Before the race I was concerned over the possible temperature of the water. No worries there, the water felt great--and was definitely warmer than the outside air! A full suit was perfect.

Temperature aside, I was also concerned with just surviving the swim in decent shape. My swim training has been minimal this season so far, just mananging to average 1 workout/week, and this is my weakest sport by far. I was pleasantly surprised. I found a rhythm fairly easily and just cruised along. I held back for the swim for fear of running out of steam, but that never happened. I came out of the water feeling pretty refreshed, aside from the usually clumbsiness that follows a long swim. I definitely could have pushed harder and likely taken a couple of minutes off my time. But given my training situation, I'm pleased.

Had I known how the swim would fair, I would have pushed harder.

My T1 times always suck (that's a shocker...me taking my time). If I could get to an average time, say knock the time to 2:30, I would have ranked ~25 places higher.

I need to remember that the transitions are part of the race! Problem is I'm tied to wearing socks and gloves, and I put on my shoes off the bike. The way I see it, I'm really working to train for longer races, where my transition routines really won't change, but my times will be more acceptable since most people will follow similar routines.

Again, I was undertrained. My last ride before the race was on the Computrainer 6 days earlier and only 18.6 miles. I really needed more time on the bike, particularly taking the hills. Because of my lack of recent riding it took a good 30 minutes to get my biking legs. I felt pretty weak on the climbs. But as the ride progressed I felt stronger and stronger. Did a good deal of passing at the end of the ride and was able to ward off several "attacks" along the way.

In the end, I'm pretty happy with my performance, having broken into the 20MPH range. This was the first race (and 4th ride) on the GURU, loaded with Zipps.

TRAIN!

T2 time was pretty good. Could maybe shave 15 seconds, but not much more.

Move faster.

Did only 2 hill runs leading to the race.

My goal was to survive the run without injuring my knees. The night before the race, I was asked what my time goal was, which I hadn't really even thought about. Since I knew there would be a challenging terrain and my state of training, I figured I'd be happy if I broke 8 minute miles, something I had yet to do in a triathlon. I met that goal and my knees feel fine!

TRAIN!!

Walked around a bit. Watched some of the other finishers. Eventually found the food (of course up another hill!)


Undertrained. However, I really can't complain. As only my second Olympic distance race and the first of the season, I feel quite good about my performance. I feel I performed better in this race than I did the other Olympic race (Cranberry Country), which came at the end of last season, had shorter swim and bike segments and was a mostly flat course.


Crowd support was fairly minimal throughout most of the race, although there was quite a large gathering along the finishing chute. I high-fived around 20 people while running across the finishing line. A great way to finish!

This will definitely be on my schedule for next year. The race is extremely well organized. The course is awesome. A great Spring challenge!