Oh what a day

Well the last "practice race" of the season has come and gone and it felt GREAT to get my racing legs back under me with 2 weeks to go. The race I competed in was an Olympic Distance Tri in Delaware City, Delaware...about an hour and 20 minutes from my home. The race was called the Escape From Ft. Delaware Triathlon and it was madness. First of all, because the swim was in a river, they had to adjust the start time of the race to match the low tide and current time for a supposed 'easier' swim...HA! And since I couldn't get to Delaware City Friday night, I had to wake up at 1:45 am Sat. morning and eat, shower , etc. to get to packet pick up and body marking at 4am (triathlon is 50% physical test, 50% mental test). Needless to say however, at 4am I was HYPED to race, much more hyped than the rest of the competitors. Back to the swim...it was actually really cool...we had to take a boat from our transition area across the river to an island which is called Ft. Delaware, which used to be a major stronghold in the Civil War and a major defense area that patrolled the river which accessed the Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. So the boat ferry's started hauling our butts over there by wave at 5:10 am and once we were all there the race would start as close to 7am as possible. So as I was sitting on the island the sun came up, the morning blues of everyone else turned into race butterflies and when a mock civil war soldier wheeled out an old cannon and 4 others came armed with civil war era rifles, the Star Spangled Banner was sung and it was go time!
THE SWIM: OK, I think I've made this race sound pretty cool so far, which it was, but the swim was BY FAR the most challenging one I've EVER done. To start, we had to jump off of the pier which unloaded us all from the boats, oh, about a 6 foot jump. But the river current was incredibly strong and since it was INCREDIBLY windy you could say some of the chop was surfable. And the water was butt cold. I could hear about 400 people simultaneously say to themselves, "what the hell am I doing?" But off we went, I was in wave two, jumped off the pier and tried to not drift back into the pier, and took off like I stole something. I felt good but within 250 meters I looked up to sight and saw swimmers 100 meters to the right, 100 meters to the left and about 8 already hanging on to kayaks as they decided this wasn't for them. I don't know if it was exhaustion or panic but it was extreme conditions and I felt bad for them that their day was done 5 minutes in. Luckily I kept my line and freestyled calmly to the finish line and felt good but knew I scored a poor time...but I was FREE and had literally escaped Ft. Delaware and had just had a great open water swim practice. By the way, I can't wait to swim Lake Coeur D'Alene after the past few swim experiences I've had out east...WOW. But what made it pretty fun is the amount of people there to watch the race and lined the transition areas and swim exit. You gotta love fans and volunteers of races, they are what makes the races truely fun!
THE BIKE: Well T1 was better as I did a better job of de-wetsuiting and readying for the ride. Armed with just 1 water bottle and 1 gel, I knew it was race time. And I knew, even though it was flat, it would be a grind with winds they say were about 20 MPH. And so over the 26 miles, that's exactly what I averaged on my ride, 20 MPH. Which is pretty weak for such a short ride but I felt strong and that's all that mattered as I kept telling myself, "this is just a simple preparation for the Big Kahuna in 2 weeks". And I know I probably shouldn't be racing this close to D-Day, but whatever, I was having fun. I entered T2 1 hour, 15 minutes later and was ready to run. Really, all I wanted out of this race was to enjoy it and not be sore when it was over so I could really get physically prepared for Idaho.
THE RUN: Had a great T2 time as I easily slipped out of bike gear, threw on the running kicks, didn't need to stop for any nutrition, so I was out. It was a simple out and back, into the wind out and a tailwind back which was just what the doctor ordered, passed a very nice amount of people who surely got their lead over me in the swim (because I still semi-suck at swimming but I'm getting there) and finished an uneventful run (no hunger, no cramps, no errors) in 47:21 or 7:38/mile. And I was very excited to not be sore the rest of the day and to wake up on Sunday without an ounce of soreness and minimal fatigue. And I'm happy because I know I pushed it hard, harder than I had planned because of what I knew this race represented. But as all racers know, you can tell yourself you're going to take it easy but when the gun goes off, the chemical imbalance all triathletes have in their brain forget about YOUR plan and take over. Oh, how sweet it is! Time to taper, take it easy and know that I've done everything I needed to and can to be ready for June 25th. Did I mention I. AM. HYPED!