I am now a winter triathlete! It doesn't really seem fair to say that, since it was warm enough outside that I could stand almost comfortably in my swimsuit when it was all over long enough to call my husband and tell him. But still. It is December, even in the southernmost parts of New Mexico. I didn't realize until I picked up my shirt that the run was 7k, not 5k. Surprise! But I ran it surprisingly fast for me. My first mile was sub-9 min, which I haven't done since Before Baby. I think the altitude might have been a little lower there than here, but part of me thinks, man, I should really push it harder in training runs! There is always something special about running with a group, and picking that next person up ahead to catch, and passing them, steady, steady, don't die out on the hill... even for a "non-competitive" person like me. And then there was the bike. 18 miles, which is more than I've ever done at one time, and today I learned why so many triathletes have those curved handlebars... trying to crouch down so that the wind would wash over me was not comfortable or pleasant on my flat-handled bike. And somehow, it seemed that I was headed into the wind much more often than not. Something about the mountains, I don't know. Lots and lots of people passed me, and it was a little disappointing to lose so much ground after all that hard work on the run. Note to self: ride the bike a lot, get stronger legs, and investigate better gear! Also, around the 20k mark I started to think about lunch. Perhaps I should also investigate mid-race refueling. I'm not sure how I feel about swimming at the end of the triathlon. My vast experience consists of one traditional tri and one backwards tri. The swim was in the pool, and I think I would really like the format in a 50m pool, but this one was 25m, so we circle-swam down and back, then ducked under the lane line and did it again in the next lane, through all 8 lanes. This made passing people more challenging, because I had to watch for oncoming traffic before passing on the left. Thankfully, people were kind and didn't mind the occasional knocked arms. I guess the open water swim is really no better as far as full-contact swimming. I don't have my exact times, since I had to leave right after a hot shower in order to get home to my little girl (first night apart ever!!), but hopefully they'll post them. The total time was around 2:10. And the crazy thing is, I want to do it again!