The End! (Or is it?)

It's all such a whirlwind and I'm still emotionally and physically drained. I could probably write a 10 page paper about my race experience, but I'll try to edit myself and keep it brief-ish. If it were really brief, it wouldn't be me writing this. ;)

So race day finally approached. After a nice evening filled with a healthy cooked dinner, a lavender-filled bath, some shaving, and last minute packing, I hit the hay. Alarm set for 2:45 a.m. (no snoozing allowed this morning). We got out the door at 3:20 a.m., just 5 minutes behind schedule. Naturally there was little traffic on the highways (most was in G'ville from those who were still up partying) so we made excellent time.

Got to the park as maybe the 9th car in and got registered in the pitch black. My race number? 7. Lucky number 7. I dug it. Brought my bike over to the transition area and the whole rack was completely open so I got LITERALLY the best parking spot in the entire area, right out front! I set up shop (bike helmet on seat, crate on ground and shoes next to it with socks inside, etc.). I was wondering how to best do it all and was studying others (Oh, that's right, kickstands AREN'T cool, so you sort of hang your bike on the bar!) and soon Vinny from Foxboro, MA came along. Vinny was a total pro, a 59 year old who looked not a day over 45, and who does Ironmans through the year. Nice guy. In the couple hours before the race, I watched people come in and nudge their bikes in next to mine to get a better position. Amazing what people will do.

Anyway, we were set up and Kate lent me her spring suit and she wore one also. We did a mini jog, got in line, and got ready. All we had to do was swim out to the buoy and go around it and swim back. DAMN that thing looked far away! So before we knew it there was a countdown and we were off. Kate & I took the left side middle position which served us well. I only was kind of running into someone towards the beginning, at one point apologizing before I realized that HEY, he was running into ME and I swam away from him. There was a strong glare and I stopped frequently to tread water, take my goggles off, and see where on Earth the damn buoy was. Not terribly efficient, but what the heck. I think I did that often too because the whole experience was so surreal and unsettling. I mean, I felt like I was in the middle of nowhere and it was madness. Still, I put my head down and plowed along. After what seemed like eternity, I found myself upon the buoy. In a daze I watched as some people were kind of treading water around it like it was a mystical God, but then I got my sh** together and moved on. It was tough going back as there were swimmers coming at me towards the buoy and I was going away. Still, I wore on and made it. The water was dark, like we knew, but it felt nice and cool and crisp. Was thankful for Kate's suit. When I finally got out, I had no idea how I'd done but I felt spent. I felt like I'd just exited the water after being shipwrecked and swimming to land. It was hard to imagine that somehow I had to put myself back together and now run 1/4 mile on dirt and road to change and do MORE exercise...

So my transition was extremely poor. I was running slow, feeling slow, and everyone around me was moving faster. I was still in transition when I saw Kate come in from the swim. I got on the bike and took off, promising to myself that I could relax on the bike for a bit. Had to pull over immediately when I realized there was no way I could put on bike gloves whilst riding (I'm not THAT coordinated) but then I got a decent groove. Sometimes I passed, sometimes I got passed. It took some time to get my breathing feeling normal due to all the excitement, but I made it. I had taped the directions to my bike (along with the words BREATHE and SMILE) but of course they changed the course AGAIN so those didn't work. I kept looking for Kate to pass me since she's stronger on the bike, but it didn't happen. Finally I saw her coming in the opposite direction, apparently she'd passed me ages ago. Seeing her fueled me to get a move on. I remembered while biking that the whole point of this thing is to HAVE FUN and so I started doing just that. When passing little kids, I told them they were doing great. I asked a cop who was directing the race if she'd mind trading places with me for a little bit. It got me smiling which helped. The bike portion seemed to go by quickly and soon I was just trading the helmet for a Sox hat and running.

My run was slow but steady. Immediately people were zipping by me, but I didn't care. And in time, I was passing some people. A lot of people seemed to stop and walk for a bit and then pick up to a solid clip, but I kept with my slow and deliberately steady pace. Again, I tried to have some fun. While running through the campground area, I came upon some kids who were saying the jersey numbers aloud. "341, 253, 7..." When they said my number, I started whooping and hollering. "Yeeeeeeeah, SEVEN!" I yelled. They smiled. At one point I came upon a guy with a giant grill, cooking up some yummy grub. I turned to the five people running behind me and said "Hey, that doesn't smell bad now does it?" Finally I came upon the last water station. I thought for sure I'd have about 5 mins left at that point. "Just a mile left" the guy said. Eeks. I wasn't running strong, so this would take around 10 mins I figured. Luckily I saw my young friends again, who shouted out "Gooooooo 7, yeah!!!" That was fun. Vinny ran by me in the opposite direction and in a moment I blanked on his name and instead yelled out "Go Foxboro!" I passed the time by watching the calves of those who ran by me, looking for fellow MFT women in the 30-34 age group. I came upon two men, one who was in his 60s and one in his 40s and passed them. Was told we were 1/4 mile away, and the 60 year old said to his younger friend, "I'm going to pick up the pace here," and immediately blew my a** out of the water. I started to pour it on hard, thinking I'd turn the corner and that was it but it was still a bit to go. No time to slow down now. I saw Kate and John cheering as I sored through the finish line. I gasped for air, was handed a water, and then lunged for John's Bloody Mary. ;)

Kate and I immediately started talking shop about the race. I found out that I was one of the first female swimmers to finish (4th I believe) and that Kate finished about 5 minutes ahead of me. She remembered being passed by two of our competitors towards the end and they took first and second, making Kate in THIRD place in our age group (SHE GOT A MEDAL. SHE'S THE BOMB!) I got fourth and am feeling pretty good about it all.

I was (am) feeling pretty good about the whole deal. It was exciting and nerve-wracking and fun. I wanted to go for less than 2 hours, I went in 1:35. I wanted to not have any big issues, and I didn't. I wanted to not get DFL in my age group, and I didn't! Yaaaaaaaay.

My body is sore and I'm exhausted. It was a long day, but a fun day. When I went back to my bike I found the race number band that Vinny had worn in his race sitting on my bike. "I have a few of 'em, you can use it for your next race!" he said. We closed it off by eating food Kate's mother-in-law had made. Ham sandwiches with cheese and mustard never tasted so good. "We should make this a yearly event!" Kate said. We could, we could. And ironically enough, the countdown I had set on my Myspace page actually reset itself to say that my triathlon is in 364 days. Ya never know what could be next... ;)

Off to bed now but more to say tomorrow. Stay tuned!