Only about 35 women participants, so swim start was pretty gentle. I started in the back of the pack and pretty much stayed there. The woman swimming to my right kept swimming into me, so I switched to her right side instead. Then she began swimming into me over there. This went on until we rounded the first buoy and I could stay to the far right of the course and get away from her. The first 350 yards felt pretty rough, but once I rounded the first buoy, it felt as though I finally had a good cadence, breathing and sighting pattern. I focused on a low head in the water and pulling all the way through my catch. By the time the last buoy arrived, I was pretty tired of being in the water. I tried to pull hard through each stroke.

My swim time was close to last year's time at this race. Considering that last year I was a mere 3 weeks from a half Ironman, I feel as though I'm starting the year on a positive note.

Be more consistent with my swim training in the off season.

I had a couple issues in transition with getting my shoes unvelcroed and on my feet as well as dripping water onto the inside of my glasses. I should have waited to put my helmet and glasses on until after I was done bending over getting my shoes on. Otherwise, this is an improvement over last year's race at the same venue.

Not drip water inside my prescription sunglasses.

I felt good on the bike. It took me a bit of time once I left transition to get my heart rate down a bit. I rode hard and passed a few people the first couple of miles. I caught up with a tri fiend, and we passed each other over and over for about 18 miles.

As I was coming towards transition, the run and bike course share the same road inside the West Dam Park. There were runners on the ride side of the road, and I was getting ready to pass a gentleman ahead of me when his wife and daughter darted from the left side of the road in front of me to be with him on the right side of the road. Why I don't know. He didn't appear to be in distress. However, their being in the road, and not paying attention to anyone but the man caused me distress. As I was getting ready to pass, the woman realized I was there. She and her daughter then attempted to run back across the street directly in my path. I was yelling, "Stop, stop, stop!" and the woman was yelling at her daughter. It was about 15 seconds of sheet chaos. I locked up my rear brake as the little girl ran directly in front of me. My bike went sideways, I yelled again for her to STOP and she finally did. I let go of the brake, put my bike in the berm/dirt on the side of the road. It fortunately righted itself and I was able to continue my forward momentum. For a moment, though, I thought both little girl and I were going to eat it pretty badly.



I feel pretty good about the bike. I will, however, ride more in my tri kit shorts before race day. The seam hits me at a weird angle on my saddle. Otherwise, I may just swap out my kit shorts with a pair of DeSoto shorts.

Got into transition and wasted a few minutes trying to fit my bike back under the rack. I did sit down to take off my cycling shoes, put on socks and put on my shoes. Grabbed my visor and my race # and off I went. This was probably my best T2 so far.

Just rack my bike by the bars if I can't get it to fit?

I felt really good for the first loop of the run. My friend, Carrie, was still directly in front of me and we kept talking. On the 2nd loop, both of us started to struggle, so we decided to run side by side. We'd make deals and then when we got to certain points, we'd renegotiate our deal. I was glad to have her run with me. We ran down the finish chute together and finished with the same time.

Just need a more solid running base. Still.

Walked around, drank some water...waited about 30 minutes to eat anything as my stomach was a bit upset.


Training


The is the first time this race has been held. It's identical to the Hot Dam Oly tri in September, but the weather was so nice this time of year. I'm pleased that Set Up events made the decision to host it.