This was the only area of the race that I wanted to do well in and that I knew last year had broken the rest of the race and made it into a really long day. I was focused, I had the fitness and pool time to complete the distance at a decent pace and now it was time to put up or shut up.

I lined up on the outside as I wanted to be out of everyone's way since I know I'm not the strongest swimmer. Announcer calls our wave to start and I wade out for about 50 yards since we could still walk and let the mess get going around me. Part of that is lack of confidence in my open water swim ability, I know for sure and really need to work on it.

Finally I got going. Stroke felt good and worked on staying long in the water and keeping things under control, but breathing felt a little tight - not something that happens in the wetsuit in the pool. Look up to sight on where I was and I was angled away from the sailboat everyone was sighting on. Fu-king great ....... here we go again ..... Unlike last year I calm down and push on mixing freestyle and breast stroke to sight. As we are cruising along I'm at the back outside of the group and the leader fish are gone in the distance in no time. They don't have any issues swimming straight!

I settle into more breast stroke and try to throw in freestyle when I can, but every time I'm all over the course and rarely going straight. So I resign myself to the fact that I'll be breast stroking the HIM swim (again) and pay attention to staying easy this year and let it happen. I just started reading "Going Long" by Gordo Byrn about ironman training and something sticks out in the first few pages that I've read, "It is better to commit 100% to a bad idea than to be indecisive about good ones." And that was what I did. I knew that breast stroking the swim last year had been a disaster and my downfall, but this year the chop and current weren't as bad even though we were swimming into it on the out leg so I stayed focused and as smooth as possible.

At the turn we suddenly got the current at our back and I was able to do a more mixed bag of freestyle and just took breaks breast stroking to site and pull myself back on course whenever I drifted. It really was a lot easier going back into the boat ramp and I was surprised that I was able to keep my freestyle line a lot better. I'd still say that I breast stroked more than freestyle on the way back in, but last year I did not do any free on the leg back in (which was the choppier part then).

As we got closer to the boatramp I knew that it was almost walkable and took some steps for a bit to check things out. To my surprise I was only at around 34 minutes or so with only a few hundred yards to go. I was shocked!! My ultimate goal was to be around 38 minutes which would be a 10 minute improvement over last year and I was thinking this would be a stretch to do that on a perfect swim for me. But here I was with another crappy swim and I was almost on my goal pace. Weird .....

Hit the ramp after freestyling some more and stood up. Shakey legs of course, but started to unzip and hit the watch as I crossed the timing mat. Ummm ..... 38 and change???? What the f-ck?? Oh well, I'll take it!!

Get more open water swim practice damnit!!! Sighting and swimming straight frickin' killed me again. I know I had the fitness and ability, just no confidence and experience. I need to get that asap or the aqua-bike in September and the Ironman in November are going to kill me!

Last year's time - 48:44, this year - 38:14. 10:30 in the bank over last year.

It was a reasonable run in from the water to my bike rack, but not THAT long. I kept the legs moving quickly to keep the pace good but not pushing it. Top off and peeled down the bottoms. Got to the rack, took off the suit fully and put socks on. Grabbed helmet and shades, made sure I had my nutrition in my pocket and put on the shoes and gloves. Since my rack was not far from the timing mat I didn't feel like doing the shoes-on-bike mount as it wouldn't save me that much time. I thought I was going along pretty well but whe I checked my watch I realized I was going slow as molasses. Great ......

Not watch an edpisode of The Lord of the Rings- Extended edition while sitting in the transition ........

Last year's time - 3:39, this year - 5:06. Lost 1:27, so 9:03 in the bank overall from last year.

Got up to speed pretty well after getting the gloves fully on and situated and immediately got down in the aero position. Riding out of town was slower because of a few turns and avoiding all the people on the road who were all over the place. I wan't fully hammering yet and was making sure to keep the heartrate under control and keeps things calm as I got situated. But we had a light tailwind and I wanted to take advantage of it as much as I could knowing that it wouldn't last!

Once out on the main roads for the course I let it go a bit. I did not have a speed sensor magnet on the disc wheel so I had no idea what my speed was or how far I had ridden at any point other than where they had marked mile marks on the road (usually every 10 - 15 miles or so). I was totally going by feel, cadence and gearing.

At this point I was flying past a lot of people, but not too many in my age group (that's how bad in the swim I am). There were not too many "packs" but when I came up on one I would try to fly on by if possible, always being very mindful of drafting. The rule states minimum of 7 lengths between the front of your bike and the next one, and you have a certain amount of time you are allowed to pass. What that works out as is that you can zoom into the draft of someone as you are passing them which allows you a small slingshot effect. Do this with all the people on the road and you can get moving pretty well without full on drafting!

I did get passed by some people ..... mainly the super fasties in the wave behind me (the ones that hadn't already passed me on the swim that is). I know that I was in my 53 x 16 gear or so which at 100 rpm (my typical cadence pedaling) is in the 25 - 27 mph range so they had to be really moving to pass me. A few times I really wanted to just match their speed and go with them knowing that I could, but trying to play it smart and pace myself. There was one guy on a BMC TT bike that was moving along and passed me, but he ended up going the same pace after that and we sort of hung together for a good 10 or 15 miles before I finally got a good shot at getting by him and leaving him for good.

At some point I remember figuring that we were near the halfway point and I was well under 1:15 which meant I was averaging in the mid 23 - 24 mph range. I was having a blast and drinking as much as I could handle. I also had a Gu bottle that had 5 Gu packs in it and was taking hits off of it every 1/2 hour or so, and this meant my nutrition seemed to be spot on! I was encouraging as many as I could and congratulating those that went past me and most importantly making a huge effort to thank all the volunteers every chance I got. I even started making a little sing-song of my "On your left ...... left left leeeefftt .... on your left" which probably annoyed the hell out of some people that may have been struggling more. But I was having fun!!

Soon we looped back into the wind and it became all business. I was still motoring and passing people, but I had to get down to my 53 x 18 gear and even the 53 x 19 sometimes with the really brutal windy stretches. Around the 40 mile point I watched an official really cracking down on the people drafting to avoid the big headwind. There was about a 3 mile stretch where I would see the motorcycle stop to penalize someone, pass him and quite a few riders, see him zoom up again and nail someone else. i'm glad that I was obviously going faster than everyone else because he didn't even give me a second glance as he drove by, and no one tried to jump on my wheel. Around this time I realized that my right shoe was slipping back and forth a little when I stood up .... uh oh, loose cleat! But it wasn't really an issue since I didn't have to stand and hammer like I would on a hilly course.

I tried to stay smooth and aero the whole time only standing up to stretch when I came up on someone I couldn't pass right away to stay out of their draft. Then motor past them when I could. As we got closer to town I got to see the pro men on their return leg of the run and they were moving! Back into town and towards the transition area there were more turns again so the speed came down and I finally slipped out of my shoes about a 1/4 mile from the dismount line. Hit the brakes, hop off at the dismount line and off to my transition. Great ride!!

Not much. This was a good effort on limited bike fitness. Maybe not hold back in the beginning when I knew I had a little help from the wind? And definitely double-check my cleats before hand ..... The event website has me doing 23.4 mph for an average which when you look at the race distance as I was told by the race director last year (56.4 miles and not 56 even) works out correctly. The top guy in my AG was only a little over a mph faster than me, which I probably could have done if I hammered, but I'll take this ride with no complaints!!

Last year's time - 2:48:08, this year - 2:24:28. Gained 23:40, so 32:43 in the bank overall from last year.

This one was better and I moved relatively quickly. The run out of T2 was like a 1/4 of a mile long almost from my rack, so that accounts for a lot of the time.

Not much, this was a pretty good transition all things considered. It could have been faster if I really wanted to make it, but I was happy to be off the bike with the overall time that I had up until then and didn't want to rush and get cramps or anything before the run really got going.

Last year's time - 3:55, this year - 3:07. Gained :48, so 33:31 in the bank overall from last year.

I was a little tired getting off the bike, but nothing was seizing like it had last year. I tried to stay high in my turnover and make it feel like little effort. Both my quads and hammies were cramping from the bike ride, but my calves felt fine, which is usually the part that goes first for me. I took this as a good sign. ;-)

First mile came easy in the 7:30's and the second one was a little faster which surprised me. I started thinking about what it would take to break 5 hours and knew that if I averaged a conservative 8 min./mile I could do it comfortably. I told myself to keep it smooth, stay on top of nutrition and make it feel like a minimal effort and then if I had anything left in the tank at the turn around to cut it loose there.

I'm glad I did that because after the turn the pace started to slow as the bike ride was catching up to me. I vowed not to walk anything other than a few feet at the rest stops and stuck to that the entire time. I didn't have any other gear to shift into so I was in hold it as long as you can mode even though the splits were getting up closer to 8's.

By the time I was 5 miles out, I was into the low 8 range and knew I had to really focus the last few miles as those are what were my downfall last year. And I did hold it together much to my happiness! Each mile I glanced at the heartrate which was climbing steadily and my splits were getting slower, but not at a disastrous rate. With 2 miles to go I had almost 25 minutes to break 5 hours and knew that barring disaster, I had it!

My last mile was the quicker of the few around it but still didn't crack back into the 7's. I had a few in my age group pass me through the run and passed a few of my own. Fred passed with me with about 4 to go and was looking smooth and solid, he did a fantastic job on his first HIM! At the finish I had put a little distance on the guy behind me (who was also in my age group) and had a clear shot into the finish with no one around. Zipped up the top, put the shades back on and composed myself for my finishing picture and threw up the right hand as I crossed the line.

I did it! Under 5 hours baby!!

Ride more so that I can take advantage of the run speed and strength I normally have! There is no reason I shouldn't be in the low 1:30's when my stand alone 1/2 marathon PR was a 1:24, even after a strong bike ride. Definitely need to work on the cycling fitness. All things considered though, this was a smart and well executed run with what was available that day.

Last year's time - 2:14:11, this year - 1:44:53. Total time was 1:02:49 better than last year!!

Got my medal, talked to Fred (PennState) who was still relaxing in the finishing chute and congratulated him, then walked around to get some food and drinks. I saw CJ and talked with him and told him how his cousin smoked past me on the bike (he was frickin' flying!) and he told me that he ended up having a crappy run, so lost a lot of what he had gained on the bike.


Not training much at the level needed to do better. Really the bike ride was solid, but without a lot of miles in the legs I did not have the strength to come off the bike and take advantage of my running speed. And the swim ..... the strength and endurance are there, but the confidence in the open water and the total lack of ability to swim in a frickin' straight line and sight well killed me!

I did go into this as a "B" race and all I really wanted to do was conquer the swim and race a smart race for the rest of it and really try and have fun. I definitely did on the bike as I felt great and it was a blast flying by everyone on Blackbird. With the fitness that was available to me I think I did really well. The day was perfect for huge times and it definitely showed with the women's world record being set and some amazing Age Group times turned in all around.


Another great and well run Columbia Tri. Assoc. race. This will be the same venue and organization that I will be doing the Chesapeakeman Aqua-Bike race in September (just double the swim and bike distances I did at this race), so it is good to get some more experience in the conditions. The day was perfect for racing and I couldn't have asked for much better of an overall performance with where I am in my training. Kudos to everyone that participated. I think more people set PR's than in any other race I've been in because of the great conditions and flat/fast course.