First Olympic Tri on the Books!

My first Oly was on Saturday in Lake Chelan! It was a blast! My husband and I left on Friday night and actually camped. I racked my bike that night as well. One of the officials said that they may not allow wetsuits because the water temp. may get too high. I found it funny that so many people were freaking out. I have realized that many triathletes rely upon their wetsuits to get them through the swim. I have never worn a wetsuit, in fact I was ecstatic to know that it would be a warm swim! That definitely eased my nerves!

We woke up at 5am, ate breakfast and drove down to the race. I set up my transition area and was ready for the course talk down at the swim start. On my way down I ran into a friend that I used to swim with in high school. We chatted a bit and listened to the race director and then went back to get ready.

The Swim: The swim was one of the best open water swims I have ever had. The lake is clear and you can actually see the bottom if it's not too deep. It's so clear in fact that you can follow the buoy lines and swim in a straight line. I don't know how anybody could have worn a wetsuit, I was even hot by the end of the swim! I finished the swim 7th in my age group and 65th out of 350 men and women.



The Bike: The bike course was amazing; beautiful scenery all around. It was an open course so there was traffic but most people were going very slow and were being courteous. There were some gradual inclines but that always means you get to go downhill! I was able to pick up some pretty fast speeds (at least for me!) and finished with the time I wanted to. Not sure how I finished but my time was 1:30:21





The Run: Oh the run!! The worst part of a tri for me. Many triathletes are much better runners and can win a race with a great, fast run. However, that is not the case with me... at least at the moment! I am a much better swimmer than most triathletes and a much worse runner! By the time I got to the run it was very hot and I was hungry. I did walk several times during the 10k, but I didn't want to make myself sick. Thankfully, there were several water stops which included gels and of course water. There were also people along the course that sprayed the racers with a hose. My run time was really bad 1:13!! Eeeek, must work on the run!





My goal time for the entire race was 3 hours, but I finished in 3:20. Not bad for a first tri but not what I wanted. I LOVED this distance and I look forward to doing another one soon!

Marathon Training: Oh yeah! That!! Tomorrow going on a run with mom, probably 45-60 minutes!