I'm Hooked

I don't even know where to begin. The entire event was absolutely awesome. The rain and thunder stayed over by my house an hour 10 min. away, near the lovely Steve it was another world. It was summer all over again. The water was a calm 73 degrees. It was warm enough that I swam in my swim suit and didn't waste my time with the wet suit. The swim was hard but not as bad as Thursday. I was panicking then. The swim start was a site. The Olympic distance men left first followed by the women. The sprint distance had to wait 20min. from the first swim start probably about 9:30am. It was very calming by the water and I never felt nervous. It was awesome to watch all those guys swim up around the coarse. I only burped up a little air I knocked a girl across her back and I think my feet hit someone once. I was bumped a few times but never hard or enough to effect me. I just kept looking up for the big orange buoys knowing the straighter I went the sooner I would be out of the water. I lost the focus to free style and for the last 100 meters I did the side stroke. I ran up the beach and was excited that my legs were not total jelly I felt like I had good footing. I ran up the flagged area toward transition. I got to wave to Danny on my way. He had Natasha on the playground that was between the beach and transition. In transition I grabbed my shirt the wrong way and lost some time trying to get it over me. It isn't so easy when your all wet. So, I was off on the bike trail. I felt OK but there where no mile markers to give me any idea how much farther. A group was directed wrong and after we went down the road we were turned around and put on the right path. I ended up passing the same people twice since I had gone the wrong way. This made it even harder for me to gauge just how far I had ridden. I was able to pass up some girls even on my big heavy gremlin of a bike. My quads felt it but I stayed in 21st gear the entire time. My front bike tire was getting louder and shaking like crazy. The entire last stretch of the bike coarse I was prying that my front wheel staied on. At one point I thought I was rounding the corner to transition and really pushed it. I passed up a sleek pink bike and still had my front tire. I then realized there was a little further. Well, the pink bike took back her spot in front of me we rounded the corner into transition. I promised I would catch her in the run. My bike made it back safely to the rack in one piece! I was feeling dehydratied and chugged some Gatorade in transition. I had already been racing for well over an hour. I headed out on the run. No sign of Danny this time, bummer. I followed the run path out of the lot. The path goes around a lagoon and loops back. My leg muscles were fighting each other the hamstrings were tight after all the biking. I was amazed that other then that my legs felt incredible. I just had to catch a pace. You could see everyone was stiff running with hardly a bend in the knee. I told myself only 3.7 miles, that is nothing. I found a pace I thought fast enough that would hold out to the end. I passed everyone in front of me. I was working hard and keeping my own pace, but I felt fine and it wasn't a huge struggle. I was almost done. Danny would have been proud of my big manly spit wad. I never stopped for water just once to tie my shoe, bummer. I wish I knew the last .7 miles were off the bridge I would have picked up my pace sooner. At the 3 mile marker I could see the path back around the lot that I knew took to the finish line. I picked up a little in the sprint for the end. It was absolutely awesome. I got a finishers towel and medal. Then this guy actually came up from finishing after me and thanked me for keeping a good pace. He said I came running by and he said wow I can do that and he pushed himself paced behind me. That was rally cool and I am glad he took the time after finishing himself to come tell me. So, thanks tall gray haired man for the nice words. It was all very awesome. I would do it again tomorrow definitely not my last one. My official over all finishing time 1 hour 54 minutes and 18 seconds.

Woohoo just checked the site for the final times!

For the 25-29 age group I placed 4th!!!!!!!!!! My rank in the swim 9th at 18:27, my bike rank 10 at 1:03:1 and for the run I took first place !!!! I ran a 7 minute 37 second pace for 28:09 WWOOHOO This is all new news to me very exciting.