Ok, my swim totaly sucked!!! I ended up doing breaststroke for about 90% of the race. I just couldn't every seem to catch my breath. Then when I would start going well, I get a someone not swimming straight and then I couldn't get enough speed to get around them. Not sure what the problem was, I think the combination of not having been in the lake before and not really swimming with people all around me, kind of freaked me out.

Need to get more open water swims in, and get used to swimming with people all around me.

There are no transition times, both T1 and T2 times are included in the bike segment. I felt I did a good job in T1, except for the part where we had to run up a hill at the end of the swim.. When I got to the top of the hill ended up needing to walk the rest of the distance to my bike to catch my breath. I would guess my T1 time was about 3-4 minutes.. Had some difficulty running and jumping on my bike.

i think this went well, need to get some different tires on my bike eventually so I don't have to turn it over to get on it..Do a few more true swim/bike bricks this one kicked my butt more than the bike/run did..

Bike went really well, didn't have any problems, passed some people. I think I was able to maintain a pretty steady pace. Course was nice and flat, they had police at intersections so we could just continue through. There were a few sharp turns as we headed back though the park, and out the parking lot on each lap. Had one Gu Gel on Bike at begginning of 3rd lap.

Need to put some slicks on my MTB.

Again no Transition time. Had some trouble getting bike gloves off, probably should have just left them on. Sliped on singlet top and race number belt and was off. Decided at last minute no to take fuel belt with water on run. They were suppose to have 2 water stations ended up only being really one.

Leave bike gloves on or figure out how to get them off quicker. Take fuel belt with water.

Run went well, anything under 11 minutes miles is good for me.. There was one kind of medium size hill towards the end. They had said the one aid station would be accessiable on the way in and the way out, but unless you wanted to run out of you way it wasn't accessiable on the way back. I couldn't have used a little more water. Should have used my own fuel belt. The run ended on the sandy beach, nothing like swimming/biking/running and then having to run the last 50yards in SAND, I felt like I was never going to finish.

Take my own water!!!!

Grabbed some water, walked around to catch my breath for a bit. They had a nice spread of sandwich makings, salads, and muffins. So made a sandwich and had a couple muffins and more water. stretched a bit. Discovered I had dropped my ID earlier in the day when they announced it over the PA, yikes hadn't realized that. Hung around a little bit talked with my co-worker who came to cheer me on for a bit. Headed home. Discovered when I got back to my bike, my front tire is flat.


Training in open water. Since I only decided about 3 1/2 weeks prior to the race to do it, I just never found the time to get out in the lake prior to the race, this really affected my swim.


I think I did pretty good for my first tri. I still would have like to do a better swim and know I am capable of one.

Thanks to all the other BT's for this site and message boards, I honestly can say that I don't think I would have done as well with out having found this site. Reading everyone else's experiences helped me tremendously!!! Thank you!!!