Columbia MD Iron Girl tri

[sfa]

I'm just now beginning to recover from this morning--getting up that early does NOT agree with me!

This was my first "real" tri (I had done a super-sprint with a short pool swim in the spring, but that didn't even begin to compare) and I was nervous; I had done the OWS practice a few weeks ago and it didn't go well. And I really didn't sleep well at all--went to bed early but couldn't get to sleep until my normal time, then woke up at 2:45 and couldn't get back to sleep, and then could only get down part of my breakfast.

Turns out I had nothing to worry about. The swim went remarkably well once I decided just to take it easy, focus on sighting to stay on course, and just enjoy the water. I was slow (28:26? I think? I don't have my card in front of me) but only a couple of minutes slower than I do the distance in a pool, and a lot of that was just me hanging back at the start to let the field clear out a bit.

The bike was fun. They didn't have my official time printed on my card, but my computer said it was 1:10, which is a record for me--averaging over 15 m.p.h. when normally I do 13 - 14 (and even slower on my commutes). And after pretty much exclusively getting passed BY people on the swim, it was nice to catch and pass some people on the bike.

The run course is always a challenge. I've only managed to actually run the whole thing once, and that's still the case--I had to stop and walk a few times. At the one mile mark I was was wondering how on earth I was going to make it the next 2.4 miles, and then I remembered Veronica's "suitcase of courage" and that made me smile. Of course then I started thinking stupid thoughts (this is why people listen to music while running--it interrupts the stupid thoughts) like "shoot, I put that suitcase in the left luggage area at Paddington Station with a little note on it reading "please look after this courage" and I meant to go back for it and just forgot!" Fortunately right about then the hills hit and I couldn't think anymore. But again, I made it through (and didn't fall down this time!) with a not-bad time for me--34:05.

My overall time was 2:19:44. I think the website doesn't have all the results up yet, but at the moment that puts me at 162/351 in my age group, 720/1665 overall (surely there were more than 1665 people there?), and 178/687 for first-time triathletes. I think I won't check the results page anymore because I kind of like those results!

I heard a couple of other people say the swim course seemed longer than it should have been. If that's the case, I'm really happy with my time in that!

My sister was there taking pictures, so I'll try to post some as soon as I get them from her.

Sarah

[7rider]

Congrats, Sarah, on the Tri! I didn't realize you were there.
Our team placed 14th out of 56 teams. They don't have the splits up (yet?) or I don't know where to find them.
I don't know about Nicole...but I'm pretty darned impressed! Our overall time of 2:08:36 would have been good for a 358th place overall.

[sfa]

Congrats, Sarah, on the Tri! I didn't realize you were there.
Our team placed 14th out of 56 teams. They don't have the splits up (yet?) or I don't know where to find them.
I don't know about Nicole...but I'm pretty darned impressed! Our overall time of 2:08:36 would have been good for a 358th place overall.

Great job! They don't have the splits up yet that I can see--just overall times.

Sarah

[HillSlugger]

So far no splits posted. On site they were handing out "results post cards" but everyone's was missing the bike and T2 splits. If you did the bike in 1:00:14 then according to our card our splits are:

Swim: 27:48
T1: 1:33
Bike: 1:00:14
T2: 1:38
Run: 37:23

[divingbiker]

They got it working by the time I picked up my card. Here's my unofficial time:

swim 32:22
T1 4:29
bike 1:11:24
T2 2:41
"run" 41:39
overall 2:32:33

16/29 Athena
would have been 59/111 in 50-54 age group, so about the same relative place.
1095/1665 overall

Here's the pic of me at the start that MDHillSlug took.

[Tri Girl]

WOO HOO!!!!! Congratulations!!!!

[colby]

Hey, more people at the tri! Awesome!! Congrats everyone