I was surprisingly calm and focused before the swim start and throughout the whole segment.

I was in the 2nd wave, there were 8 lanes with 8 participants in each, caps were colored and each participant left at a 5 sec interval. My cap was white meaning that I had to start first.

I wanted to have a strong and steady swim, saving harder effort in case I had to pass other swimmers in my lane; I ended up passing two of them. I was the first out of the pool in my wave.

Nothing, my swim was better than I expected!

Transition times did not count in this race. However, I feel I did pretty well except for the fact that I struggled a little getting on the bike and inserting my foot in my left shoe.

I would have pedaled more to have a good coasting speed in order to put my shoes on without struggling too much. I will put elastics on the next race to keep the shoes horizontal.

There were some little debris on the track after the Senna turn and the track was shared with other cyclists and rollerbladers (a big no no in a race like this in my opinion).

Had a bottle of HEED throughout the bike segment and another packet of Sport Beans at the beginning of the last lap.

I could definitely have been a little more aggressive on the corners/turns and could have used higher gears when pedaling with a 95 - 100 cadence. I could have also gotten out of the "ease into the bike" mode a lot sooner.

Being too cautious made me take a more conservative approach as far as the bike portion goes.

It was a lot easier to get the feet out of the shoes and jump off the bike! Overall a pretty good T2, speed laces were VERY useful. Good thing I grabbed my belt with my bottle of water, there was only Gatorade available at the drink station.

Nothing.

I did not expect the run to be done on trails; I never did trail running before therefore I was being very careful of where my two feet were landing. There were also short but sharp hills, something I did not train for at all but I am overall pleased with my run time.

Spend more running training time doing strides/sprint drills and hill repeats.

Walk on the island with my mom... she's a fast walker!


Lack of preparation for trail running, not enough hill repeats and sprints/strides during training, and being too conservative on the bike.


My post race activity was a picnic with my mom and dad on the island after the race chatting about training and how the race went.

If I would have known that the transition times did not count, I would have taken my sweet time. On the other hand, rushing in and out served its purpose, it was a great opportunity to practice.

Negatives:

1) No water at the drink station, only Gatorade; 2) not enough volunteers in the transition area; 3) bike course should not have been shared with other cyclists and rollerbladers; 4) an increased police presence would have been welcomed at the Cosmos Bridge crossing.

Positives:

1) Great location for a race; 2) met with Chipit Muffin, she's an awesome, uplifting and cool tri mom! Salut Isa, ça m'a fait plaisir de t'avoir rencontré et j'espère qu'on se reprendra plus tard!

I will be back in Montreal September 15 to race the Esprit Olympic Triathlon.