completed my first TRIATHLON!!!

So I did it! I don't have official results yet, but I finished around 01:45:00 and change. Over all the swim was a bit harder than I expected, the bike was as I expected, and I could have gone harder on the run. Here goes the breakdown:

Swim:
First off the water was a balmy 72 degrees!.....72 degrees! Thats freaking WARM! I dipped my toes in the water expecting it to be cold (not as cold as last weekend) but cold. No way was it that. I got my wetsuit on and warmed up a bit. No hyperventilation. No issues putting my face in the water. That water felt AWESOME.

So it finally came time to line up. Before the horn went off a group of buzzards decided to swarm over the water. We all had a good laugh at that one! I went into slower than the front guys to keep out of the mayhem. The water still looked like rapids from us running and diving in. I dove in too soon cuz the water was still too shallow, got up ran a bit more than went. I just need even more practice in the wetsuit. The suit constricts your arm movements and it felt like I was swimming 2x as a hard to go the same speed as usual. I did great sighting this time and swam towards the big orange bouy .25 miles out. After turning the bouy I was happy to get onto the final stretch, but the sun was in our eyes so sighting this time was a bit harder, so I aimed for the big boat house until I could sight on the final two orange giant inflatable balls on the shore.


Coming out of the water my legs felt like rubber and I couldn't run that fast, which was strange because I wasn't using my legs! I guess maybe the little bit of kicking I did was enough. I did the swim in about just under 20 mins (new record for a .5 mile swim!) even though I felt like a slow moving barge in the water.

Transition from swim to bike was easy. I got my wetsuit no problem, dried my suit no problem and put on socks no problem.

Bike:
After running through transition, I had a bit of trouble getting my first cleat into the petal. I finally got it in and got moving.

I started passing people. Then I passed more people. I passed a LOT of people on the biking portion just like I passed a lot of others on the bike in the two duathlons I have done.

The came "The Hill." I did much better up (meaning went faster) up the hill than the last two times, and at a race pace. It still hurt as bad but I was going faster and legs were turning the petals faster. I again passed quite a few folks on this leg. The stupid race number that goes onto your bike this time was basically a sticker that you wrap around your top tube. The thing was a POS. It came loose on the downhills and after the last uphill on the flats it was totally loose flopping around and scratching my inner legs pretty hard. It was pretty frustrating.

Also, I got a new water bottle that goes between the aero bars. That thing works great but the spongy thing that keeps liquid from spilling out fell out of the top of the bottle on one of the flying downhills, so whenever I hit a bump, liquid would splash out and hit me in the face. Another frustration. Oh also at the very beginning of the biking portion a bee hit me and stung me on the upper lip. That hurt a bit but kinda fired me up. My lip is fine now, but what a freak accident!

I came off the bike @ 01:15:00 so that mins 20 mins is what, a 55 min bike? I think its less because of the transition from the swim to bike with took 2-3 mins.

The transition from bike to run was non eventful and something I have done 3 times now.

Run:
My legs were slow and I was bit more tired, but it still wasn't as bad as the two duathlons that I have done. My legs were actually able to GO this time, but again, not as fast. The run course was an out and back course which mostly went uphill for the first half and then you got to go down it on the 2nd, so the 2nd leg was much better than the first, and I felt like I could have pushed it a bit harder on the run. And again, those who I passed on the bike passed me on the run. Something I STILL need to work on.

I think my run time was 30 mins or less, due to the transition from bike to run. I prolly ran around a 9:45 min mile pace.

I wasn't here to win or to place well. That wasn't my goal. My goal was to finish, and if I happened to finish in under 2 hours, then thats cool too, which I did do :)