Race Day: Part 1

When we last heard from the Would Be Triathlete there were many unanswered questions. Well join us now as we answer those and perhaps many more...

So last night I finally got in bed at 11 after a few trips to the car to put in some last minute items I finally got to bed and turned out the lights and then tossed in turned for about an hour or so...even played a s few games of solitaire on my Ipod to try and put my brain to sleep. So I finally fell asleep and woke up about 5 am (usual work week time) got dressed, had a bowl of cereal and banana and headed out the door. I got the the Guilderland YMCA about 6:15 and got there the same time as my Tri coach so we walked over and set up our Bike to Run transitions next to each other since we were some of the first people get there. So for the first part of the morning there was a Batman and Smiley balloon uh...doing something inappropriate I guess...
I then went over to the lake to set up my Transition 1 (Swim to Bike) where I had my pick of where I wanted to set up so I picked a place at the top of the racks.

As you can see I was there pretty early. So after setting up my stations I headed back to the car to grab my swim gear and put my shoes and gym shorts in the car and then head to the lake and pick up my timing chip and get ready to race. Before I left the car I decided that I was not above shameless promotion and marked my swim cap...
I know, no one probably saw it or will visit the blog but it was a fun thing to do, maybe next year will do more advertising, thought about taking my Sharpie and writing on the banner there at the lake. So finally they started the race. It was hard and somewhat nerve racking to sit there and wait for the last heat (my heat). Finally it came and I think that it was the longest 3 minutes in my life.

THE SWIM:
So with ~50 people in the water I understand that some contact is going to happen. Before we reached the first buoy I was kicked in the teeth, not hard but enough to feel it. After making the turn I was making decent time and finding my stroke then I knew I was swimming right next to someone so I decided to pass them but every time I went to dig in and try to pass I got a nice kidney shot. Finally I pulled to the right to the outside. I did manage to to pass some of the people from the previous heat. I just want to say the end of the swim is deceiving because I got to the 2 buoys which I thought marked the beginning of the beach and tried to touch the bottom only find out that I still could not touch the bottom...I thought that the dirt was just stirred up from people exiting the water...not so...so I think that kinda slowed me down a bit.

Total Swim Time: 5 min. 57 sec. Overall Swim place: 67/450
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So originally I was going to recap the whole race but the longer I sit here typing (I am debating if I am going to teach Spin in the morning) I can feel the energy just sapped out of me so I will finish up the rest of the story tomorrow.

So I leave you with another cliffhanger...