The course was short for sure; everyone was commenting on it after the fact. The fact of the matter is they measure the course from the start to the finish of the run which is considerable. I did the match after the race I think it comes out 160 meters shorter than last year. Still doing that math my swim time was well over a minute faster than last year.

I swam hard

Navigation was a mess on this swim -

I could not find the string for my wet suit to say me; drove me nuts and slowed me down

affix the wet suit pull

One guy passed me on the bike; I passed him back and hit cut a corner (wisely I might add) and I never quite got him. He was the wave ahead of me. Other than that it was a good ride in tougher conditions than last year (4 seconds faster)

I forgot to start my Garmin 500 before the race. I typically turn it on, it gets the satellite then shuts itself off while I am off swimming. It took a good while to get a signal which meant I was flying blind for a while.

I had a bonk breaker with me and a gel; the bonk breaker literally came out of the package after one bite. Best laid plans of mice and men

Got the left foot out of the shoe and the right popped out before I could the foot out. Oh well

The combined T2 into our run times - no clue why as that was not true last year. Run was over a minute faster than last year. With a hip I was not sure of and absolutely blowing up again. Got passed by the female overall winner.

More nutrition and water on the bike? 10K is a weird distance -

I was hurting afterwards. I thought I was going to throw up at the finish. Grabbed some water and simply sat down. Ran into Matt Perry (4th overall and crushed the AG). Waited for results to be posted to verify my time. I was close on the AG podium - got passed on the run frankly.


The hip - huge worry and was not certain what to expect. Nutrition was not great and felt pretty darn tired after the fact.


70 seconds - I wanted to be 70 seconds faster than last year to break 2:30. Well with the swim being short that was not a problem but I figure I was 3 minutes faster than last year. I was faster in every segment except T2. Given the 10 days prior, it was a huge success - would love to be on the AG podium (well there was no podium) but the time was the goal.


I have hard rating this race for a multitude of reasons; I have made this an A race on my calendar. I actually rested and did what for me is a true taper (planned and unplanned) . It fits well into our family calendar (end of school the next week so it frees me up some for the summer time with less training stress) plus it is one of the few Olys in the state. The venue itself is not bad to race - I counted less than 20 cars on the race route this year and that felt high! The swim is nice and tends to be wetsuit legal even in June.

The run is well not so fun but could be so much worse. The road in and out of the venue (which is 9 plus miles of the ride) could use a re-pavement job .The run is deceptively harder than it looks is the net of the equation. My elevation gain from my watch was pretty high - i think it was in error?

If this race was not the week after the Raleigh Half I know it would be bigger - it use to be a great deal bigger in prior years. It has some of the worse after race festivities - there is no on e for bike help pre-race, Zero vendors at all after the race. Being in the Lake Norman area I am so use to having these huge spreads and vendors galore. There was no referee on site (that is right at the women on the relay with the head phones !).

They do provide Jersey Mike subs. But after say Tri the Trump it is pretty stark.

I enjoy the challenge and it reminds me every year why this is my limit distance wise. I would have to really -re-learn how to race at longer distances

The swim course - who knows. Why the T2 times where lumped into run times - who knows. Glad I had my 910 on my wrist for sure.

Will likely do it next year