Tempe International Triathlon - Sprint Triathlon - TriathlonSprint

The swim was definitely long. My official time shows no swim or T1 split, actually out of the top 15 in the first wave, only about 2 or 3 have the swim split. Not sure what happened, but anyway...

The swim was good. I felt like I was swimming right around my goal pace of 1:30/100 effortwise. The first buoy was a total scrum. There was maybe 50-75m to get to the buoy, which was not enough time to really separate. Swam over someone swimming quasi vertically, didn't even notice unti I was clubbing him in the head (sorry!!), and I got a nice kick in the solar plexus from someone else. I exited the water right around 4th or 5th.

Nothing. I picked the best line I could, sighted well, and swam what felt like my goal pace. The fastest swimmer in the sprint went 7:04, which was 1:45/100m so the sprint was long just like the Olympic.

No clue on time, no splits available. Felt pretty good, lot of grass on the feet, so I wasted some time getting that washed off before donning socks. I've got to toughen up the feet and learn to go sockless in races.

Learn to ride/run sockless.

Pretty good ride. The time includes a long run from and to the transition area before mounting. I still haven't gotten the whole clipped in shoes thing down yet, so I ran in my shoes. I reset my comp to get actual bike time, and my pace average was 21 mph. This was my goal pace, and an increase of 2.5mph from last years version. Felt like I could have pushed a little harder, but didn't want to kill the run. Also lost about a minute, since I was in the first wave they didn't have really clear markings, and about 4 of us turned when we were supposed to go straight. Irritating, since it allowed 3 people that I had just passed to repass me. Teaches me to not drive/ride the course, first time in years I haven't. On the way in, got out of the shoes and did a good flying dismount leaving my shoes in the pedals. Yay me.

Learn to ride sockless. Ride/drive the course beforehand. Dummy. ;)

T2 was good. I had everything laid out, and the actual clothing change was good. I'd have been about 15-20 seconds faster, except I got lost. They had 3 racks per # series, and I forgot which rack was mine. Changed direction a couple times trying to spot my bag.

Remember the rack count, and not rely on the numbers.

The run was good. I didn't drink much, but I did take at least one water at each station and pour it over my hat and jersey. I felt like my fitness could have carried me at a faster pace, but I just couldn't force my body to pick it up. Lack of endurance, so I have something to train towards. Also lost a bit of time here, I zoned out going through a water station and missed a turn.

Be more alert. Don't know if the sprint course was short, the Olympic 10k that shared the same loop was short (5.82 m is the consensus on the run distance).

Vitamin waters and laying in the shade at the team tent.


Endurance. I had the fitness, but just couldn't pick it up when I needed. Also, after 24 oz of water, two 20 oz vitamin waters, 2 beers and a 20 oz gatorade, I was still at 167 lbs, which was a 3 lb loss from starting race weight, so I lost quite a bit of weight during the race.


Overall I'm pretty pleased. I improved my time drastically from last year (1:19:xx), I hit all the goal paces that I wanted to, and held to my race plan. But, as Bryancd has pointed out, a lot of FAST people showed up this year. I improved my time by 7 minutes, and finished 15th as opposed to last years 13th. But, overall a really good race!