Triathlon - a nice place to visit...

...but I wouldn't want to live there. It was a lot of fun today & I'm wearing my finisher's shirt with pride, but strike, it was tough! Hats off to all who choose to do it regularly. I don't think I'll aspire to be in that category** :-)

It was too warm for wet suits which caused some consternation amongst the competitors, but didn't bother me 'cause that's the only way I know how to swim. I was hoping for under 30 minutes, so I got a real buzz when tiger angel called out "sub 25" (official time, 24:28, 47/60 category position). Much better than expected.



I managed a 'leisurely' transition. :-) Amongst other things, I knew that part of TA's transition mantra is "Helmet on first", but of course she doesn't need to put a shirt on... Helmet off, shirt on, helmet on again... About this point I realised that 3 of the 4 pins holding my race number to my shirt had sprung open and were scattered around the ground. Find one of them and re-secure number...



The bike leg was great. I found out today that I'm better on acceleration than some, but slower in a straight line than most. Hence, the technical parts around the industrial area suited me to a T, the straight along Castlereagh less so. Got a remarkably sore butt in a remarkably short time. By my measurement, I did the 30k in 57 minutes (av speed 31.6kph). The official time (including both transitions) was 1:01:41 (46/60).



The run leg was the best! A few people (mostly team runners) passed me, but I had the immense satisfaction of passing LOTS of people. The surprise for me was that, although I was aerobically fine, I felt like I had no strength at all. It was the weirdest feeling. Still, given that I'm only running 44 minute 10ks at the moment, I was super pleased with an official 48:05 (25/60), and a final overall time of 2:14:15 (35/60), heaps under my hoped for 2:30:00.


I'd like to expand here what I've already said on Cool Running. I've watched tiger angel doing triathlons since 2002, and before she got sick it seemed like she was doing them every few weeks. She seemed to be having so much fun that I wanted to try too, but my one-and-only attempt was such a miserable experience because of the swim leg that I contented myself with photographing from the sidelines. At the beginning of this year I asked TA to teach me to swim as an adjunct to my 6ft training, and she did so with patience and skill (I imagine that it's quite hard to teach someone who you're very close to and who keeps asking 'why?' to everything you say) so that I was already achieving laps after only a couple of lessons, and I was swimming more than a km straight within a couple of months.

When I found tiger angel after the race I got a bit emotional trying to explain to her just what she'd given me and I think that I was a little incoherent (no! :-) ), so I'm going to say it again here. Once again, you've given me a life experience that I never could have achieved on my own. Thank you, my Beautiful.

Gnome

** Note that I said 'regularly'. I didn't say that I don't intend to do it again... :-)