I was sweating this swim. I had not swam much at all due to hurting my shoulder. 800 is a haul for me without a wetsuit regardless.

Although I had my doubts during the swim I held it together and finished it at a decent pace. Xterra folks are much faster than the average tri swimmer. I had to keep it going to not be the last out of both waves out of water. This race had a theme - hangin' with the ladies. I swam mostly with the ladies from the wave behind me (+ 1 min interval)

Not hurt my shoulder so I can swim more. I had planned on being better prepared for the swim. I can swim that distance better

This is as tired as I can remember coming out of the water. Death march to T1 and still heart punding while getting on the bike

swim more so I am not wrecked coming out of the water

HR was crazy for the 1st 4 miles of the bike. The poor ladies heard me coming behind them and quickly wanted me to pass if I was fortunate to catch anyone. Goal was to stay on my side of the handlebars and I accomplished that. I walked the huge sand hill both loops unfortunately. The Cammelbak was still a bit cold during the ride from freezing the water the night before. I was out by the time I arrived in T2 but I had plenty.

I need much more confidence to take an off-road course more agressively. I enjoyed parts of the course but I was clearly not racing.

better but not in any hurry for sure

Parts of the off road run course were not possible to run - trees everywhere and hard to determine what was woods and what was the course. I walked a good portion of the off road section hoping to have something for the sandy bake in the sun section around the lake. I managed a 9-10' mile pace both loops on the open portion. Walking 1/2 the run course will hurt your split time by a bunch. The heat and sand were a lot to handle. A guy stopped walking and decided to give me a challenge to the finish and I had plenty to fight back which told me I had a lot more that I didn't use in this race.

Hard to imagine that run was good for 11th in AG but it was crazy hot by the time we were running.

Find Mark congratulate a few other finishers and say hi to my wife. Keri surprised me by coming out to cheer with Rachel while I was running. It was good to see her even though I didn't do a good job of acknowledging how happy I was to see her while running. It was really great that they both managed to find us and check out this race for a bit.


Lack of swimming
Lack of experience on the mountain bike
lack of traction and incredible heat on the run


This was a good decision. I decided the goal was to finish and not race this one. I'm glad to finish a race and be happy about just finishing. Quite a few did not complete this race and I'm happy I made it and wasn't last in any of the 3 sections. I'm not hooked and ready to do more of these but I am very happy I did this one. Who knows if it rains a bit more before this race and it pops up again next year I may give it another shot.