The run felt hard. I neeeeed to do some hill work, as the hill totally kicked my butt. I did give a kick to get under 50 minutes, which felt good.

Use bodyglide! I didn't and I got terrible chafing from running while totally sopping wet. Ouch. That didn't happen in the tri, so I wasn't prepared for it at all. Oh well.

I did some terrible self-talk all through this swim. I thought I was going super slow and thought I totally sucked. I had a hard time sighting and this was my first swim where the waves were strong enough to alter my course. I wasn't used to dealing with that. I knew that the majority of the people in this race were fast, and I should have been prepared to be smoked and just to swim my swim. But, it took me at least 2/3rds of the race to get their mentally. I also had to stop once and clear my goggles, because I couldn't see through the fog. Amazingly, the time was a lot faster than I thought it would be. So, I guess in the end it went well.

Don't worry about what anyone else is doing - just swim your own race and relax. Put your head down and go! Oh, and don't stand up too early. Keep swimming even though you can stand.

I took a little extra time here to catch my breath. I'm not used to doing swim/run transitions and cardiovascularly, this puts more strain on me than a bike/run transition. I really want a tri suit and race belt, though. That would make this transition a lot faster.

Walked back out on the course to cheer on Siri. Ate some cookies and drank some sports drink.


My mental state.


This is a very mellow race - casual mid week evening kind of race. It was fun and I enjoyed it. I'll be back next month!