This was a good swim for me, I'm just slow.

Sighted well and had very little contact. Actually concentrated on swimming faster and not being content to just be comfortable.

Had good form and technique, I'm just slow.

Swim faster.

I had a goal of 9 minutes and was just a little slower than that. Normally I would have predicted 10 minutes and been close, but wanted to challenge myself somewhat today.

I'm rating this a good swim for me, I'm just slow.

Good T1.

The fastest in my AG was 51s and I was fourth at 55s. Not much difference.

We had been assigned rack spots by AG, so everybody was working from the same rack positions and no one had the advantage of a sweet location.

Had to pick up and carry the bike to detour around a logjam of folks sauntering to the mount area. Come on people; move it along, it's a race!

Nothing.

Now that I was out of the water and on dry land where I was designed to be, it was time to get to work on making up for the slow swimming.

With a stripped down bike and my new aero helmet, it was time to fly. I put the hammer down and never let up, except for the cornering. It was just 10 miles, so there would be no holding back.

This was a fun ride and somewhere along the way, I passed up most of the guys who'd beaten me out of the water.

Played leap-frog with a guy in my AG who eventually passed me for good and beat me on the bike by 14 seconds. He had a faster run than me, but was penalized 2 minutes (drafting off of me?) and I ended up beating him by 14 seconds in the overall. Funny how that worked out.

The bike traffic wasn't too bad and everybody stayed to the right, just like they're supposed to. None of the craziness of the 2 and 3 abreast like in my last race.

Being such a short ride, I didn't fool around with any nutrition, and only drank about 8 of the 12 ozs of GE from the aero bottle.

Brought it in fast, dismounted and hit the line almost perfectly.

Time to go run.

Not much that could be done. Not knowing the course, I had predicted 27 minutes and pretty much nailed it.

With all the corners, you just had to be careful and slow up a little bit. I don't feel comfortable bombing unfamiliar corners at 20+ mph.

Tied for second place in AG. So I'm thinking that's pretty good.

I run relatively fast in bike shoes.




Nothing.

Rack bike, throw off helmet, change shoes, grab number belt; it's not rocket surgery.

I'm not a slave to my watch, but I glanced it for the first time, and knew that I could beat my time goal if I didn't let up.

It was time to "hurt myself" as Johnny Cash had sung it and it started right out of T2 by sprinting hard for the first half mile. Slowly started settling down into a steady striding/breathing pattern, but probably stayed at my LT the whole time. Wasn't afraid to breath heavily and loudly.

I had already decided that I wasn't going to let anybody pass me. My challenge was to stay with whoever caught me.

At about the 2/3rds mark, a woman (37) came up on me at a fast pace. I hung on her heels for a 100 yards, but she was fast and I couldn't maintain it. I'd been "chicked". She was a better runner. Oh well, no shame in that.

Passed a lot of runners, but none in my AG. The 4 faster guys were well ahead and I guess I'd already passed the others on the bike.

Half mile to go, stayed steady to the end, never faded, and finished with a sprint.

Nothing really; pushed it hard, and ran my race.

I had predicted 23 minutes and hit it very close. Some racers thought the course was a bit long, and it seemed long, but I can't say for sure.

Walked around; got some fruit, couple of smoothies, piece of pizza, and some water. Kind of disappointed they didn't have any coke or beer; something with some flavor and fizz.

Found a tent offering free massages for the price of my email address and they had an open table. What the heck, I'll give it a try. I didn't know what "hurt" was until those gals got ahold of my legs. Yowza! They found the sore spots alright. I begged for mercy, and soon they were finished. I guess I "felt better", not too sure.


Slow swimming will hinder any further advancement towards the top placings. I was fortunate to win the AG a couple weeks ago, but that was a one-time deal.

I'm very pleased with this race on several levels:
1) I met all my time goals and predictions.
2) I beat my overall time goal by 1m-32s.
3) I bettered my time by slightly more than 6 minutes from last year.
4) I made zero mistakes and performed to the best of my abilities.

Everything else is clicking into place, but the swimming has a ways to go.

It's easy to maintain this level of hurt for an hour; the question will be whether I can do it for twice the distance and for another ~1h-45m at CapTex next weekend.


This was a fun race, short enough to go wide-open and not mess up any training schedules and just a well run event. Gave it 4 just because it lacked that "little extra" that makes it a 5.