Tri For Fun!

Today was Donna's first triathlon! And I'm proud to say I encouraged her to do it. She's been working hard and we got to see the results of that today.

I got up at 5am and snoozed. I was pooped. The plan was to go to bed at 9pm, and get 8 hours, but it didn't work so well. I got a couple calls from good friends and Anne of Green Gables kept me up later than I thought. Anyway, up at 5:09, downed some coffee and yogurt, and got dressed. Soon Donna and John arrived, we loaded and were off.

I thought we would be plenty early, but apparently other people need less sleep than us. It was packed by the time we got there at 6:30. So we registered, unloaded and set up transition. It was so full we had to set up on the grass. A little different than usual, but it worked fine.Then we went down to the beach to find out what time our wave went. It was a little frantic wondering when that would be, since it wasn't posted ahead of time, but the announcer finally told us as we waited.
Soon after the times were announced it was time to start, so Donna and I got in a quick frolic in the grass which served as our warm up. Not enough time to put on shoes and actually run. A couple strokes in the water, and it was time to get with our wave. It was a huge wave. All the women 35 and under. Way too big. The swim was a mess! I felt like I was fighting my way through a crowd from start to finish. Constantly gasping and trying to get past people or around them or away from them. Even as I exited the swim I was glad to be on the ground where I could run faster away from everyone.

Not too happy about the swim, I was very glad to start the bike. I was a bit curious how the course would go since it wasn't posted online and we couldn't practice it. It ended up being fairly flat with one short hill. I was pleasantly surprised by passing some vineyards also. There were headwinds out, which was kind of frustrating, but tailwinds back...I even got up to 27mph! I finished the bike in good time and had a fast transition out to run.

I was worried about the run also since I've been having shin splints. I took 3.5 weeks off to rest, and it paid off. I wasn't particularly fast, but I was able to run the whole thing with minimal pain and cramping. It felt good to run. John even got a picture of me running and kind of smiling...which is never the case in race photos!You can see my time...and some random guys ;) I finished in 1:28 (15 min after the clock started)
...and right as I was stuffing some oranges in my face, I turned and saw Esther and Timothy! They had talked about coming, but I didn't see them at the beginning so I assumed they didn't make it. It was a wonderful surprise to have more friends waiting for me. :)

All in all it was a good race. I had fun. It was sad not to have my favorite photographer and fan (because he-who-will-not-be-named and I are taking a 2 month break), but it was really fun to rope someone else into the fun of triing and see them succeed! GO DONNA!