Maumee Bay Triathlon

I decided to race on Sunday down a Maumee State Park since I was down there allready for my son's show.

Very nice park and was put on by one of the best race organizers around, HFP Racing.

I'll have some pictures later today.

Swim
It was a beach start and I've been swimming well lately so I started at the front. The horn went off and I was running into the water, after a few dolphin dives I swam hard for 100 strokes then settled into a smooth pace. I caught a lot of people from previous waves and had to swim around them. For the most part it was OK but sometimes I got wacked by them inadvertently, mostly in the back. It was 2 laps and the second lap went as well as the first, smooth swimming and fairly uneventfull. I was out of the water in 22 minutes.

Bike
After a 54 second transition I was off on the bike. I was told it was flat and it was. It is the only race that I've done that is flatter than Sylvania :) Since I wasn't really rested for this race I was concerned about going too hard on the bike, then I remembered that I really wanted this race to be a test and it was also a "C" race so I decided to go fairly hard. I seemed to settle in to about 200 watts fairly well which brought me back in 1:03:30...Not my best but a solid ride. The course had a little bit of wind, maybe 5 mph, and it seemed like I was going into it about 75% of the time which suits me fine since I am more aero than most cuz of my size. The roads outside of the park were in fairly good condition and allowed for a lot of speed. There were Police and volunteers at every intersection and I felt very safe during the ride.

Run
Back in transistion and out in 54 seconds (again!!!) even though I put socks on it went pretty quick.

I really didn't know where to go comming out of transistion but the volunteers pointed me in the right direction and I followed the cones that marked the way really well. When I got to the path I just settled in to my quickest pace I felt I could hold for the entire run. After a few minutes into the run, Tom Demerly passed me smiling away, it looked like he was having a good time and just ran away, I wasn't able to follow. I lost a little concentration and my second mile was a little slower than the rest, when I realized it I picked it back up. I hit the turn around just under 23 minutes and wanted to try and neg split the run, I wound up doing that but just by 1 sec so I felt it was a good run for me at just under 46 minutes. I'm not a great runner and I really felt slow during the run despite it being my quickest Oly Tri run by a few seconds.

2:13:18 is my best Oly time, good for 4th in AG and 21st overall...not a bad day for going into a race unrested :) I was very happy with the result.