The swim start was staggered, and I was in wave 17 of 20. The first wave started at 6:55, but mine didn't start until 8:10. I did get in the water to do a small swim practice, but there was a lot of waiting - and to be honest, all the excess waiting sucked. It's hard to maintain focus waiting so long.

In any case, when my wave finally started, I thought my swim went well. The water was a nice temperature and I started off at a good pace despite some traffic and not being able to find any feet. The back half of the swim heading back to the beach didn't go as well because every time I turned to breathe, the sun was right there, so sighting (ie. navigating) was a bit more difficult on the second half than the first half. I had tinited goggles, but there is only so much they can do. But overall, I did well and am pleased with my time.

Need to practice ows more - this was my first ows of the year. And my goggles probably need to be replaced. Otherwise, I was happy with my swim

Walked from beach to transition, and probably 'lost' a few minutes. But did a reasonable transition to bike once I got there.

Perhaps I could have jogged or ran to transition

The bike leg is generally uphill for the first 12ish miles, with a couple of fairly steep sections. I didn't push myself too hard on this section because I knew I would pay for it later. I passed a number of people, so it seemed that my climbing legs were in good shape. At around mile 15 when the course became more reasonable with rolling hills, I decided to push it a bit more. I continued to do really well on the climbing and descending (and passed a lot of folks), but think I lost time on the flatter sections. And my split times confirm this - my climbing/descending is great, but my flat riding is comparatively weak. I noticed that I would pass folks going up hill, they would pass me on the flats and then I pass them again on the next hill. Weird, eh? Now I know what I need to work on. Any ideas?

In any case, the second half of the ride is generally downhill, and I descended well...in fact, I was reaching speeds of more than 42 miles per hour on some sections. Overall, I had a good, but not great, bike ride.

BTW, there is a 2 mile no passing zone just before the end of the bike leg because of traffic patterns, and I know I lost some time here. I was flying upto that point, and as soon as I entered in the no passing zone there was a dude going really slow. He was from a previous wave and was struggling. I felt bad for him, but dude c'mon. He held up a number of us. I would think we lost 3-4 minutes over this stretch. Granted, 3-4 minutes isn't all that much in a +/- 6hr race, but it definitely took away some momentum I had towards the end of the bike leg. I guess these things happen when you start in a late swim wave. Oh well.

I need to practice flat riding. To be honest, I think my bike leg can be faster and *should* be faster.

Fairly normal transition to run gear. Had to stop by a porta-pottie, so that added some time.

nothing

The run leg was as expected. My plan was to walk the uphills and run the rest, and this worked out fairly well. The run course is a double out and back. The first part of the course is reasonably flat, a few mild hills, but overall a fair course. I did well on that part on both laps. The part right before the first turnaround is a double hill - you run uphill, it level out just a bit and then it's uphill again to the turnaround point. The second hill really burns. There were a lot of folks suffering on this part. I had no intention to push myself that hard to run the hills, so I fast walked up the hills. I was actually passing folks who were still trying to run.

When I was descending the double hill on my last lap, I saw a challenged athlete trying to go uphill in his wheel chair. Man, that dude was suffering. He was giving it all he had and it was an *amazing* sight to behold. Everybody was cheering him on, willing him to keep going. That guy is awesome!! Here we are with two legs complaining about the hills, and this challenged athlete is going up the same hills using just the strength and power in his arms and back, and if he stopped pushing even for a second, he would have rolled backwards. That dude is definitely inspirational. Good for him. I was running (slowly) when I saw him, and definitely kicked it up a notch after seeing him.

I used that inspiration to finish the 2nd lap, and finished strong. Overall, it was a good run leg.

And I saw two friends from high school on the run course - one racing and one volunteering - that was pretty cool too.

Need to practice running and also on hills on tired legs - perhaps more bricks.

Got my medal, hugged my family, got some food and water, and got a massage. I ended-up finding out that the guy sitting next to me in line in the massage tent lives only a few blocks away from where I do.


I really enjoyed Syr 70.3! The race was really well organized, the course is challenging, volunteers were great(!) and the weather was really nice. No complaints. My daughter did the Ironkids race and placed 5th, so that was another really nice part about the weekend.