Monday, June 16, 2008

Blue Lake Triathlon

What a great weekend! Our TNT teams signed up for the Blue Lake events this weekend. Our Olympic team did the Sprint distance on Saturday and everyone went out to cheer them on. I took the kids and it was a great day! Yesterday our 1/2 IM team participated in the Olympic distance Tri as our last big workout before Pac Crest. If anyone who reads this has thought about joining up with TNT for training for an endurance event - DO IT!! I had so many people cheering me on - yelling out my name at all portions of the course and people slapping my hands as we passed on the run. It is an amazing feeling to have that kind of support.

This was my first "official" triathlon. I had a taste of it all at our "mock" tri two weeks ago and this one went even more smoothly. I was in the next to the last wave at the swim and that played a bit of a mental game on me knowing that I would be one of the last out of the water and definitely one of the last off the bike course, but overall I had a pretty great attitude. My swim was HOT AWESOME! I couldn't have been happier. I passed a couple people in the waves ahead of me and for the most part stayed in my pack of gold caps without falling behind. My time was 31:42 for the swim portion and I was in in 312 out of 436th place after the swim so that fear is over ~ I am not the slowest.

I decided not to try to put on socks over wet feet at T1 so I rode sockless and the only problem was my toes never warmed up - I hoped this wouldn't cause problems at the start of the run and it didn't. I passed three people on the bike. That's it. Now, I know you're getting all excited for me ;o) ~ wait, it gets even better. Of the three people I passed, two were not even in the race - in fact they looked like they might have just slept one off and hopped on their bikes to stumble home. The third had a flat tire. Hmph. As usual, I was passed by many but this is just my fate at this time. At one point I could see no other bikers and it occurred to me that I was taking this all at a rather leisurly place and realized I had forgotten I was in a race at all. That got me to pick it up a bit and I think I did actually pass one racer at the end. After the bike portion I was in 415th place out of 436 (yikes!).

I felt great on the run. My legs warmed up pretty good after mile 2 and although I thought I had about a 9:30 pace, the timing chip said more like a 10m/m.

My final placing in my division was 17/19 and for the total placing I was 397/436.

I feel good about the race and I woke up this morning thinking that I might actually become addicted to triathlons. I think a road bike is in my near future. This is FUN!

Swim 31:42
T1 3:33
Bike 1:32:42
T2 3:27
Run 59:52
Total Time 3:11:16

Watch out! I have the tri bug.

After the race we headed out to Willamette Park to have a Father's Day picnic with Steve's family. The weather was perfect and we all played baseball and the kids all rolled down the hill getting grass in every nook and cranny of their bodies before we headed out to the river for some boat rides from Uncle Dan. The kids were in heaven with the wind whipping their hair around and the sun shining off their sweet faces. Perfect day! We are so lucky!

1 comment:

DD said...

Hey, you still did better than me. I never passed ANYBODY on the bike, never, not one.