I might babble.
So the plan was my parents were coming down sat. by 1, we would leave they would watch the kiddos, my dad would not stay he would drove home and leave my mom to stay the night in our house. All of that went fine. My girls are in heaven with their grandparents who buy them anything and everything. We took off and I was feeling good, nervous but good. I had been hydrating a bunch since we were in the midst of a heat wave. We went straight to the race site which was about an hour drive. Caught the middle of the race meeting. It was sweltering. I had water but it ran out. There was no other water to be handed out or bought. I listened to the director and felt good about knowing what was up. I told hubby we had to leave b/c i was melting. Before we left we took a look at the swim entrance. This was in a lake that is only used for swimming during this tri ???? which i was not crazy to hear and then we saw a dead fish. UMMMM ick. I knew I would not be wearing my wet suit b/c the water temp was 88 degrees. No biggie for me.
So we got to hotel and plan was to rest, head out for a good healthy dinner, get some food for pre race, hotel and bed. Hubby got on phone to work, he had a big thing going on that weekend. 2 hours later i resorted to room service. Healthy cobb salad, plus i asked for bread since i had brought peanut butter, and i had oatmeal so at least i had a bfast ready. i was pissed b/c hate when hubby's work does this. it will be a minute, ok maybe an hour, ok forget it all night. whatever, the good part was i was resting the entire time in a nice comfy bed and a cold room.
wake up time. where i always wonder WHY ? why am i doing this ? The pb and bread didn't work out, stomach was not wanting it, but the oatmeal worked, and a banana. we got iced and iced up my water bottles, i had shaklee performance in one for bike and just water as my second for bike. i had my cliff blocks. we got to the race site and i set up. it was not as hot as the day prior but it was still expected in the 90's. Went to the water start to get in the water and warm up. HELLLLOOOO it was a hot tub.NO joke.It was warm. but it was flat and it was not swampy or dirty it was quite nice. I was happy. The swim course looked LONG. It was 1500 meters. but it looked LONG. I was scared. I just tried to warm up or stay in the shade and just keep my head in the game. I was the third to last wave. People could have finished by the time we went in. I kid. Finally the call us in and we swim out - it starts in the water. There were about 90 in my wave, it was good b/c we were not too crowded and everyone was respectful about where to start, faster in front, avg in mid, slow in back. So the swam began. My main goal for the swim was to swim, not to keep popping up looking where i was and do breaststroke and catch my breath and swim. I did it, i kept my head down and swam and I felt good. I was fine with sighting, I was comfy when i had folks around me. I broke into breast stroke very few times. It felt long. but I was ok, i was not getting that out of breath where am i feeling. The end was tough, i usually keep looking up at the finish to see how far and wind up not swimming b/c i keep looking. this time i just plowed ahead.
swim time 37.58 - rank 654 (out of about 1000) - i was very happy with this, my last timed mile swim was 43 so this was about where i thought i would be
T1 -2.47 rank 498 (i suck at transition but i really did try to go fast and not drink and do that on the bike)
bike - 2 loops. i was off and felt ok. started to get into a rhythm but then i would see someone pass me. I just kept biking. I really have NO idea how to bike, i suck. I was feeling ok and then 2 ladies from my age group passed me, and i was pissed. I caught up and passed them. ONly for them to catch me again and pass me and i would never see them again, i only saw about 5 more ladies from my age group pass me. I was so pissed. what was i doing wrong ? they seemed effortless and i felt like i was chugging away. by the start of second loop i felt ok but i was not happy, i just kept going but it just seemed to get worse. I did pick some folks off but i just knew that i did not bike well. I was tired when I was coming in and my right ass cheek hurt. I was SOOOOO happy to be off the bike.
bike 1.30.24 - rank 818 MPH 16.9 - seriously ?? i only did better than about 100 people ? someone get me a new bike ?
T2 - 2.15 rank 527 (at this point i am tired and i am not rushing)
run- i can hear the announcer shouting out folks finishing. This didn't help. But I was feeling ok. I was not hurting that i couldn't run and I was feeling that I could run ok. I knew they had water and ice on the course. As I started running (it was 2 mickey mouse ears if you will) so you could see a bunch of folks each and every way, I saw many if not all folks walking ??? I was confused. I was able to run no problem. I did stop at the water stops and did fully stop and walk, but then i went back to running. I was passing a bunch of people b/c they were all walking. I felt fine and strong. I just kept doing my thing, but i was baffled why did i feel this way and they were walking. Some of these walkers were in shape men? I pushed on. stopped at water and grabbed ice bags stuffed them down my shirt. the heat was getting up there and i was feeling it. when i started the run i was at about 2.15 and i knew i had an hour to run if i wanted to make 3.15. I was 2 miles in and doing ok, I didn't want to push much more yet and was saving a bit. By mile 4 I was trying to push more but that is about when the heat took its toll, and now i understood why there were so many walkers.The heat was getting to us. I kept running but my paced slowed. at about 5 1/2 I wanted to stop and walk, i didn't i just slowed down and dreams of my 3.15 went away, maybe 3.20. I kept pushing, saw hubby a bunch of times - usually giving him smile and thumbs up but the last time i was trying to tell him i won't make 3.15. i finally was coming upon the finish and there was a lady running with me, at first i was going to let her take it but then i figured i would be mad so i gave what i had and passed her.
run - 1.10.12 - 11.19 min/mile (SLOW) rank 720 (i must have passed all 300 people ?)
i crossed at 3.23. I was happy. I was thirsty. I was searching for something cold. found hubby and went to the cooling area - a spray tent almost. found some cold water and drank.
overall rank 756 age group 51 out of 71
I was happy with my race, i was happy with my swim and that my head did not get in the way. I was ehh about bike and i was happy that i felt strong enough to run the run. However, i see the times and i feel like why wasn't i faster. But overall i was happy. I was so happy that coming home to a house in a heat wave where the AC had broken didn't seem to bother me as it should have.......so as my core temp was probably already too high it just got higher and higher but now i wasn't so concerned with recovery and hydrating.......and that took its toll........more on the meltdown......later
my overall rank
Congrats on a great race! :) You got it done!!!
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