2026 T100 Vancouver Sprint

Before we get into this race report, it's important to understand the events leading up to race day. 

4 weeks before race day, my family and I went on vacation. Training was limited to a 5 hour hike I did with my sister. After a week of vacation, it was back home and business as usual. I knew that we would be camping the week before the race, so for the next 2 weeks, I would need to get all my training in for proper prep. The first week went fine, but that weekend there was a death in my family and I needed to fly "home." I did get one good run session in, but nothing else. 

When I got back home, I was able to get a good bike session in before our second vacation.

I brought my gravel bike and was able to get a good ride in while camping, but spent the rest of the time relaxing with family. 

There was miscommunication on my part about when we would be coming back. For some reason, I assumed we were coming back Thursday, but I was wrong. We would be coming back Friday, well after package pick-up and bike drop-off. We changed our ferry reservations to make sure I was back in time. 

We left the campsite on time and made it to our first ferry. 

It was delayed. 

After the first ferry, we drove to the next ferry. We just barely made it and had just enough time to clean up the aftermath of a car sick 2 year old in the back seat before the second ferry left. 

The second ferry was delayed. 

We got off the ferry and realized we were now in Friday afternoon, rush hour traffic. What should have been a 45 minute drive took well over 2 hours. 

We made it home, I loaded my bike on the rack, and left for package pickup. 

Traffic was still bad. What should have been another 45 minute drive was over 90 minutes. I arrived just in time to check in and drop off my bike. 

I drove home, unpacked the rest of camping, then prepped my gear for the race. 

All this rushing around ended up triggering a stress migraine later that night and after a restless and virtually sleepless night, it was race day. 

I am not going to lie, there was a part of me that just wanted to say, "You know what? Forget this!"

But I had been in a similar situation before. And if I could race a 70.3 with no sleep after a migraine, I can race a sprint under the same conditions. 

I made it to the race early and parked 5 minutes down the road. On the walk in, I met up with my friend and former teammate Alison. We chatted as we walked and caught up on life. 

In the mad rush the day before, I had misplaced my timing chip. Now this sounds familiar. I was able to get a replacement and then set up my transition area. 

A few other things got lost in the shuffle. I forgot my body glide (for my socks and wetsuit). Not a big deal.

I also forgot to check/pump my tires. Luckily they were good.

And my power meter battery was dead, so I would riding by feel alone. Again not the end of the world. 

Once setup, I watched the Olympic distance start. The water had little current, it was high tide, and the water was warm (18 degrees).

After chatting with quite a few athletes that I know from coaching, it was time to line up. 

The Swim

It was a rolling start, 2 athletes at a time every 5 seconds. I thanked the volunteer as I made my way to the water. It was colder than I expected, but still very nice. 

I kept a good line out to the first turn buoy. There was a tanker lined up perfectly so sighting was a breeze. 

I took the first turn and noticed the next buoy was not at 90 degrees. This made the turn not as sharp and easier to get a new sighting line.

Everyone seemed to be going off to the left, but I kept my line and swam a straight line to the next few buoys. 

I rounded the last turn buoy and was headed into shore. It was starting to get a bit more crowded now. I grabbed a draft when I could, but soon the swimmer started off course. I kept my line. 

Soon I was at shore. I swam all the way up and made a good exit. 

As I made my way up the beach, I was not feeling great. Not sick, just very run down. There was a good 10 or so seconds where I considered dropping out. There was a mini aid station with water so I grabbed a cup and threw the cold water on my face. I shook the feeling off and kept marching toward my bike. 

 

I took my time in transition. The race organizers had put up more fencing to control the flow of athlete traffic. This meant we had to run all the way around transition before entering. Not a big deal, I memorized my landmarks from both sides. Not my first rodeo.

I turned left at the second porto-potty and headed toward the white tent until I found my bike. I changed into my gear and was headed out. 
 
The mount line was about 20 meters up the road, so I took my time walking on the pavement in my cycling shoes. I crossed the mount line, got on my bike and was off. 

The Bike

The course took us on all my old familiar training routes. We went up the hill past the Jericho Hostel and up onto 4th.

As I took the turn onto 4th, I saw 3 athletes walking their bikes. I felt bad for them. If they were walking this early and on this hill, they were in for a rude awaking when they got to Spanish Banks. I gave some words of accoutrement as I rode by.

I took the hill nice and easy. We had at least 2 more hills to go and a 5k run. That and I had no power meter to keep me in check. I had the option to display speed, time, and/or distance but opted for a blank screen. 

As we rounded the top of 4th, we had a good downhill onto Chancellor. I used this to gain enough speed to make it up the small incline before heading into UBC. 

Riding through the neighborhood at UBC was a good opportunity to get aero and hydrate. Soon I was making the left onto NW Marine Drive and heading back down to Jericho. 

I stayed to the right as the course merged with those on the end of their lap. And I stayed right to make sure those who were better at descending than me could fly by with ease. Coming down this hill is very technical as it has some twists and turns. I rode within my limit and only went 'full send' toward the bottom where I felt safe. 

I veered left and into the parking lot for the turn around. What comes down must go up. So back up we went. 

Once again, I took the hill very easy. It's not as long as the hill on 4th, but it has some punchy bits. We turned right at the top and rode into UBC. 

These were roads I am very familiar with. I used to ride this route all the time when I lived downtown. I gained good speed and stayed tucked in aero.  

We got to 16th and turned left, This would be last hill on the course. I knew it well from the UBC triathlon. After riding down East Mall, we rode onto the Main Mall and the cobble brick path that is the UBC Tri run course. This took us past the UBC Tri transition area and down the East Mall walkaway (the start of the Great Trek, formerly known as the Fall Classic). This dumped us out at the top of the NW Marine Drive hill.

It was here that I got confused. I saw a race official pointing to the right. I knew we were supposed to go straight, but maybe there was a medical emergency and they were rerouting us. I saw a few athletes ahead of me go right, so I went right. 

I then stopped immediately as I saw another race official wave me back. I asked the first official why he pointed right and he said, "I was not pointing right. I was pointing at you." 

Note to any officials out there, if you are going to point, please only point in the direction we need to go. We are moving fast, our brains are not working 100%, and we cannot read your mind.  

I flew down the hill a second time leaving more room as the race was now very crowded. I rode the down hill speed through the flats along the beach to the construction detour. I took the ramp slowly and under control and was back in aero as we rode into transition.

It was yet another long walk all the way around to my spot. An official joking said, "We changed the format. It's now Swim-Bike-Swim-Run."

I laughed and asked, "Can it just be Bike-Bike-Bike?"

A lady laughed and said as long as she did not have to swim. 

"I can swim for you if you run for me." I joked 

I racked my bike and started off on the run 

The Run

I walked the first bit, getting some hydration and a gel. Once onto the main path, I started to run. I walked through the first aid station and grabbed some water. 

My legs were not giving me what I wanted and I ended up walking more than I would have liked. While looping around the lake, I got some much needed encouragement from the amazing course marshals. 

We looped past transition and I made a mental note of all the signage. There were several ways to go depending on what lap you were on or what distance you were doing. It seemed pretty straight forward to me. But I did see several sprint distance athletes either finish too soon or go out for an unneeded second lap. 

After an out-and-back along Lacarno Beach, it was time to run to the finish. With 1.5k to go, I set the goal of running all the way to the finish. 

I was all in now. I looped around the roundabout that marked the end of 1 lap and turned right onto the finish chute. The chute was a large blue carpet over sand. I could feel it shifting underfoot. I pushed foreword but under control. This was not the time to get injured. 

As I approached the finish line, I realized there was no one around me. I centered myself in the chute and thought, "This will make for a cool photo."  

And it did.

After the race, I went back to transition to collect my gear. There were still 3 athletes on the race course so we all had to wait. As they came in, we all cheered for them. They seemed to have enjoyed having the crowd there. 

I packed my gear, walked back to my car, changed, then went back to watch the pro race. 

It's a pretty cool thing to have the 20 best female pros in the world race in your backyard. 

 

All in all, I am very happy with my result. I could have done better on the run, but given the lead up to race day I'd say I did well.

Swim: 00:16:36
T1:      00:08:03
Bike:   00:50:33
T2:      00:05:15
Run:    00:41:39
Total:   02:02:05

I have one more race on the books for 2026 and my coaches and I are already starting to plan what 2027 may bring. Stay tuned. 

2026 Updates (UBC Sprint, Longest Day 10k, VictoriaHalf Standard)

I am usually pretty good about updating my entries close to the race dates, but work and life have been busy. I am 2 days away from a much needed vacation and I finally find myself with enough downtime to sit and write out some race reports.

This report will cover the first half of 2026 and includes the UBC Sprint Triathlon, The Longest Day 10k, and the VictoriaHalf Standard Distance Triathlon.

 

UBC Sprint Triathlon

As I stated in my last entry, 2026 is a continuation of short course racing. And on March 7, 2026 I raced the UBC Sprint Triathlon. Those who have read any of race reports know I usually race the duathlon due to my mixed feelings about the swim. But my coaches wanted me swimming. 

I arrived at UBC early despite my later start time. I wanted to get a prime transition spot and cheer on people I knew doing the other distances. 

After setting up my transition area, I checked in and dropped off my wet bag. Since UBC is a pool swim with a long transition from Swim to Bike, we are given a wet bag to use as a little mini transition before transition. 

Once my start group was called, we lined up according to our self seed time. I had made a mistake and given my time based 750m and the swim was only 700m. One swimmer was way faster than the rest of us and she lined up first. The next 3 swimmers (including me) all had the same estimated time. We decided we would work together. This is not something I would usually do in the swim, but seeing as it was not open water, I was going to allow it. 

The Swim

I dropped into the water and was off. After about 150 meters, I felt a tap on my toe. This is the signal to wait at the wall and let the swimmer behind pass. A rule that, in the past, was not followed very well by first time swimmers. This is the frustrating reason I started doing the Duathlon instead. 

I let the 2 swimmers pass me and took my spot in the back of our 3 swimmer pace line. 

The start of the race had been delayed due to an issue on the bike course. In an attempt to get the schedule back on track, the race officials shortened the breaks between wave starts. So about halfway through the swim, we caught up with the tail end of the wave that started before us. Surprisingly, every single swimmer we came upon waited at the wall for use to pass. I was shocked. 

Our triplet moved at a good pace and soon I was getting out of the water. 

 

I got out of the water feeling pretty good. I grabbed my wet bag from the volunteer and headed to the change tent. The change tent was in a different area than in years past but it was also alot bigger. 

I had everything in my bag stacked in the order I needed it. Once I had on warmer clothes, I decide to put on my gloves while on the move. I dropped my wet back in the bin and made my way to transition.

The Bike

I got to my bike, put on my helmet and shoes, and I was off. But not before waving to my biggest little fans. 

The start of the bike was an uphill so I was sure to take it nice and easy. I took some hydration and nutrition while my heart rate was still down. 

I made up time on the downhill and took the first turn around under control. Then it was a speedy net downhill to the second turn around. It was during this section of the course that I realized that I had lost enough weight, I could now drink from my aero bottle while in the aero position.  

After the turn around it was a false flat back to the hill on 16th. I kept the climb under control to save energy for lap 2 and the run. 

My heart rate was climbing on the second lap. I wanted to be fast but also be in control. I was getting a bit worried I was pushing too hard, but it all still felt manageable. 

I gained some speed on the second lap and soon I was at the dismount line. 

The ground was wet so I took my time running with the bike in my cleats. 

The Run

After T2, I started the run. I once again saw my family and got some high fives.

The start of the run was up a hill so I opted to walk up to give myself some time to shake out the legs. Once at the top, I started to run. 

I was pushing hard and felt my pacing was off. But every time I tried to reign it in, I ended up settling back in the faster speed. I guess this was the pace my body wanted to go. 

Both laps of the run went about the same. I was gaining speed, pushing hard, and feeling good. I got the last turn around and started to push (more) to the finish.  

I made the left turn and finished strong

I felt really good at this race. With the weight lose and other health improvements, my running has gotten faster. I was happy the swim was not as frustrating as it had been in the past. 

Swim:  0:15:51
T1:       0:07:08
Bike:    0:44:15
T2:       0:04:22
Run:     0:38:09
Total:   1:49:43

Longest Day 10k

On Friday, May 29th I ran the Longest Day 10k running race (once again) at UBC. 

This was a strange one as it was at night, so all day I had to watch what I ate. 

Not really much to go over here. I was once again able to push pretty hard on this one. As stated before, my running has gotten faster and stronger.

I started off pretty easy and in the back of the pack. I knew full well that by lap 2 I would be passing everyone who went out to hard. 

Sure enough, by lap 2 I was passing people as they fell off their pace. I crossed the finish line feeling spent, but was happy I was able to push as hard as I did. 

Time: 1:17:54

Not many pictures of me, but here are a few of my family who are always out supporting me.

  

Victoria Half (Standard Distance) Triathlon

The next race I did was the Victoria Half (Standard Distance) Triathlon on July 12th.

This course is very similar to the Ironman 70.3 Victoria and was therefore familiar territory. When we arrived for bike check in, I was shocked at how small transition was. I had always seen this race advertised and knew several athletes who have race it, so I just assumed it was bigger. 

On race day, the family and I took the shuttle to the race start. I setup my transition while the boys played at the local park. We watched the half distance start and then it was time to suit up. 

I was happy to once again be able to squeeze into my old wetsuit from years ago. And I received several comments on wetsuit secret weapon: Gardening Gloves. They help you get a good grip on the suit material and pull/tug for that perfect fit, They also help protect your suit from those pesky, tiny finger nail tears. 

The Swim

The swim line up was supposed to be self seeded, but everyone just kind of clumped together randomly. I decided to start in the back. Always better to be the swimmer swimming over people, than having people swimming over you. 

I started out nice and slow, taking my time and sighting the sailing club that lined up perfectly with the buoys. The water was warm and there was no current (lake swim). 

I began to pass people almost immediately, but the pack was still relatively spread out. Even at the first turn buoy, the normal race congestion was very minimal. I took the turn and had a clear line of sight to the second turn buoy.  

For some reason, the race pack was veering way to the left. I kept my line and soon I was at the second turn. 

The sun was now on my right and I had to close my eyes when breathing to keep from being blinding. I can hear my swim coach now as he reads this, "Well learn to breathe on the left!" For the record I can, I just choose not to. 

As we made our way back to shore, I was catching even more swimmers. I had to keep my focus (and composure) as swimmers constantly zig-zagged in front of me. 

By now the sun was behind the tree line and it was much easier to navigate. I swam all the way up to shore, popped up, and was on my way. 

For some reason, I could not find my zipper cord. So yet again, here are videos/photos of me looking confused with my am behind my head. 

You do not want to take your cap and goggles off right away, because now they occupy one of your much needed 2 hands. Both of which you need to take off your wetsuit. So when taking off my wetsuit, I take one arm out, then grab my cap and goggles then release them as I pull them through the other sleeve. Both hands are free and I know where my cap and goggle are. 

Unfortunately I found out later that only may cap got caught in my sleeve and I lost my open water goggles. I either need to make sure my goggles are inside my cap or abandon this technique. 

I also tried something new this race. I had my cycling gloves in a ziplock bag in my back pocket.  The idea was to put on my cycling gloves on the move to save time during transition. 

When putting in my wetsuit, Jen asked me if I was afraid the bag would fall out. At the time I said no.

But they did. 

Luckily, when I looked behind me, there on the ground only about 5 feet away. And with wet hands, they were very hard to put on. The amount of time I would have saved was lost in the seconds it look to go back and retrieve them. Not a strategy I will use again. In fact, for olympic and sprint distances, I may forgo gloves all together. I still have not decided on that. I will have to practice some longer rides in training sans gloves. 

I finished my transition and headed to the mount line 

The Bike

I started the bike nice and easy. I had driven the course the day before and new the start was a series of rolling hills. I used the descents to gain speed for the climbs.   

I geared down and made the right turn onto West Saanich. I knew there was a hill right after the turn and did not want to drop a chain. Others were not so lucky or observant. 

The course had good road conditions overall and although it was not a closed course, the majority the roads included a bike lane. 

I navigated some more rolling hills before hitting a big hill the 10k mark. I took this very easy. I knew there were more hills (and we had to do them all twice). Oh and I still had to run 10k after. What is wrong with me? 

After a right turn on Wallace, we had a nice flat section. We hit the second big hill and then came back down. I was happy I drove the course the day before, because halfway down this hill was a sharp right turn. It would be tricky to navigate if you didn't know it was there. 

I got stuck behind a flatbed truck for a bit, but he soon turned off. A few more rolling hills then onto Lap 2. 

Lap 2 went about the same as Lap 1, although I felt more comfortable on a few of the more technical sections. 

At the end of the lap, we turned left to head back to transition. After even more rollers and some fun twisties, we were back at the dismount line. 

I ran my bike in, racked it, then prepped for the run. 

But not before a high five and a hug from my 2 biggest little fans.

It took a bit of time for me to find my legs. The bike was considerably more hilly than I anticipated and the run was primarily a trail run. I do much better on flat, hard surfaces. Odd for someone my size.  

I soon settled into a rhythm and was making good time. 

About 7k into the run, the effort of the day was beginning to catch up with me. At this point, the trees opened up and I could see the finish line. I pointed across the lake like a baseball player calling his shot. 

At 9.1k, I told myself I was going to push and run it all the way in. 

And push I did. 

I saw my family and kept pushing to the finish. The announcer called my name and my time. I was a bit upset about my time when I heard it. But, I needed to take time to properly evaluate the day before I would worry about that. 

Even though triathlons have their set distances (Ironman, 70.3, Standard, Sprint, etc), there is no Apples-to-Apples comparison.  Every course is so different and the transitions are always different distances/setups. I needed to take all this into account before decided if it was a bad time or not. 

Overall, I am happy with my result. It was a very hilly bike, a run that involved some technical trail running, and a unique transition. 

Swim: 0:35:01
T1:      0:03:11
Bike:   1:49:09
T2:      0:02:37  
Run:   1:26:06
Total:  3:56:04

Some things to consider: Was the gloves-on-the-run into T1 worth it? How do I keep with my hydration on the bike when a hilly course offers little opportunity to do so safely? I need to up my brick workouts to better train my legs off the bike.

All in all, a good day. And a race I'd definitely do again. But the standard or sprint, not 4 laps of that bike course at the half iron distance.  

2025 Vancouver Standard Triathlon

Here we are again with my return to racing. This time it's the 2025 Vancouver Triathlon standard distance. It's been a few years since I've done this race at this distance, but I'm really excited to be back at it.

The original plan for this year was to do 70.3 Victoria in May and then Washington Tri-Cities in September. However, this year turned out to be busier than expected with family and life. I ended up backing out of both. 

It wasn't a decision that was made lightly, but I think in the end it was definitely the right one. With life being as busy as it has been, I ended up putting too much pressure on trying to get the proper training. Additionally, I found that I wasn't enjoying my training sessions or even the sport in general. It was becoming a chore rather than an experience.

After talking with my coaches, we decided that we're going to take the next year or two to focus on Sprint and Olympic distance races. My fitness level is such that an Olympic distance race was achievable and with extra training, I could begin to excel at those distances again. 

Think of it as taking a step back and falling in love with the sport again. So I'll be focusing on distances that are feasible that allow me to push and challenge myself, but still allow the training and the racing to be a bit more fun with less pressure. 

Onto the race!

As always, the day before the race we did our Swim Smart clinics. These are always great and this year we had over 100 people show up. After our clinics, we set up the train smart tent.

After a quick up and down the parking lot, I lined up for bike drop. This race is first-come-first-serve (within your respective distance) for transition. I ended up getting a good spot near the Bike In/Out.

After an afternoon helping at the Swim Smart tent, I went home and finished packing up all of my stuff.

The next morning I got up super early and headed down to the race. My race start wasn't until 7:30, but this race is notorious for not starting on time. But getting there at 6:00am when transition opened allowed plenty of time to take care of anything that might need to be done. I got my transition set up and then walked transition to make sure I knew my landmarks. Then I went and hung out at the Swim Smart tent. 

Soon it was time to put on the wetsuit and head down to the swim. I made my way down to the beach to watch the previous starts and get a better idea of tides and current. The tide was super low which meant the course was probably going to be a bit short. That didn't bother me at all. The low tide also meant all the rocks that this beach are notorious for, would be very visible. So there wouldn't be as big of a risk of cutting feet or hands. 

I watch the women's standard distance start and I made note of the current (which I kind of already knew because Stewart set up the course). There was a strong left to right current, so I would try to aim more left. Then ride the current from turn one to turn two. Then once you get past turn two, try to aim more right as you come into shore. 

The Swim

When my wave was called, we walked through the gate and then lined up in about knee deep water. 

As usual with these mass starts races, I usually stay back at the start. I let everyone who is going to podium or everyone that starts off too fast, get ahead of me. That way I have nice clean, clear, calm water to swim in. 

The only problem was that because the tide was so low, everyone just kept walking! No one started swimming!  So here I was in the back, wasting time waiting for people to start swimming. So finally, I just dropped and started swimming, dodging people that were still standing. 

Before I knew it, I was at the first turn buoy. My recon paid off. My line was nice and straight. As I made the turn from turn one to turn two I noticed that people were getting swept out to the left. So I adjusting my sighting and had a very straight line all the way to turn 2. Every time I sighted, I could see the turn buoy right in front of me and everyone else off to my left. 

From turn two to turn three it was a bit of a slog, but I kept my line nice and straight. The water at the third turn was very shallow, and lots of people during the women's race were standing up and walking. 

I always tell my swim clients that swimming through water is faster and more efficient than walking through water. So I made it a point that I was going to swim the third turn. 

Which I did. 

Based on the people around me, I seemed to be the only one that did this. It was very shallow but still enough to swim in. I felt very accomplished knowing that I didn't waste time or energy trudging through knee deep water. 

Lap 2 went pretty much the same as lap one, except for the fact that I was starting to feel very tired. I was a bit worried about feeling this tired so close to the beginning of the race. I wasn't sure if this was mental fatigue or physical fatigue. So I did what I tell my clients, just start counting. 

We give a good five/six breathe/sighting pattern to our clients. This also serves a second purpose of just getting you to count to six over and over. If you do this, you tend to get into a good rhythm. So that's what I did for most of lap 2. I just counted to six. 

Soon I was in the groove again. A few times between turn one and turn two, I was even able to catch a bit of a draft off of a swimmer in front of me.

Before I knew it lap 2 was done and I was swimming towards shore. As always, people were standing up way too soon and trying to trudge through water. I swam in as far as I could to save energy and keep momentum. Then I popped up and made my way up onto shore. 

I made my way up the beach and saw lots of friends cheering me on, including my strength and conditioning coach. She always talked about wanting to come and see me race so I was very glad she was able to support me on the day. 

The Bike

I made my way into transition, found my bike and had a very calm and controlled transition. My family saw me and my son was yelling to me as I was getting out on the bike. 

At the mount line I saw even more friends and teammates cheering me on. I even got heckled by Stu. Which at this point is a race standard. 

I started on the bike nice and easy. I made sure to get some hydration and a gel. It was then that I realized that my drink and eat alerts were not set. 

Earlier in the summer, I had left my watch out in the sun and fried the motherboard. I was lucky enough to find the same watch on marketplace for a reasonable price. I had taken the time to set everything up the way I like it, but I had forgotten to set my drink and eat alerts for the bike. I've been using my bike computer for all my bike training and it just slipped my mind. No matter, I knew from my ride the week before that it took me about 23 minutes to do one lap. So as long as I was getting one gel and half a bottle every lap, I knew I would be on track. 

The first section of the bike course was nice and easy with some rollers and good areas to get in the aero position. Once I got to the hill I implemented the gearing strategy that I had tested out the week before.

This past year I updated my bike to have better gearing to help on hills. The Stanley Park Hill is not very steep, but it is very long. So I put myself in the second easiest gear and started to climb. This gave me an easy enough to gear to climb comfortably, but the mental and physical benefit of knowing I had one more gear for when the hill got punchy at the top. 

Once up and over the hill, there was a small descent that I used to get some fluid before starting a very small climb again. 

After the short climb, it's nice sweeping downhill pretty much all the way to the end of the first lap. Based on my ride the week before, I knew what speed was comfortable and how to take the turn at the bottom of the hill. There's a red fire hydrant just as you come into the turn. If you wait to apex the turn until you are even with it, you don't have to sacrifice speed. And of course there was the speed bump that you would hit right after you make it. From there it was some nice curves and a fun downhill until the end of the lap. 

I took the turn to the start of the second lap faster than I think I ever have on this race before. I was feeling very confident on my bike and very fast. 

The second lap was much like the first. I was able to gain a little bit more speed grab some aero advantages. I climbed conservatively and descended with speed.

On the third lap, the course was getting crowded and I was dealing with a lot of people blocking. For those who don't know, when you do a triathlon you have to keep to a draft zone. If you enter that draft zone, you have a certain amount of time to make the pass. Once you make the pass you have to move to the right to make room for other people who might be passing. If you do not, it is called blocking. 

There was way too many people on the course making the pass and staying in the left hand side. This wouldn't have been a huge issue except for the fact that the second half of this course is a very fast downhill. A lot of people were not leaving very much room for a pass. Which is dangerous when you're descending at 50 to 60 km an hour. 

I got a bit frustrated, but ended up letting that group get ahead of me and just let them ride on. 

The fourth lap was nice and easy and I was ready to get on to the run. 

I came down the hill and exited to the right and found the dismount line. I got off my bike and made my way to transition. The only problem was, they changed transition from when I ran out. I thought I just had to run straight into my bike in the corner. But I ended up having to run around the whole of transition to get back. Not a huge deal just something I wasn't expecting. 

Once in transition, a rider (with whom I'd been playing leapfrog with all race) asked if my name was Joseph. Turns out, his name was Joseph too. Apparently he'd gotten really confused when everyone was cheering for him and he had no clue who they were. 

The Run

At the start of the run I was sure to grab some water and a gel. It was a two lap, out-and-back of course totaling 10k. The first 3K I went a bit too fast I was feeling good and thought I could maintain the speed. Once I got to the turnaround I had to start walking to try to reel things in. It was all pretty much downhill from there. 

Friday night, I had come down with a really bad stomach bug. I woke up on Saturday with absolutely nothing in my system. I was very worried about how this was going to affect my race. So Sunday I made sure to try to get foods in my system that would help fuel me but also not make me feel sick on race day.

I knew that at some point today I was going to bonk. I was hoping it wouldn't be on the bike and kind of glad it was on the run. I did what I could and took way more walk breaks than I wanted to, but certain things you just can't control. I was happy to have showed up and do as well on the swim and bike as I did, and I was just going to let the run be what it was.

One of the great things about this race is that it's a local race and it's sponsored by Swim Smart. Which means the amount of people out on the course were either clients, teammates, or new people I met the day before at the clinic. So the amount of encouragement I was getting was great. I decided it would be a good idea to return the favor.

I took this opportunity to cheer on everyone else on the course. As they were running by me I would call them out by their race number and encourage them as they went along. If I wasn't going to have a good race it doesn't mean I couldn't help someone else have a good race.

As I got closer to the finish line, I made myself a deal. Once I got up the small hill onto the overlook, I would run the rest of the way to finish line.

I kept my end of the deal and after giving my family a wave, I ran into the finish line.

All in all I'm very happy with my performance. It's been awhile since I've done this distance. I was really feeling good the week before during my training. It wasn't until I got the stomach bug on Friday that I really started to get worried. But I had battled through things before and had great results.



Some things you just can't control. Getting sick is one of those things. I did my best to make sure I fueled so that I could get to the start line. I got to the start line, I had a great swim, and I had a great bike. I suffered through the run but I finished and was happy with my time.

This race in particular has a great sense of community. It's a local race so lots of people come out and support. I saw coworkers, friends, family, teammates, clients, and my coaches and trainers as well.

A thought occurred to me on the run. That even though I might not be good at this sport, I show up and I finish. And what I give back to the sport through my coaching and clinics and encouragement, I feel more than makes up for my lack of speed.

Results:
Swim: 0:25:44
Bike: 1:32:29
Run: 1:27:33
Total: 3:35:35

I'm looking forward to next year where I can really focus on having good results on the Sprint and Olympic distance.  I am most definitely falling back in love with the sport. |

And one day, when the time is right.. I will be an Ironman.

But for now, there is no rush.