Because of Ophelia, the current was opposite the way it usually goes, and it was nice and strong. So we swam with the beach on our right, which is perfect for me since I breath to the right. Very light chop, almost none in fact, and the tide was coming in so the hardest part was not getting inside the buoys. I stood up at 11:40 and was on the beach by 11:50. The official time includes a 400m run across asphalt to transition, and my poor tender feet did not do so well after the 400m walk barefoot from transition down to the swim start. I guess I should coordinate some sandals somehow...will remember that in April.

My actual pace on the swim was 2:22/100m. The race report insists on calculating in the time it took me to run/walk to T1. :P

I decided to start mid-pack this time, since the conditions were exactly right for the way I swim. What a trip! We all lumped up at the first buoy and had to tread water for a minute while everyone got themselves round. I got whacked in the back of the head repeatedly by some guy's elbow, I got kicked several times...it was like a mosh pit. It totally rocked. I am NEVER hanging back to the edge of a mass start again! The only thing is I might actually want to start out front because I think I could really improve my time if I weren't perpetually slowing down to navigate around slow and/or thrashing people, I passed a ton of people (who subsequently passed right by my on the way to transition because I'm slow running barefoot).

Not a single thing. The swim itself was amazingly good, fast, strong.

I guess the only thing I [sort-of] wish I'd done differently is actually tried to race this part. I was having such a good time that I forgot to try to focus on strong pulls and actually going fast. This happens to me in the pool too, if I don't focus on every single stroke I just laze off and have a big ole time like I'm not trying to accomplish anything. OTOH, starting out the race like this put me in exactly the right mindset for the rest of the race, so I don't know that I'd change it for the additional half minute gain.

Much improved over April! No wetsuit to worry with, but also much faster into my socks and shoes. Helmet, sunglasses on in good time and good order, the only slowdown was gloves and I'm a little particular about my socks, but it was fractional seconds on the socks.

I either need to learn to ride without gloves, or get looser gloves for racing. I lost a lot of time struggling wet hands into tight gloves. Blek.

Woot for cornering practice, woot for being aero for 50% of the ride. But bigtime suckage for not having actually gotten my lazy butt on the bike for 2 weeks pre-race! Woah. I was suffering more than I think I needed to...yes, I was pushing, but my muscles felt like they'd never been used to bike before. Got a cramp in my calf or...something that hurt from mid-calf to mid-hamstring, left leg, on lap 2 and by the 4th lap I had to drop off my speed if I wanted to run at all. And my neck hurt!!! How stupid is that?? I always do indoor trainer rides with a helmet so that this doesn't happen, but I rarely go aero on the trainer and so my traps started aching midway thru.

Train more, and outside! That's all there is to it, I simply was not prepared to ride like I wanted to ride. Next year I'm going to tear up that course, there's no excuses in April.

Much improved over April. Again with the gloves being tight causing a problem, but otherwise this was easy.

Gloves -- either ditch 'em or get bigger ones.

What a glorious day to go for a run. Perfect temperature, beautiful scenery on HHI, just fabulous. Despite the leg cramp on the bike I just went for it on the run and tried to cruise at a slightly faster than average speed. I felt some twinges but for the most part just chanted "quick feet and high knees." I don't think I accomplished either one, based on the photos, but it kept my brain busy. :)

Nothing. It was a fabulous run. And SOOOOOO close to my goal of 9:30 for a 5k. And a PR!!!

Post-race-stupidity-syndrome trying to locate the transition area and pack my gear over to the hotel. Thank god the SO was in attendance to lead my grinning self back home.


Lack of training on the bike. I went about where I should be on the swim and run, and 3 laps I was doing about what I should've been doing on the bike but that 4th lap really dragged me back. The muscle cramp on the bike was a bit alarming, and I'm not sure what brought it on, but it did slow me down some. And of course that damn barefoot-over-asphalt thing -- a guy I know who got out of the water a full minute behind me got to T1 2 minutes faster than I did because he was able to run up there while I hobbled. Sickening.


I rated this race the best simply because I went into it knowing it was the last race of my first season, I wanted to compare it to my first ever tri (which was this same race 6 months ago), and coming off all the stress from Katrina. The weather was so perfect there simply aren't any words for it. The race was tight and well-organized, well-staffed. I didn't quite make it sub-1:30:00 (which was my goal) but I came really, really, really close and I took EIGHT MINUTES off my time from 6 months ago. I can't think of anything that went wrong. I performed exactly where I should be at this stage.

Ranking for all female participants:
Overall: 46/96
Swim: 50/96
Bike: 45/96
Run: 52/96