SOMEONE PINCH ME!!

WOW! It is has taken me a long time to write this blog. Not sure why. I think this is the final thing that I need to have done to call this triathlon complete. It is so bittersweet. Sweet in that I did it and that I can take some of my training time and focus on some things that need attention. Bitter in that I loved the training and the team that I trained with. I knew that I loved to get together with the team a couple of times a week, however I did not realize how much I was going to miss them once the season was complete.

So here are some pictures from the day of the event:

We stayed @ a hotel in Santa Monica the night before the race and we needed to be up and on the bus with everything we needed by 4:45 am. When we arrived at Malibu there were so many people there. On the race day there was somewhere between 2500-3000 participants. I was amazingly relaxed before the race, I just kept thinking this is what I have been getting ready for 4 months. I also had a hypnotherapy session on Friday night that seemed to really relax me (Thanks Ida!!) The race started at 7:15 am, the wave that I was in started somewhere around 7:50. I am somewhere in the midst of these ladies wearing pink hats. This was us waiting just before the canon went off.
This is just after the canon went off running into the ocean and the waves.
The orange buoy is what we swam around and then went swimming for a while parallel to the beach.
The end of the swim running out of the water.
From the ocean running to the transition area.

In the transition area. Stripped off the wetsuit and had my tri suit underneath.

Leaving the transition area with my bike.
About 3 miles into the bike course. Just past this, the guy that I am riding behind and I almost got hit by a car that went through some cops at an intersection. At this point I did something to the gears on my bike and could no longer change gears on the front sprockets. The last 14 miles of the ride I did in the same general gears, so the ride took me longer than I wanted it to. However I am very thankful that I was able to finish it.

One of the best pieces of advice that I think we received during the training was SMILE. I took this to heart and smiled as much as possibble. It really did make the event even better.

Dismount line after the bike going into the transition area.

This is what the transition area looked like. It was huge!!
On the run...
Close to the finish.



Crossing the finish...

Everyone received a medal for completing the event.
My biggest fan!!

Here are the times that I completed that triathlon in:

1/2 mile ocean swim: 23 minutes 32 seconds
Transition 1 (swim to bike): 4 minutes 7 seconds
18 mile bike: 1 hour 9 minutes 59 seconds
Transition 2 (bike to run): 2 minutes 16 seconds
4 mile run: 49 minutes 57 seconds
Total Time: 2 hours 29 minutes 53 seconds

I am very pleased with these times for my first event.

Thank you all so much for all your support. I raised over $3200 for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. I loved being part of the Team in Training program and I would recommend these events for everyone.