So I keep meaning to get back here and post about things, but the THINGS just keep happening at a rate so fast that I can’t sit down and write about them. Last week was what I affectionately started calling “hell week” about 2 days into it. We had 4 proposals due last week, 3 of them on Friday and the one that was supposed to be “easy” consumed both mine and my coworker’s time almost exclusively for 2.5 days, leaving us just pieces of Thursday and Friday to get the other two in. I worked over 50 hours last week and left the office at 2:20 on Friday. Good times.
Luckily, I had my first triathlon to look forward to! My friend Jenny is sort of my partner in crime. We egg each other on to do increasingly questionable athletic things. Wanna run do a triathlon? Sure! Wanna run a 15K? Sure! We thank each other for acting before thinking so at least we’re in this together. Thus, after my hell week, I set out with Matt and the kids in tow to the nether regions of Denver. So far East you can’t even see the mountains a lot of the time. Crazy! But what waaaaay East Denver does have is Cherry Creek State Park which contains Cherry Creek Reservoir where our triathlon was being held.
So we went stopped there first to do packet pickup, consisting of things like putting your bike in the corral, getting your timing chip, grabbing fun swag from the sponsors and generally checking things out. After packet pickup, we met the husbands and kids at Benihana and had dinner and a show.
We had elected to stay at a hotel in the area (it’s almost an hour drive from where we live to the reservoir) and it turned out great because the kids went to sleep quickly and despite nerves, I got a pretty good night sleep. I met Jenny just before 6 and we headed over to the reservoir to get close parking and make sure we had plenty of time. It was a good plan – I am always surprised how fast pre-race goes. And though we weren’t “on” until after 7:30, the hour + zipped by with waiting in line to pee (twice), getting on our wetsuits, inking our numbers on our arms, setting up our transition areas, etc.
Before I knew it, we were on the beach. We took a quick test-run through the water and then waited with everyone else as the waves were called. We were in different waves since we’re in different age groups and I got to wave my friend into the water and promptly lose sight of her in a sea of red swim caps.
My wave went 5 minutes later and right away I knew I was going to have a good swim. My practice open water swims have been a very mixed bag. If I take my inhaler, I’ve been OK, but if I haven’t, I’ve had real problems. So I swam and swam and felt awesome. The biggest problem I had was the sun in my eyes and seeing the buoys we were supposed to be swimming around, but I was surprised how soon I was at the turnaround point, and felt great coming out of the water. My swim time was around 18:00 which is my best so far.
We had to run up a ramp and a bunch of stairs back to transition. I peeled off my wetsuit. goggles and cap and put on a t’shirt, shoes, sunglasses and helmet and got out on my bike! I love the bike portion – it is easily my best part. It is what the super muscular thighs I am blessed with are made for. Most people in the race rode road bikes, but I do not own a road bike because I don’t really like riding on the road. You have to share it with cars and they are large and can kill you, so I just rode my mountain bike because I’m used to it and I didn’t have to shell out $1000 + to acquire it. However, in this application, it was frustrating. I am a fast rider and I could easily pass almost anyone on the way up hills, but I ran out of gears to push out speed on the downs and flats. I ride in almost the lowest gear possible all the time and there just wasn’t anything left, so then the same girls I’d just passed on the UPS would pass me on the flats an downhills. grrrrr I also lost some time because a SEMI TRUCK was in the park for some reason and couldn’t make a tight turn and blocked off the road!!! Still, good bike and I made about 45 min on that portion.
I headed back into transition to ditch my bike and helmet and don my running hat. I also downed a bunch of water and ate a few Shot Blocks. I should have chased them with more water because I had an icky heavy sweet taste my whole run until I got to the aid station. I also should have taken another inhaler puff because I was wheezy on my run. The run wasn’t great. It was rolling hills which I rather despise. But it was what it was so I wheezed and ran-walked my way over the 3.1 miles. I must have had a bit more in me than I thought though because once I saw Matt and the kids, I sprinted through to the finish. My run time was around 36 minutes, very disappointing because I should be right around 30 to 31 or, theoretically on that short of a distance, even faster.
All said, for the whole race, I was under 1:45, about 15 minutes faster than I’d expected! Not too shabby. The after party was nice with a catered breakfast and fun with the husbands and kids. And the experience, overall was wonderful! I really liked the sprint tri distance and I wouldn’t hesitate to do one again. The Iron Girl triathlon was particularly great – all-women races are always very fun and supportive – and this was well run and very fun.
