Tri-ing times

I competed in the Colchester Triathlon yesterday, and it was quite an event. The bike and run were great, but the swim was another story. I realized very early into the swim that I NEED to practice, visualize and feel confident that I can complete an event before I jump in. For the marathon, I have to run a couple of 20 milers before doing a race, and I always check out the course at least a day before to get to know it. For the swim, I did a 12 minute session in the lake on Friday and tried to check out the course at dusk on Saturday night. It was just too dark to see the end of the course, so I was left thinking the thing went on forever. Not ideal visualization material.

Come race day, I was still feeling pretty good, if a bit uneasy. The gun sounded, I hit the water and started at it. Within about 15 strokes, my chest tightened, I had trouble getting a good breath, and I resorted to the breast stroke. I plugged away, but nerves kpet nagging me as I thought about the guy who drowned in a tri in NY last week, the qualifications of the safety personnel, and other not-so-inspiring images. I continued with the breast/side stroke all the way out and across the course, but a strange thing happened when I turned the corner to head back to shore. The nerves disappeared. Suddenly, I could do the crawl without an issue and I actually passed a couple of people. The mind is a powerful thing. The second I headed toward shore, toward safety, I was fine. Call it survival instinct, mental attitude, psychological readiness, whatever -- this swim reiterated something we've discussed here many times. The non-physical aspect of sport is a huge factor (I'd say over 80%) in any sporting endeavor.

I finally got to shore and gave a big fist pump back to my family cheering section who followed me from the water in the punt. (I learned post-race that they were confused by my excitement exiting the water, "Does he know he's almost the last one out?") That fist pump served as a good lesson for the kids, though. Yes, I bit it on the swim, but I'm still a winner because I didn't quit and perservered through a tough spot.

I found out after the fact that the swim course was about more like three quarters of a mile, not the advertised half-mile due to a bouy malfunction. I felt strong on the bike and the three mile run was no sweat, mainly because I'm mentally used to longer distances at this point. As is always the case in triathlons, the fellow racers were awesome. I've never heard more encouragement from participating racers on course than I have in triathlons. I forgot about that, and it was a huge bonus. In the end, the race was a great experience that left me feeling good about pushing through a tough spot.

The numbers...
1/2 - 3/4 mile swim - 30:48
12 mile bike - 38:59
3 mile run (probably more like 2.75) - 20:00
Grand total with transitions - 1:32:29

But the real numbers were 1 and 2 for my two kids. After the race a neighbor at camp put on a mini triathlon for the local kids. The events were swim, run and inner-tube swim, and there were two classes, under and over 10 years old. The kids all got numbers written on their arms and everyone won a prize. The kids cheered for me in the morning and I got to cheer for them in the afternoon. How cool is that?