Suncoast Triathlon '08

Today was "dooms day"! This is the event that Troy and I have been training for over the last 8 weeks. So, this morning we awoke at 4:45 a.m. and was greeted with some scrambled eggs made by our Dad. That was chased with some Red Bull and our daily GXL supplements. We packed the car with all of our prepared gear and headed to the race site with excitement. Upon our arrival, we immediately jumped into action. Checking in, organizing, and arranging was in full effect from the start until we had to make our way to the starting line on the beach. To top things off, we had to deal with adverse weather consisting of rain and lots of wind. It was not an ideal start of a race. However, the race proceeded as planned and by the end, the conditions ended up being perfect.

Going in, I had a goal in mind. Even though the course was longer than our last tri, I made it my goal to finish in less time than my previous race. My last race time was 01:13:22. I was shooting for a 01:10:00 even with the extra 200 meters in the swim. During the race, I felt good and kept my focus on who I was doing this for and the small benchmarks I had made for myself during the race. Come race end, I was not only able to meet my goal, but better still, to exceed my goal. My official time ended up being 01:07:28 so I'm quite satisfied with my performance and my fitness level and I'm more than ready to find, train, and tackle our next outing.

Meanwhile, (this is Troy writing now) I threw up all over my shirt (that I was actually wearing) when it was over and I passed out in the car on the way home. Nice one, huh? No kidding. This is not exactly the same glowing report that Todd was just able to personally provide, but looking back, I really don't have any regrets at all. My time was 1:24 the last time I did this one. Today it was 1:30. Considering that we had 200 extra yards to cover on the swim than the last time we did this course, I'm actually not very disappointed. My goal coming in was to match my time last time, and with my being a heavier guy and still a "work in progress," I knew it would more than likely take ideal weather conditions to pull it off because my goal was difficult from the outset - just like Todd's was. This is a reflection of 2 things in retrospect upon examining each of our results: 1. That the weather proved to NOT be the ideal conditions that I knew I would need to get this done, but much more impressively, 2. How amazing Todd's preparation and eventual results proved to be. I tip my hat to him. He dropped 6 minutes from last time, while I added 6 minutes - on the SAME course, at the SAME time, and in the SAME conditions. Todd said that the run wouldn't get him this time like it did last time. He was right. I would think that 11th place out of the 65 men in his division would verify that. I close with this comment on a personal note. While Todd placed 11th, and he earned every bit of that ranking, I'm proud to report that I came in 20th place in the "Clydesdale" division. For those of you who are unfamiliar, that's the group of men that you have to be over 200 pounds to be in, which (believe it or not), I actually qualify for. :)

Check back on the blog soon. Our next order of buisness is to identify our next target, set the blog countdown timer, and get going! Yes, you know it, we're going to do it again! (and again, and again, and AGAIN!)