I did it!

I guess I can officially claim the title of triathlete. I'll be honest... it doesn't quite fit or feel right. Should I really be able to claim the title if I've only done 1 race?!

So, the breakdown. I don't own a watch, so you'll get no time breakdowns from me but as for the rest...

The swim was hard - much harder than I'd anticipated. I'd swam/walked 200yds in the rec center pool and it wasn't that bad, but it's a 25y pool and this was a 50y pool. My strategy was to swim 50y, walk 50y and repeat. What ended up happening was I swam 50y and pretty much walked the rest, although I have to say that walking in 4' of water when you're only 5'4" is no easy task! I was the last one out of the pool in my heat, but Jay had everyone clapping and cheering me on so I was too embarrassed by all the attention to really care!

The bike was long (for me) and I started thinking that training for these races really might be a good idea!! Yeah, I can swim 200y and I can bike 8mi and I can walk 2mi but I'd never done them all together :) I think the worst part of the bike was that my carpel tunnel flared up and my hands were numb for almost the entire ride. So numb, in fact, that I couldn't even use the brakes when I pulled into the transition area... not a good thing.

Despite my aching, numb hands, I felt great after the bike! I was really worried that my shins would cramp up and make the walk difficult, but that never happened. I even felt good enough to run (jog? whatever...) into the finish line. Note to self - check out the couch to 5k program because running really isn't that bad.

Ok, so I finished and it didn't take me hours and hours and not one person laughed or made fun. In fact, I was showered with encouragement and I really did do the entire thing with a smile on my face!


I am so proud of Jake! He was the youngest person to ever do this race and Trudy created an age group just for him. He took home a medal, a door prize and a huge sense of accomplishment!

Jay had a great race as well... 1st in his age group and 3rd overall. He improved his time by about 7 minutes, which is pretty fantastic for such a short race! I guess all that IM training has done him well!

I got to meet some of Jay's blogger buddies too - always a treat! Duane and KT joined us for dinner on Friday. Both are such great people with really encouraging spirits :)

What a great day! I'm proud of myself for getting out there and doing it and am actually thinking that the local triathlon in April just might be something I could do :)