didn't get anything worse than a little roadrash on my knee though so jumped up and kept going. Lost a few seconds to being stupid though.

Not crash!

Felt pretty rough at the start of the run after pushing the bike but just kept running through it. The uphill part of the first mile really didn't feel very good at all but eventually I started feeling better. Last mile felt pretty decent.

Not much. Suck it up.

Walked for a bit to shake out the legs. Met up with Lisa and we talked to some of our friends who were racing then waited for awards.


Run fitness needs to be better.


Took 1st in my AG, Clydesdale Masters, and was 5th overall 50-54 AG. This was the USAT Pacific Northwest Regional Sprint Tri championship with a lot of people from all over this region so I was very happy with the result. Very well run race with the exception of the awards...took way too long and disorganized. Next race will be the USAT Pacific Northwest AG Championships at the CDA Olympic race. We'll see how things go on a longer, much hillier course.