started at far left of corral, the right side appeared closer to first bouy so most congregated there, stayed to inside left of pack the whole way, sighted more frequently than last week and had good visual cues from the mass of 89 yellow caps to my right. Swim had lots of physical contact but everyone was fairly polite about it as we all searched for our own little piece of water to swim in. The kink in the back stretch due to floating turn bouy is clearly visible on my Garmin trace.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/180318923

Occasionally switched side breathing to give shoulders/neck a break, experimented with 2/3 and 3/5 breathing in the last third, this is a little more effective when my stroke cadence slows down toward the end of a long swim, it is probably a little slow but very effective for recovery efforts after getting a mouthful of water or whatnot.

All in all felt really good swimming, I'm no speedster but I was comfortable and maintained an effective stroke the whole way. Got a massive cramp in my right hamstring when I stood up to exit the water.

nothing, just a couple minutes slower than I was expecting/hoping for, perhaps partially explained by the floating buoy.

5th AG, 47 OA
hamsting cramp had me hobbling up the hill stiff legged and took a few seconds in transition to stretch it as I pulled my wetsuit off. Figured if I could just get on the bike I could stretch at 20 mph instead of stationary in transition.

nothing

Took first lap real conservatively due to cramped hamstring, 2nd lap was still on the conservative side of normal. I expected the bike to bring some hamstring relief though, and it did.

Crowded pretty well describes the course and wide describes the width of the handlebars on mountain bikes and hybrids. Lap one was okay, only passed a few packs that were 3 or 4 wide but once the sprint traffic mixed in they were everywhere. The speed differentials and closeness of some passess was scary. Got my front wheel clipped once, fortunately while climbing so it was in slow motion and an easy save. I about went horse on the south leg of Raytown road where it was single lane yelling stay right, 2 simple rules: stay right and always leave room for bikes on your left, oh, and transition closes at 7:00.

I checked average power at end of 1st lap and it showed 209 W, I knew I was taking it easy but thats more than 10% down from training ride a week earlier and it sure didn't feel like I was taking it that easy, after race I found there was some warmup time figured into the average I forgot to clear from memory, doh!

Drank 1 bottle of Heed (2 scoops), unhappy tummy, especially on the first lap, maybe a bit queesy from the swim or just trying to get too many calories?

push more on the bike but that wasn't an option with the hamstring cramp

11 AG, 74 OA
crowded coming into transition but not too bad
shoes and socks, didn't want gravel and blisters
glanced at my watch and saw 1:38, no seconds shown once I'm past an hour, than meant I had less than 42 minutes to run the 10k, this is going to hurt

nothing

Started out with focus on standing up, opening up hips, and keeping strides quick and short. First mile was 6:52 I had a side stitch but managed to get it to go away, the next 2 were around 6:40 and I felt pretty good so I knew it was going to be close at the finish. First mile of lap 2 was 7:01, the wind was blowing pretty good down the park road and I kept losing focus and easing up. Finished up with a 6:45 and 6:34. Stomach was unsettled the entire time.

Not much, Not knowing the exact race time when it was going to be so close was tough mentally. But an arbitray round number isn't a real big deal, in the grand scheme of things.

walking around and talking


-Not real structured or focused on the training, although total volume has been sufficient, most sessions were under an hour, including warmup.
-Maybe if I'm going to be hard on myself about missing goals I should start eating to race rather than racing to eat.
-Hamstring cramp, not sure what set that off but it stuck with me, thinking back over the past year or so I've had some close hamstring calls so I guess I'll have to add them to the ever growing list of failing body parts that need focused stretching/conditioning as I get older.
-was starting to get burned out with training, I was tired and grumpy after many workouts the last month or so, not a good thing when this is supposed to help with sanity.

Got some vacation coming up next week with cold lakes, endless gravel roads and fire trails, and grampa and grandma to entertian the kids, priceless.


It's become a KC Triathlon tradition: communication prior to race, poor; execution on race day, excellent. As I was walking around barefoot in the grass pre-race, eyes on the ground looking for things I didn't want to step on, I noticed that even the grass was freshly raked/vacuumed/something I don't know how you get grass that clean, there was NOTHING in the grass except clean dirt and blades of grass, talk about attention to detail.

I've bought the VIP every year I've raced, in the past it was a good value, shoes, sunglasses, personal masseusse and bike mechanic, but now it is little more than a parking pass, still worth getting for me so the family will come out and watch and not have to trek 2 miles for a diaper change or the 3rd set of dry clothes, good food in a nice shady tent goes a long way. All in all a well organized and growing race, I'll be back next year.