having done 3 tri's now, there's a lot to be said for 'em.  firstly,
triathletes are a lot more friendly than road racers.  they're more like
mtn bikers, i guess.  secondly, the need for water means that most tri's
take place in parky, bucolic venues, not some crappy industrial park
without a dapple of shade.  and thirdly, there's good entertainment
without the gore.  before the race began, i watched some chick fall off
her bike for NO reason, right in front of the first aid tent.  she was
muscle-hewn like greg watson, so i can't blame lack of ability or athletic
prowess.  she was unscathed, fortunately, and popped back on her bike.  in
tri's you rarely get that sound of a bunch of bikes clattering to the
pavement, with all the attendant broken collarbones and damaged spatulas.

sharon, peg and i did the tri, while scaff, adam "flax seed" singer, and
amy & joe blithe did the duathlon that ran concurrently.  steve showed
he's got cross-season form coming on by placing 2nd in his age group,
right behind adam. joe finished 3rd in his age group, while amy finished
4th in hers.

the half mile swim cut a counter-clockwise rectangle across a lake.  my
wave stood on the beach and watched while a guy from the previous wave
made an unintentional 90-degree left and started swimming straight up the
lake, while the rest of the race continued across it.  people in boats
blew whistles and hollered, but the poor dude continued his lonely journey
up the lake another 200 yards before the officials finally got his
attention and turned him back, whereupon the audience on the beach
cheered.

see?  good entertainment.

no doubt i would have done the same thing if i hadn't taken a peek around
me every 6 or strokes.  it's really easy to get off course without that
nice black line on the bottom.

my mediochre swimming and transition-zone ineptitude mean that i'm already
a good 7 minutes behind the leaders when i get on my bike.  good
transitions are triumphs of coordination and
having-your-shit-togetherness, neither of which i have in any measure.  so
for the bike and run legs, i play catch-up.  the bike leg hurts a lot
because the head-wind seems perpetual.  peg does a phenomenal ride and
leaves me in the dust on a long, interminable false flat.  for a while i
pace with a dude with legs the size of my torso, covered with tattoos.
he's got terrible form, knees splayed out to the side, but he's Strong
Like Ox, except on the corners as we come into town.  at every turn he
seems to come to a dead stop before riding through, so i leave him behind.

only, i have another shitty transition from bike to run, so i pass the
same guy again about half a mile in.  the run course travels along a
shaded creekside, which is really pleasant, and there are lots of water
stops.  there's a steep, short climb over uneven, broken asphalt, which my
traildawg runner friends would have loved, and a trek over a marshy
baseball field.  much, much more fun than running alongside a highway.
the run is less agonising than usual, which means i'm not going as fast as
i should, but i'm content to not suffer too much.

sharon, peg and i finish within a minute and a half of each other, 19th,
21st and 20th, respectively.  coming off a nasty stomach bug, sharon is
still 4th in her age group; meanwhile peg is 3rd in hers, and i am 5th in
mine.

this weekend is another local sprint tri in north east, MD, while the
following weekend is the olympic distance national championship in
wilkes-barre, which purportedly has a hillier, more technical bike course.
goodie!

vive le lance.