I was really thinking I'd be under 45 minutes for this since I was about 44 minutes at the 2000m splash n' dash a few weeks ago. I did manage to swim away from the course on the way out, so that added some distance and on the way back, I managed to swim a bit too far into the center of the course. Other than some slightly questionable swim navigation, I was pleased with this swim and it turns out to be possible the nicest part of the day!

Maybe get some new goggles. My current ones are tinted pretty dark and being small, they're not doing me any favors from a sighting standpoint.

This went really smoothly. Wetsuit strippers got me out pretty fast other than the suit hanging up on my heels, as always. I didn't bother to spend a lot of time cleaning off grass, just slammed on my socks and shoes and hit it.

Nothing at this point. Some day I'll experiment with putting my shoes on my bike.

I got on to the bike and in the first half mile, I see a wreck on the opposite side of the road with several athletes involved. Not a good sign I though. Got settled down into an okay pace. Probably should have let my HR come down a bit more. I was hoping to catch Todd before too long and at mile 3 I had found him. I thought I was going to be able to put a lot of distance between him and I on this bike course. I passed him and after several minutes, I figured I had dropped him. To my surprise, he suddenly pulled up right next to me. WTF??? We must have done this back and forth passing thing 8-10 times. Finally on the 3rd loop, I told myself I had better let it go. My HR was in the mid-160s, so I came to the realization that Todd was trained up better than me and he was going to beat me today. I backed off and let myself recover a bit. As I was on the last stretch of Rio Salado heading East, I noticed by aerobars and front wheel weren't parallel. I was worried that my handlebars were loose, so after the last turn-around on Rio, I pulled off to the side and checked. I didn't want to find myself descending Curry with loose handlebars. They seemed tight, so I nudged them back to straight and got going again. This course was pretty decent other than that the hardest part of the course is at the end. I did my final climbs around Curry and headed back to transition. I would have liked to come in under 3 hours, but with the short handlebar check stop, I missed it.

I had kind of slacked off on bike training in the month leading up to the race. It was just hard to juggle everything, so it fell by the wayside. I need to accept the fact that I'll need to spend some time on the trainer if I want to stay fresh on the bike.

Another good transition. Had my feet out of the shoes and slowly trotted through transition and racked my bike. I quickly got on my running shoes and carried my visor, race belt and hydration belt out of transition and put them on as I was moving.

Nothing to complain about here! No need to hit the restroom this time around.

By now, the temps had really started to climb. I knew it was going to be warm, so I took it easy. First loop wasn't too bad, but I couldn't hit a pace that I thought was good. Took on water, gatorade, water, ice and the occasional coke at the aid stations. On the second loop, I actually started to walk the aid stations. I also filled up my water bottles too so I'd have something to keep me cool between aid stations. 2nd loop wasn't a whole lot harder than the first, but I did walk a small amount in the shade under the 202 and at the aid stations again. Just before the turn-around on the north side of the 202, I was a few co-workers that were also competing. I walked one last aid station and then hit the final few miles. I managed to slightly pick up the pace for the last few miles to a pace that I wish I had been at the entire run. That last mile seemed soooooo long!

Should have taken it a bit easier on the bike and saved more for the run. This was my slowest half marathon ever!

Hit the restroom (and hacked up foot in the process) and sat in the shade with my family and had some more Ironman Perform. After sufficient rest, we went down to Mill and ate and headed home. Hopped in the pool to relax my warm body and then took a long shower.


As always, need more aerobic base and need to take it easier on the bike. Also put in more training time in general.


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