This 'race' (if you can call it that) is the exact opposite of the last time I did the same distance back in 2010. Maybe it's age or just laziness, but I was a good 7 minutes slower than I was 3 years ago! And that was running with mud-caked feet!
I had been training half-heartedly before the race because...honestly?....I just didn't really take it seriously. At the back of my head was the constant 'they're all friendly distances so chill!' And chill I did. A lot of it. Especially the week before the race. Plus I guess I could use the whole 'injury' excuse, but I think I've pretty much milked that sorry little reason dry.
That said, I did enjoy the race. I was pleasantly surprised each time each leg ended. It is nice (and rare) when you think 'this leg is over already? that's fast' at the end of each leg. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I am fast...I'm saying the distances were just that short!
The swim leg went pretty well considering a fairly decent current I was swimming against and some slight choppiness. I sighted a gazillion times, which probably explains the aching neck, but that also meant I swam straight for a change. The first 20m of my swim my speedy swim amazed me even and I was all 'check me out dudes, I'm going so fast and swimming over every dang slow person out there'. Obviously that was short-lived and the rest of the swim was just spent dying a little and trying to catch my breath from that short spell. I think I got beat by a breaststroker at the end. And she was speedy. I spent the last 10m or so (between desperate gulps of air) trying to swim over random people just to catch up with her and I missed by a hair. Darn.
My bike leg was also better than many many other bike legs I've been for. Mainly this time I didn't have every man and his dog overtaking me (woohoo!) and I think I may actually have overtaken a few people. I was an idiot and packed the wrong bottle of water though (Side note: I need to spend some ass time on my road bike when training for stuff like this, because I tend to forget how to work the gears or what damn bottle fits in the bottle cage!) so because the bottle kept getting stuck on the cage I didn't actually dare take it out. Which meant I was just thirsty the whole way.
My run was shameful. This leads me to how important it is to do brick training. And that I didn't bother to do any. I really tried to run, I did. But whilst my spirit was willing, my legs felt like they were just weighed down by cement and weren't quite moving at the speed I was trying to get them to move at. I tried pumping my arms harder, but that did nothing except perhaps made me look ridiculous. It's amazing how much of a rhino you feel like right after you get through the transition. Anyway, because my legs weren't behaving, I took that as a good reason to stop running. So I walked. When I tried to run again, my knee hurt. So I walked some more. And even more. Soon it was the turn around point and I managed to find a girl going at a nice consistent pace I could stick myself behind and drag my heavy feet along. In the last 100m, my legs found it's groove and I made some wild crazed dash to the finish line...only to have a child beat me at the last 1m. Pffft.
I finished my teeny tiny race and thought I did awesomely and today after looking at the results, it seemed I had more of a 'meh' performance.
Swim leg (200m) - 05:19 mins
Bike leg (10k) - 31:56 mins
Run leg (2.4k)- 16:50
Overall - 54:04 mins
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