J-Hawk Early Bird Triathlon - TriathlonSprint

The guy starting behind me (the eventual Male overall winner) caught me after 50 yards. After he passed me I caught up the the guy in front of me and kept tapping his feet but her never let me pass. That is OK though because I just used him to draft off of. I was very pleased with my time. Swims have not been great lately so this time was better than I expected. The time shown included getting out of the pool and running outside since the mats were not until you got to the parking lot.

Nothing. Very pleased.

The weather being cold I planned on wearing a long sleeve shirt under the Tri top but it kept getting stuck. I lost 45-60 seconds trying to get it on before throwing it down and just wearing the jersey. Had I not done this I could have moved up a place in my age group.

Not worry about the shirt. Wear the Tri top for the swim and not worry about putting anything on.

Didn't feel that bad. Got into a good rythem and just went. Was suprised that even though most of the first half was into the wind, I was able to get down into a tuck and was going at a good pace. One guy and I kept passing each other for about the middle half of the course until he pulled away in the last 2-3 miles. I know I need to improve more on the bike. It is always my lowest ranked portion but even though this was my worst of the three, it still felt pretty good.

More time on the bike practicing. I'll get to do that after my half marathon in two weeks.

Got out of the bike shoes good and slipped into the run shoes. This transition went very well.

Nothing. My bike was about half way down the row of bikes so there was more running to get back to the rack and out to the run course.

I felt very good and that suprised me. I grabbed the Garmin in the transition so I could see my pacing and in the first mile I was in the low 7's to high 6's per mile pace. The footing was a little slippery in the preserve and along the wooden bridge so I slowed down a bit there. I passed a number of people and did not let anyone pass me on the run. When I came out of the woods and within sight of the finish line I gave it all I had to the finish. I probably had a little more left so I could have started pushing it a little earlier, but the footing being what it was I didn't want to fall on the downhills leading out of the woods.

The results said that I averaged 7:13 so either the course was longer than a 5K or their paces are off.

Not much I could do. I think I ran well. I probably could have pushed a bit harder at times, but I was happy overall.

Walked a bit, ayt some food and then went to find Kim and the rest of the Donkeys to have lunch. (Thanks to Kim for organizing that!)


The weather was a major factor. The wind hurt my bike performance and the rain the night before made the footing bad so I slowed on the run. It was a really bad decision to try to get that shirt on in T1. I should never have done that.


If I really wanted to focus on this race I would not have run 8 miles the day before. However my focus was on the half marathon in two weeks so I did not rest for this race at all.

In all I was very happy with the performance. I wanted to go under 1:15:00 and I did. The time I got this year would have been good enough for 3rd in my age group last year.