The first 500 yards was terrible. Had problems breathing and just didn't feel comfortable. My sighting was terrible. I bet I swam 1.2 miles. I have worked really hard to improve my swim times, and I think that I actually took a step backwards today.

I have to practice open water swims if I expect to have better race times.

Better transition than my previous 2 races. There was a tough steep run into T1. I stripped my suit at the bottom of the hill and that helped. I was pretty winded before I mounted the bike.

I need to practice transitions

Ranked 5th overall. Really proud of that. My offseason bike workouts really paid off. If I had a shot of placing, I needed to kill the bike, so I hammered it. I started to cramp a little on the last half lap and knew that I was in for a bad run. I felt great about the bike leg. I never got passed and passed a bunch of people. When I got near transition, I passed 4 runners so I knew that I had a good shot of placing.

I can't go that hard on a longer distance. I probably should't have pushed it as much as I did since I knew that I had a tough run coming up.

Good fast transition.

I fumbled getting my watch off the bike and onto my wrist. Need to practice that a bit more.

This was the hardest run that I've done in a few years. I started cramping at mile 2 and knew that some tough hills were coming up. I only took one gel with me and there was no nutrition on the course. Just water and gatorade. I ended up walking .25 miles and probably stopped 4-5 times to get a cramp out. At mile 7, some guy was about to pass me and he asked if I needed anything. He gave me a salt tablet and that helped me finish relatively pain free. I'm embarrassed about a 9 minute mile, but considering the shape I was in, I fought off the pain and finished okay.

Bring my own nutrition. Rookie mistake.

Hung out with some MidTN guys waiting for awards.


Too hard on bike and lack of nutrition.


I placed 2nd in my age group (only 7) and I'm really really happy about that. (Especially since it was my 3rd Triathlon). My goal was 4:15 and I beat that by 10 minutes. It was a tough course, but I really enjoyed it, especially the bike leg. I made up my mind that I was going to push it really hard on the bike and hope that i had enough gas in the tank for the run. Well...I ran out of gas, but finished strong enough to place. I was really disappointed by the lack of nutrition on the run course. I now know to carry my own no matter what is promised. Today was a great day because I finally got to see all of my hard work pay off.