only panicked a little. really impressed with my ability to keep calm and keep swimming and focus on form. no problems with the swim cap for once, which was AWESOME.

practice the swim more before my next race, work on more frequent sighting toward the end + swimming straight. i should also learn how to draft in a swim. overall extremely pleased - considering i just "learned" to swim in april and did my first OWS just two weeks ago!

socks were a bad idea coming out of the swim. darren was also a bit of a distraction at this point, talking and taking pictures when i knew i should have been moving.

focused! and maybe skipped socks on the bike portion, and lubed the edges of the wetsuit. i was only 30 seconds later than the girl before me at the overall finish, and she got me SOLELY by being faster in and out of the transition zone! (she finished her transitions more than 2 minutes before me)

definitely need to work on shifting, hills, and keeping higher cadence + speed. i was amazed at some of the riders that sped past me. i could tell i had only been on a "real bike" for two weeks and not training on the bike for 6-7 weeks before that. i still did well, thanks to marcia (my new specialized tarmac!) - i almost feel like i was cheating, riding her like that.

wear an HRM and keep a consistently high HR if possible. i was going at a "comfortable" lung pace for too much of this but my legs were kind of tired. overall i am really pleased. also would have eaten something earlier in the ride and not shoved anything in my mouth on my way to the run. also, i have the alerts on my FR70, but a bike computer that actually showed me cadence and speed would be really useful!

set up with a clear dismount, so couldn't really get out of the shoes early. darren not being there made this go much quicker.

jogged out of the transition zone!

cramped a little in my side, def could not feel my legs. started to run out of steam at mile 4-4.5.

never run in a cycling jersey! bad idea. and lose weight to make it easier to go fast. also, my race chip/ankle band was WAY too tight and i was bleeding halfway through the run, which was a distraction. :) still, not a bad run for me.

walking around with the guys and getting that freaking bracelet off my ankle.


food awkwardly timed, distractions in the transition zone. mostly i think i just need to train more. for my first tri, i'm really happy with the emotional control, smoothness, and overall performance. there's a lot to work on, but this was a great start.