White Lake Sprint Triathlon

I did this race in 2006, my times were
Swim T1 Bike T2 Run Total
00:14:52 00:02:37 00:42:52 00:01:43 00:28:55 01:30:55
this year according to my watch which is not quite accurate
16:08 2:32 39:24 1:46 27:33 01:27:26

that's 3:29 faster woohoo! Not sure what happened with the swim, but after some research, it appears the swim in 2006 was a little short as the times from 2007 of some of the people who did it in 2006 were slower even though their overall time was faster. anyway on to the race report.

Set my alarm for 3:45 AM, woke up at 3:40 AM 5 minutes before the alarm went off. Ate some cereal, feed the cats, finished packing the car up then took at nice warm shower. Left the house at 4:48, arrived at the race site at 6:20. Should have parked on the road so I could have left early, but I needed to use the bathroom and having the car right there was too appealing to turn down. Nothing exciting happened during setup, got everything setup and ate some more then walked around waiting for 7 am so I could start my warmup. Warmup felt really good first ran for about 1/2 mile, then took the bike out for a short spin. I don't usually ride, but my chain feel off this morning so I wanted to make sure everything was working and get it in a good gear and make sure it would not de chain itself again, especially since last time I did this race, my chain fell off. Finished the bike warmup and reset my transition and then grabbed the wetsuit and headed to the lake. It was about 72 degrees and really clear today. I Think they added some sand as the water was only waist deep at the start and I remember it being close to head high in previous years.
On to the race.
The swim. Lined up to the left and tried to stay out of the mess and keep a good line to the first buoy. Felt really good on the swim. I sighted often and finally kept a straight line. Only got bumped once or twice by someone swimming off line. I didn't want to go too fast while trying to keep my effort high. Got out of the water and my watch said 15 something, a little depressing as I was comparing to last time, but the swim is the easiest thing for them to mess up so I put that out of my mind and started to concentrate on transition and the bike coming up.
T1: I had my wetsuit halfway off by the time I got to my bike and kept focus while getting ready for the bike
Bike: This time on the bike I really wanted to push the whole way and see how my legs would do on the run, so the first lap I tried to keep my speed over 21 as best as possible and except for the one really bumpy part I was able to do that. First lap was 19:50 and my goal was under 40 so I was right on track, the second lap I wanted to push a little more so kept the speed over 22 and finished with an average speed of 21.7 and my bike computer said 40:10, but watch said 39:24 so I suspect it's somewhere in the middle but I did break 40 ( I hope ) like I wanted.
T2: 1:46 nothing exciting to report here.
Run: The beginning was really tough, my legs were spent from the hard bike, but I knew if I just kept going I knew they would come back. The course was not marked correctly, as at mile 1 my watch said 7:15, when I got to the turn around I was at 14:11, then I got to mile 2 marker and my watch said 20:14, but the mile 2 marker was right at the mile 1 marker so I knew I only had about 7 minutes to go. the last half mile was really tough to keep the speed up, but somehow I managed until the very end when I turned to go over the bridge my right hamstring started to cramp, but it went away, then I made the left turn for the finish and wanted to sprint, but the hamstring started up again and I didn't want to have to limp across the line so I just kept my pace consistent and only had to hop a couple times. Hopefully my pictures show some of that. It had started to get hot and I was sweating up a storm on the bike and on the run.
All in all a good effort and the nice cool lake after was awesome.

Next up Surf and Turf on 5/17