Wwe were informed the day before that the start time had moved up 45 minutes. No big deal, however we were looking forward to a little bit later start. We thought we actually were going to be able to "sleep in" a little bit. Oh well, got up at around 5:30 to get to the race site by around 6:30. Ate a banana, protein bar and some water.

Oh we get to the race site and they aplogize but the earlier start was a mistake and we were going to start at the normal time. Man! I could have gotten 45 minutes more sleep. We (my wife and I) were a little bit peeved at the time issues.

The water was cold at 72 degrees. Not used to that so I made sure I got in the water to get used to the temps and to get a decent warm up swim. Once I was in the water I didn't want to get out. The outside air was about 65 degrees, but only being in tri shorts, I was freezing when we were asked to get out of the water.

O.K. swim. Longest swim in a tri for me, so I was careful to not go out too hard. Took it easy. I think my navigation was O.K. I just followed the swimmers in front of me, since I couldn't see the buoys. I got kicked a couple of times, which threw me off a little bit, but not too bad. I feel like I could have done a little better, but overall not too bad.

I probably would have pushed it a little hard, but like I said I was afraid to go to hard. I didn't want to die out on the swim and still have so much race left.

T1 time includes what they called T0 (zero) which was about a 1/4 mile run from the swim to transition. I passed a few people on this run. Helmet seemed really tight when I tried to put it on. I could even buckle it. So, I took it off and tried again. Still felt tight, but was able to buckle it that time. Headed out. No flying mount but did have the shoes on the bike already. Left foot on shoe, push off, swing right leg over and onto right shoe. Got up to about 19-20 MPH and slid into shoes.

Nothing.

I started out in too high a gear. My legs felt achy at first. I'm not sure what this was from. After about 6 miles or so, I decided to down shift and spin a little to try and loosen up the legs. It worked. After about 10 miles, I felt like I was a training ride. Felt much better. I went probably .8-1 Mph faster on the second loop.

Not sure. I guess realize I was in too high a gear to start and fix it. I was being stubborn and waited too long to make an adjustment to try and loosen up the legs.

Pretty good T2. Helmet off, sunglasses off. Visor on, socks and shoes on good, grabbed my watch and race belt and took off. I put my watch on as I was running out of T2 and then put my race belt on as I started on the run.

Nothing.

Didn't want to go out too fast, so kept a comfortable pace throughout. At times my legs felt good and I was able to pick up the pace a little bit, but at other times, I just couldn't get the legs to turn over any faster or open up my stride. Both laps were about the same time. Had a little bit left to have a decent kick at the end. I think this run was short. I don't feel I had a faster than an 8 min/mile pace. Probably closer to 5.25 miles, but really no way to tell without a Garmin, which I don't have.

Nothing.

Walked around and waited for my wife to finish.

This is my 1st year of tri's. My 4th tri. But my very first Olympic distance. So, I felt I did good. hey, even though it was a small feild, it's always nice to get hardware. I got 1st in my age group. My wife in only her 3rd tri (1st Olympic) she got 1st Overall woman!

The actual race is good. The race organization was not good. From packet pick up where we had to wait 10 minutes to have someone come over and help us. They had plenty of volunteers, but I guess only certain people were authorized to give out the race packets and they were busy doing other stuff. The mix up with the race start times was disappointing. They started taking down transition while people were still out on the race course. They had sprints and Olympic distance races and the pizza was probably hot and a plenty for the sprint finishers, but us Olympics were left with cold pizza and were lucky to get any. The had bananas, but no gatorade or water, except you did get a bottle water at the finish. They didn't have all of the plaques for the all of the events. We weren't affected, but there were quite a few that had to have their plaques mailed to them. Oh and we had to pay $3 to get into the park. After paying $80 for this race, at leatst they could let the athletes in the park for free. Luckily we had some cash, usually we don't carry cash. Hopefully, they realize their mistakes and fix them for next year. I plan on doing the race again next year, like I said the actual race is good. They just need some help with the "other stuff".