Your DOH! moments in triathlon ...

This happened last weekend in a local sprint that I did.  Almost complete failure on my part, I simply have no idea what I was thinking.

I arrive towards the end of check-in and transition setup, and just prior to the pre-race meeting.  Because I was later than most they ran out of my color swim cap, so they gave me another color, but said to go ahead and swim with my correct heat, which was heat number 1.  They start the pre-race meeting and I stand there and listen to every word, as if I've never heard one of these before.  The meeting ends, and they say, "Alright, let's get down to the start and get going!".  It's now that I realize I don't have my wetsuit on yet, have no pre-race nutrition in me such as clif shots or anything, and the race start is 400 yards down the shore from the transition.  I run back to transition, get my wetsuit on, forgot to put my tri top on, couldn't get the zipper all the way up my back, grab my goggles and swim cap and sprint all the way back to the race start.  I'm still a hundred yards away and my entire wave is in the water ready to start.  I get my swim cap on, get my goggles on and watch them all start as I'm still running to get there.  I run through the crowd, jump a fence and plow into the water to get going.  Meanwhile everyone on shore is screaming at me and getting all upset because I'm cheating and in the wrong wave, remember the swim cap issue?!  The race director had to come on the loudspeaker and calm everyone down and explain that I was where I belonged, albeit late, and they just ran out of my color swim cap.

The upside to all this?  Despite being 30 seconds behind my entire wave, I still had the 10th fastest swim time of the entire day out 200 racers.

...mine was published in Triathlon Life:

"This summer, I picked my race packet up the morning of the race. I took the packet with me into a port-a-potty. When I got back to transition to finish setting up, I realized I had left my timing chip in the port-a-potty! I went back over to the port-a-potties and asked a few people in line to check when they got in there. One of them started knocking on doors asking if anyone saw a timing chip in there. Someone found my chip, and everyone waiting in line cheered for me when he walked out of the port-a-potty with it and handed it to me."

Oh, and I ran over my bike helmet with my car a few weeks ago

Ya had to bring that up, huh?  :-)

I’m in the men’s locker room, whisk my running shorts out of my gym bag and pair of pink panties go flying across the locker room!  “Uh, cough, cough hmm, uh…..where did those come from?”  [Mike decides playing dumb is not working so mutters something about static cling]

Philly tri this year was set up so that the wave start for the swim was queued up next to transition.

There were so many waves that I was back from the swim and getting ready for the bike only to have about 20 people waiting to get into the water yell at me "your helmet's on backwards."

Nothing like an audience of your peers, is there!

I was warming up for an indoor tri on the Cybex bike and saw my boyfriend (also racing) had left his shirt on the bike. I grabbed it as I left, thinking I was doing him a favor since he'd obviously carelessly forgotten he'd left his shirt there.

Come to find he had purposely left it there so he could throw it on while he was riding (he was in the 1st heat) and had the RD asking everyone who took his shirt - unbeknownst to me as I was racing at the time.

Normally I would have apologized, but he was forced to race shirtless, which is never a bad thing in my eyes 

^^^^^ See, it's not just you (and your pink panties), Mike

My first tri this year was about a 4 hour drive away.  My wife and I packed everything up, piled into the car and started driving.  About 45 mins from our place, we have to cross a toll bridge to get off the island we live on.  The toll is $43 (ugh) and about 5 mins onto the bridge (It's a 13km bridge so about a 10-12 min drive) my wife says "You remembered your wetsuit right?".  DOH!!!!  I had forgotten both my wetsuit and my goggles.  So we had to cross the rest of the bridge, call her parents who went to our house and got the wetsuit and goggles and would meet us halfway there.  We then had to go back across the bridge and half way home to meet them.  Fortunately, my wife was able to convince the bridge peeps that we shouldn't pay the toll again as we had just crossed it earlier!  A nice 4 hour drive turned into a 6.5 hour drive because I didn't check my list! 

and while I *could* have raced without the wetsuit, it would have been cold!  There were a couple of people that did and they looked miserable standing on their tippy toes gasping for air!

Ok, not my story but a great story so I’ll share. 

My friend left work and drove to the park where she was going to go for a run.  She already had her running shorts and shoes on when she got out of the car.  She THOUGHT she was wearing her sports bar so peeled off her Polo shirt and threw it in the car and locked the door.  It was then that she realized she was wearing her regular, very lacey bra and looked up to see several guys staring at her to see what she was gonna do next.

Classic nothing new on race day DOH.... right before the swim at the AG Nationals in Tuscaloosa this past year... I decided a GU was in order... I sucked that thing down as I walked to the swim start... I FELT INVINCIBLE... unfortunately.. with zero water on top of the GU... the GU felt invincible about 300 yards into the swim... swimming with indigestion... in a river...  is probably one of the worst things I have ever experienced... NOTHING NEW ON RACE DAY!!!

So... I say that... yet tomorrow I will be racing on my new tri bike that I fit myself on last night...

Love this topic...it fits me.  :-)

I was on Kwajalein in the south Pacific for a while and would often run around the island before hitting the pool.  One day I ran to few miles and ended up at the pool.  All the lanes were taken so I sat down, took off my shirt and began talking to two women at the end of the pool.  Finally a lane opened up and I started swimming laps.

On about my second lap my arm brushed across my pecs and I felt something that was not skin.  Oh NO!!  I still had the Band-Aids on my nipples!!!  I nearly gasp a mouthful of water when I laughed out loud realizing what those two women must have thought. 

I decided the Band-Aids must go before I get out of the pool but did not want to make a scene by stopping to peal the Band-Aids off my nipples so I decided I could do this mid-stroke.  Now I'm not a hairy-chested man....but I ain't bald either!  I reached up and ripped one Band-Aid off in mid-stoke and let out a whelp...yeeooowww!!!  Fortunately my yell was underwater so it was muted to my fellow swimmer....I hope.  This cracked me up too! 

The story of my first tri:

Had everything laid out and packed perfectly the night before. Got up on time. Grabbed my stuff and head out the door. Live in the city, and race was just on the north side so was taking the train (don't own a car). Get to train station, realize I don't have my helmet. Go back, get helmet, back to train station. Now who would guess a city train would be packed before 5 in the morning? I was running way behind because of the helmet debacle and had to beg people to squeeze so I could get on with my bike. Got to the necessary stop. Rode hard to get to race site and get into transition before it closed. Basically through my stuff down and got booted out. No one else was with me, and there was no gear check/swim bags, so walked around for a couple of hours in just my jammers. Finally my wave started, got into transition, and had no clue where my stuff was! Spent several minutes looking for my bike. Did the same thing coming in for T2. After the race I realized I must have run down my row and past my stuff many times, just wasn't looking hard enough.

Second tri is 2 weeks out. I am getting there super early and getting the best spot in the transition area possible!