First off, this is my first "race" of the season due to some back problems. That being said, this was a great race to participate in. All of the proceeds from the race go to research for SIDS. The namesake of the race was an infant that passed away after only 60 some days from SIDS and the family has made it their mission to try to do something to help prevent other families from going through what they went through. There were clowns making balloon animals, a naturalist with some wild animals for the kids/spectators to see. It was just a fun atmosphere.
5K run/17.5 bike/5K run
Friday started off with a trip with my Cross-Country team. They had a race and then I was supposed to come home with the team 2 hrs, then turn around and drive 3 more to get to where my race was supposed to be. I ended up driving my car to the meet and cutting two hours off of my overall travel thanks to my bosses permission. So after standing around in a dreary drizzle and chasing the kids around the xc course giving them their mile splits, we were off to dinner with the team and my folks, I drove the 3 hrs to cincinnati and got all checked in the hotel around 8:30PM. After I got settled, I was bored and decided I wanted to go and drive the bike course since I had heard 4 different reports of what it was like. If I would have combined all of the reports, it would have been close to being actually true. Some rolling hills on 75% of it with one 5 mile stretch that was basically nothing but uphill with some short descents.
Saturday morning the alarm goes off at 6:00AM. I stumble to breakfast, back to the room to shower and make sure that I had everything all set out I was going to need. Luckily I remembered to bring everything (I usually forget something. BONUS). About 7:15 I arrive at the race to get all checked in and pick my spot on the rack for the bike. It was a pretty laid back race so it was a freee for all at the bike racks. I got my stuff all laid out and started warming up. We got the 5 minute warning so we all started moving towards the start line. There were 5 races going on saturday so it was a mad house (at least it seemed like it anway). There were about 160 signed up for the duathlon and it was a mass start for the run. I had talked with a few guys and figured out what they were planning on running their 5K in so I found a nice little grop of guys to pace me since this was my first "race" in a while. 1st 5K ended up with an 18:33 and felt really good. I was a little winded but hadn't killed myself so I was kinda psyched for the bike. Then I got to T1 and hadn't thought about planning it out at all. Ooops. After fumbling my way through everything for about a minute, I was out on the bike (which sucked). OMG the bike SUCKED!!!! I have had training rides that were longer and faster then this. I don't know what the deal was. I think it might have been a touch of dehydration since I have done some bricks and was fine (well about as fine as can be anyway).Oh well.
I finally dragged my lifeless corpse into the transistion area and was out on my way to the last 5K. T2 was only 30 seconds so bonus there too. I had actually taken the time to think about the second transition. I ended up passing most of the people that passed me on the bike. 20:07 for the second 5K. Both of my 5K's were in the top 10 overall and my bike sucked. LOL. Overall I was 20th overall out of 160 and 4th overall in my age group. Not too shabby and now I know what to expect for next summer.
Moral of the story: I needed to do a little more planning for race day, but all things considered I was happy with my first attempt. I think this gives me an idea of what i'm going to focus on for next season too. I'm going to focus on the international distance tri's that we have around here (1500/40K bike/10K run) and possibly find a 1/2 IM to get into in the middle of the season.