I intended to swim smooth and efficiently without much exertion. I accomplished that, but thought I'd be faster. Just this morning I swam the first 200 of practice in 3:20...why was I so much slower?

This pool has no lines however and the wall blends to the bottom and is absolutely invisible. It's the same color blue as the water. I literally had to use open water sighting to know where the wall was.

Swim with more effort.

Great, fast transition. Went in to the water in 17th. Came out in 19th, I think (I was being gracious and waited at the wall for passers).

But I think I passed a lot of people in transition.

On the bike I felt like I was strong, yet wasn't pushing too hard. It was paced well, but I wonder if I wouldn't have been better off pushing more on the bike?

Maybe push harder and suffer more to see where that got me.

I came out of the water 19th? Then on the bike I remember passing 6? So I should have been in 13th...

My swim team buddy Wes started #4. On the bike course I passed him...got passed back...passed him again...got passed back getting my feet out of the shoes just before T2....He transitioned fast and was on the run before me.

Nothing.

No water during the race at all btw...that's 'just right' in this race. I did pour water over my head for cooling however.

Coming out of T2 and down the hill I was chasing Wes and expecting the thing and fit and YOUNG kid to pull away. (by being with him I already had about a minute lead).

I found my legs surprisingly ready to run off the bike and didn't have the usual repiratory issues transitioning to the run...I let the downhill pull me while I relaxed and used very little energy and allowed my stride to lengthen.

Then I proceeded to follow Wes at the fastest pace I dared. I passed a guy right off the bat down the hill going out of T2 but then it was Wes and me and no one else in sight. There is a section of the race less than 1/2 mile in where you lap the inside of a stadium and therefore had over a quarter mile view and there was no one within a quarter mile of us.

I had no idea how many people were in front. As we ran we got closer and closer to the turn around in a part of the course with no real view ahead. Suddenly the race leader (my buddy Brad) can booking toward me in the lead. That's 1. Then the chaser, Rob came through. That's 2. Then as I saw Wes get to the turnaround I realized I was running in 4th position on the course. So where in the world did I pass the other 12 or more people???? TRANSITIONS!

With less than 1/2 mile left I caught and passed Wes. He said something to the effect that he was conceding defeat and I tried to build a gap. But youth....hasn't lost leg speed yet. And he passed me again before the finish continuing the leap-frogging we'd been doing since the bike.

And the rest of the people that beat me came in behind me having started behind me too.

Nothing

Talked and walked. Drank water...got a cold towel..

About 45 minutes after the finish I joined my youngest son in the pool and I can't tell you how nice it is to take a dip in a pool after a race!


Well, this was a good race for me all around...but perhaps I had more than I dared think and could have pushed harder in the swim and bike?


Nice race. It's always done well for a small event. There was a big snafu this year though that has never happened at this race before.

A course volunteer misunderstood the directions. The out and back course went through the local stadium and this meant that we did 2 laps of the stadium total. She was telling runners to lap it twice on the way out and twice on the way back!
I don't know how many people did this, but none of us at the front did it.

It underscores the speech the USAT official gave us at the start...we must know the course and the race director is the only one that can tell us the course has changed...and beyond that we aren't to accept the word of ANYONE on the course, not even cops....