I started out pretty good and had a good pace going, I was careful about going out too fast and tried to relax. Something didn't feel right early on in the swim however, I just didn't have a good stroke going, it felt choppy. The other person in my lane and the next person over were side by side for about the first four laps. If I tried to speed up and pull away she came right along too. This was kind of anoying as we pretty much were staring at each others face on every breath, and I spent more time thinking about that, (making sure I looked good, :) ) then my stroke. So I figured why fight it and dropped back into her draft. I stayed there for the last 10 laps. The three of us were side by side all 15 laps. I came out of the pool knowing I could have pushed it more but I was happy to see 13:10 on my watch knowing I saved a bit of energy from the free ride. I was hoping for 12:30 but was happy with my result. I came out of the swim in 5th in my heat I believe, with the two people beside me just behind. I was about a minute behind the heat leader at this point.

I had a new pair of goggles that ive only used twice before. I knew they had the potential to leak and sure enough as soon as I jumped in for my warm up lap they did. I hopped back out and rushed over to switch them out with a back up pair. This got me a little worked up and I really wasn't relaxed right from the start of the swim.

I put my shoes on in transition as I have a set of road cycling shoes and they are kind of hard to get on when they are already clipped into the bike. The run to the mount area was ok even with them on.

Pratice more. This was only my second tri so I was pretty happy with how it went. There weren't any major problems.

I started the bike pretty good and caught 2 people on the first climb. I knew I still had a few people in front of me and hoped to catch them as I'm not the strongest runner and hoped to have a bit of a lead off the bike. I managed to catch the first two people in my heat by about km 4, just as we made a turn and had a slight tail wind for a stright shot down the runway. I started to open up some distance and by the third and final lap of the runaway I could tell that I had about a 1k lead. Starting off the runway and back to transition I made the decistion to slip my feet out of my shoes while going back down the hill. This went better then I thought it would as I have never practiced it. I came into transition with just over a minute lead. I was 7th overall on the bike however that was with the transition added in, I think if it was just bike time I was actually higher as some of the guys were lighting fast through there.

I might have gone a little hard on the bike as I didnt have alot of gas left once I was on the run. I also removed all my water bottles and cages from the bike. It was pretty warm out and I havent worked out in heat yet this year. It would of been nice to have a drink, but it wasn't a major problem. I do think I needed a gu or something while on the bike for an extra jolt for the run.

Not too bad at this point. Shoes went on pretty quick. I had a water bottle there and took a pretty big drink as I was quite thirsty.

Nothing

Man I suck on the run. Not sure if it was my lack of taper, not being used to the heat, too hard on the bike, not enough nutrition/water on bike, or the fact that Im 30 lbs heavier then everyone who finished ahead of me, lol. My legs felt great but I was breathing pretty heavy and couldn't seem to move faster then a 4:50/km, and even that was a struggle to hold. I got passed at the turn around and tried to pick up the pace but I just cuuldn't do it. I did manage to hang on by a few seconds for 2nd place in my heat.

I planned on training right through this race as i just spent a few weeks tapering and recovering so my legs were a little tired. Other then that I did the best I could with what I had to work with. Hopefully mu next race in a few weeks I will be able to test this theory.

Went for a quick cool down run. Had some orange slices, water, and a banana. talked to a few people the showered up and changed.


Run training for sure. I dropped 12 minutes from last years sprint time, and increased my bike pace by 5km/h.


Overall I had a great race and was very happy with my finish. Ive got a a sprint coming up in two weeks that is almost identical in set up and layout so It will be intresting to see how much I learned from this one, and if a taper helps me run a little better. Race organization was great and all the heat times seemed to be right on scheduel.