I lined myself up in the very front towards the buoy. I hate swimming where I can see the bottom and so I decided to move out to deeper water. Also, I thought that new swimmers might be lining up towards shore because knowing that they could always stand up if needed and I didn't want to get caught up in all that.

The beeper went off and our group took off. I was able to position myself in the front pack - about halfway through, I noticed that the pack had all but disappear and that there was only one girl in front of me and one right next to me. The one right next to me was in a wetsuit and we were swimming stroke for stroke the same almost until the finish. I don't know if she was getting irritated with us being so close together or if it was an accident, but I got hit in the goggles causing my right one to fill up with water. I wasn't going to stop to fix them in just a sprint and so I swam the final 100 yards with water in my eye. I finally managed to drop her.

Get away from people. I thought that I was moving away from the girl in the wetsuit, but it seemed like we were only inches apart the entire time. The benefit I might get from drafting doesn't make up for getting hit in the eye.

So I ran out of the water and I hear my group of friends yelling for me which is really great. I also hear the volunteers yelling 'Alright - Go! 3rd woman out of the water!'. I don't know why this freaks me out, but it's one of the reasons that I hate wave starts. You know where you are within the pack of people you're competing against and it puts a huge pressure on you to not let anyone with a ponytail pass you on the bike or run.

Regardless, the climb from the beach up to TA was incredibly brutal, but since I was the 3rd girl, I couldn't let them see me walking up it. :) So I just took small baby steps and tried to control my breathing. Hit my rack, put helmet, socks and bike shoes on and took off.

Not much. It was about 1/4 mile run from swim exit to transition so T1 time is actually pretty good.

So I took off from transition and immediately begin passing the guys from waves ahead of me. That was one great thing about this race and course - you got to see and encourage so many people. It took me a good 2 miles to get my heartrate to calm down from the run from transition and then after that it was smooth sailing. The roads were a little rough, but the race organization tried to mark the major potholes and areas to avoid.

I took water throughout the bike in my aerobottle and only drank a little gatorade at miles 7 and 13 (about 1/4 of a bottle in total).

Push harder. I really just wanted to enjoy the bike. I was coasting on the downhills and not killing myself up the uphills. After the past 3 months of Olympics and Halfs, this bike split seemed to go by SO fast!

Bike in, helmet and bike shoes off. Running shoes on. Visor, running belt and gel in my hand.

Nothing. I can't complain about my T2 times this season. I've got a good system going.

I ran out of T2, grabbed some gatorade and immediately heard Felix (zaichikmiller) yelling for me as I ran by. I wanted to say something back, but I was slightly out of breath and very much in a zone. It was still great to have such support out there. My mentality was to just keep running and it seemed to work. Before I knew it, I was beginning to see some of the guys I knew from Get-Fit coming back the other way (we all gave acknowledgements). I grabbed some water from the aide station and took a gel (just to get me through the rest of the run). Hit the turnaround - I LOVE that they had a timing pad at the turnaround - and headed back the way we had come. Saw Courtney (clelling) out on the run and tried to smile at her (again - a zone). Finished the run with friends cheering me on. Heard my name called out and Tony from ATS telling me good job. Knew that I hadn't let anyone in my age group pass me on the run or bike so it only depended on it someone was in front of me off of the swim.

Well, this run was good, but I know that I can get faster. I ran a 5k at the end of a sprint in the mid-22s at the beginning of the year and the course was similar difficulty. I have just let my speed run training slide so I will work on getting my times down again.

Walked around and met up with friends. Waited for the rest of the people I knew to finish. Went and picked up t-shirt and grabbed some pizza, cookies and diet coke. MMM.


End of season blues. And tiredness. Plus, I haven't been training for sprint distances.


I got 1st in my age group which I'm really happy about. I think it's the largest age group that I've actually placed in. I was also the 5th female overall out of about 225 women. Now I just need to figure out how to move up a couple of spots. :) Overall, it was much more fun to hang out with friends and Bters than to worry about getting awards.

I'm so glad that GaMultisports added this sprint to the end of the year. It's a great course and it's a perfect event for first time triathletes to hit up. That atmosphere was awesome out there - everyone was encouraging and having fun. I would highly recommend this event to anyone.