What times to expect in first tri, based on individual event times

I did the same thing last year and the advice I received was it's tough to calculate even if comparing apples to apples (ows training swim to ows race swim, etc) let alone pool time versus OWS on race day

In my case I trained on a flat road for the run and then had to deal with a cross country run course which made my pace time 4 mins slower.

My next sprint happens to be in the city I live in and I have access to the lake, run and bike course and have been training on them to point that I know where eveyr pothole and slight incline are.

I'm sure you'll receive more qualified advice, just my .02

 Good luck !

Swim:  Your swim will be slower.  Kicking people, getting kicked, not being able to see, more idfficult breathing, ect will slow you down.  The first tri swim ever is smoething nobody forgets!  I'll give you 14 minutes.

Bike:  I'm wondering where your 45 minutes is coming from.  A race, or a training day.  I'm going to assume its from a training day so I'll give you 44 minutes.

Run:  Hope you've been doing your bricks!  This is where the most time is going to pile up on your previous bests.  You're legs are likely going to be screaming at you.  Based on the 21 minute PR, I'll give you 26 minutes.

Just educated guesses of course.  And the results are a very repectible:

14 + 1.5 + 44 + 1.5 + 26 = 1:27

Thanks guys- I appreciate the input.

Scuba Steve, you are correct with the assumption on the bike. I have never raced before on the bike so 45 mins is about what I do in training (pushing fairly hard). I'll take 44 mins though! :-) I've been doing bricks (only 3 so far) and you are right, my legs are pretty angry at the end of the bike. Thanks for the warning about the swim- I used to be a swimmer and was feeling very comfortable with the swim portion, but knowing that it will be tougher than expected is great to know. I'll be interested to see how close your estimates are. If you are within a minute and I ever see you at a race, post-race drinks are on me!

Fun times?

Anything can happen, so prepare for just about anything and don't worry about the time.  Enjoy the race and do your best.

Good luck.

I went through the same exercise when i did my first sprint time.  I too was hoping for a finishing time of around 1:24:00.  Problem was that the hills on the bike course were more challenging than I anticipated.  A good goal would be 1:30 as most people don't have flawless Transition times for the first time.  Best of luck.

Train Safe, Train Hard and Have Fun

Cheers

looking back now, here is what I thought I would do and what I did in first sprint:

swim:  11:00  bike  46:00   Run 28:00    1:25 (thought I had a chance at top 3 clyde)

swim:  12:19   bike  48:23   Run 33:48   1:34:29 (8th out of 20 clydes)

I did my first sprint a few weeks ago (next is on the 27th)....and this was my experience.

swim - 750m lake - only my second OWS EVER (the first being the day before LOL)...and I only learned how to swim in February of this year - I expected to be about 16-22 min - actual: 17:11

bike - 20K - I expected to be about 40-45 min - actual 38:23

run - 5k - I expected to be about 28 min (I run about 26.5/27 min 5k's normally) - here's the kicker! actual: 30:33!!!  (I actually walked about 1 minute 5 or 6 times during that 5K....I can run 10K non-stop so that is not normal for me)

My first sprint overall time was 1:29:32  (I had expected to be about 1:40 or so - so faster than I had hoped overall for my first sprint....and that got me 7th in my AG).

clearly I need to practice BRICKS more - and with another sprint in just over 2 weeks I am quite disappointed to say that I have not been (so I will likely have a similar experience next race!) - I actually have been running very little lately - lost the mostivation to run somehow - and my knees have not been happy the last 2 runs either....

I am always faster running in a sprint triathlon than running in a standalone event.  All my 5K pr's were during triathlons (if the race distances are to be believed).  So - anything is possible!

Anyway. Your estimation looks good to me barring torrential downpours/flats/whatever else.
 

Stop thinking about it, Go do the race and find out!

Thanks to everyone for the input on this topic. So I did my first sprint on Sat (Buckner Mission Man). Here's my report- some of you were quite close in your guesses!

750m swim: In pool I can do 12 mins fairly easily. Took me 14:51 in the lake, but I swam all over the place and had trouble sighting.

15 mile bike: I thought I would get about 45 mins; actual time was 43:08, so thrilled about this!

5K run: 23.59. Haven't been able to train much on the run, so definite room for improvement, but getting the input from you guys about being aware of how hard this might feel was good prep.

Overall time with transitions: 1:24:15 (goal was 1:25). Overall place: 62/217 men; 72/400+ competitors. 8/52 in age group. I'm quite happy with it, and know definite places where I can improve. Overall it was just a really nice event- beautiful setting and well organized, and other competitors were really helpful to me getting set up. Thanks to them!