I hated this swim's performance. The first buoy was alright, but afterwards it was just off course the whole way to the finish. There were buoys ALWAYS on the horizon and because of the time trial start there were no people to gauge where I was going, because they were everywhere. There were a few different colored buoys but the race announcer wasn't finite in which color buoy we should go to after which turn, and the kayakers were relatively thinned out by the time my wave went (looking for the drowning swimmers not the lost ones). As a result, I added on roughly 300 meters to the total course. That took a serious hit on my time and my motivation to go faster in the water. If I could do the course again I really do believe I could get out in 26 minutes.

I looked at the entire course map and knew it like the back of my hand, but it was just very disorienting. Rounding the buoys was smooth and almost flawless, however afterwards the direction to go wasn't absolute.

I messed up the flying mount at my sprint tris two weeks ago so I didn't want to attempt anything that would mess up my mojo today on a race where transitions aren't nearly as important as in sprints; so however still important, I put my shoes on before running out of transition and made use of a wetsuit stripper before actually entering the transition area.

I need to practice fast transitions more. I was unnerved from two weeks ago so played it safe today. It wasn't bad, but it could have been better.

Nutrition was nailed perfectly, however I'm not sure how well it translated into the run. I didn't feel anything on the bike so I thought it was pretty good.

I found a gear that I felt comfortable pushing at "comfortably hard" and went one gear easier, and kept that pace and effort level. It worked well and I didn't fade at the end.


I feel I executed the race pretty well, however in training I would like to have done my long rides much harder. The duration was fine, since my long rides went to about 75 miles at their peak. I pushed my body to a new limit on this race and found my red-line zone.

I thought that the dismount line was about a block earlier than it really was so I put my feet on top of my shoes much earlier than I needed to. It wasn't much of a big issue because most of the last block was turning and slowing down (downhill), but it was a small detail.

I had severe gastrointestinal pain for the first four miles, then it died down. The muscle right above my kneecap in both knees was locking up from start to finish and only getting progressively worse; it locked at about mile 6 and I stretched for about ten seconds and pushed onward. My left foot had severe pain on the plantar fascia and another ligament that runs from the outside of the left toe down to the arch.

It was excruciating and mentally, very difficult to push the pace. The first four miles were right on target at 7:50 min/mi and I was feeling very strong minus the GI pain, and thought I could cruise at this pace without any severe exertion then "let loose" at the last 5k and finish in 4:50. After the third aid station at about mile 4 the race just went to hell.

Normally in training I've done 14 mile runs at about a 7:45-7:50 pace without too much exertion so was hoping for that pace to be the run pace. It didn't work. I ran from aid station to aid station and walked the whole station grabbing ice sponges, ironman PERFORM, water and a GU at miles 2, 5, 7 and 10.

The past three weeks weren't ideal in terms of training. The previous weekend there was a field training exercise with little to no sleep and land navigation in HOT weather that lasted several hours, among training lanes. I think this is where my feet injuries came from as the issued boots from ROTC are several years old and broken in to someone else's foot.

I needed longer long runs in training. Longer brick sessions as well. Mile 4 is where I fell apart. Oddly enough, my longest brick was 60mi bike 4 mile run, though even at an easier effort.

I pushed my legs through so much pain the last 3 miles that I got talked into getting iced down at the medical tent and very gentle stretching in the cold. Re-hydrated and had some fruit. It took about thirty minutes before I could finally stumble around and get my change of clothes.


The three weeks leading up to the race were horrible as far as a proper taper. Race conditions were almost ideal. Mentally I was strong. I believe the time to be shaved will come from better training.


My goal of 4:45 was hampered by getting lost on the swim course and my secondary "satisfied" goal of 5:00 fell apart due to poor run performance. Any easier on the bike and I would have felt lazy, but considering my average pace was an 8:20 min/mi even with walking the aid stations, I feel a standalone half marathon could have been finished in 1:38, so time shaved would be under fifteen minutes from the run while eight to ten minutes would have been gained on the bike. A net difference would have been plus or minus five minutes