Pineman

I didn't have a good time at this race. The week before the race we had some anouncements at work about how the company would be split up. I work for Visteon and didn't know if I was going to the services group or staying with corporate Visteon.



It turned out that I was chosen to stay with Visteon while my peers are moving to the service group, which one is better I still don't know but I feel I'm in a better position with the ability to advance now. Still, there were a lot of nights where I had difficulty sleeping and missed some training days. My nutrition wasn't the greatest but I decided to go on with the race plans.



The race: Got there the day before, went over the bike and run course and got a feel for them. I stayed at the camp ground and had a good nights' rest.



The start was delayed for about an hour due to fog. The management changed the swim course to keep it closer to shore, which was probably a good idea and the race started. The start waves were fairly small and there was a lot of room so I had no trouble with people bashing around. It was a wetsuit race so I expected to go a bit faster and felt good. I started brisk and then settled into my race pace, I felt someone drafting me for a while but I couldn't find a pair of feet to follow. There was 3 minutes between waves so I caught a lot of people that started in front of me, it was easy to go around them. The second loop was even more wide open since there was no mini-tri people left on the course. I came out of the water in 28 minutes and took a minute to get to transition so the total swim time was 28:53. Yes, it was really short, I expected to come out of the water near 34 minutes.



The bike ride I didn't like. It seemed like 40 of the 56 miles were on bumpy roads that got me pretty upset. There's nothing like riding on bumpy roads with 150psig in your tires for 2:42. It was pretty uneventfull and nutrition went exactly as planned. 1 GU every 30 minutes, 2 bottles of Gatorade (my mix) and 3 bottles of water picked up from the course. Average HR was 158, a bit higher than I planned but this wasn't a flat course like it was advertised.



The run started uneventfull but near the end of the first loop I twisted my ankle running on the grass just after crossing the dam. I must have stepped on the only hole on the course cuz it was well laid out with mile markers and aid stations, it was just some bad luck on my part. I finished the first loop and called it quits, I really didn't want to hurt myself in a race that I wasn't really enjoying and meant nothing to me. Up untill the time of the incident I was running 8:30's to 8:40's, just like I planned on doing but I probably wouldn't have been able to pick it up on the second loop.

This is the first race that I haven't finished and I'm not proud of it, Oh Well, there will be more races in the future for me but probably not this one.



I would give HFP Racing a good thumbs up for their organization and execution of the race. The fog and road conditions were beyond their control. I look forward to doing one of their races in the future, likely the Little Smokies HIM and maybe the Triple T if it fits my schedule.