The Iron Geek

My First Triathlon: Holy Crap That Was Hard!

My first triathlon kicked my ass, and hard!  That was 10x harder than I thought it was going to be.  I was feeling pretty good about the event, leading up to that morning.  I have trained hard and have come a long way, including huge fitness gains and losing close to 35 pounds.  But guess what?  I took an absolute beating on this course.

“I haven’t seen a beating like that since they shoved a banana down my pants and turned a monkey lose!”

This was a sprint triathlon: 400 yard swim, 15 mile bike and 5K (3.2 mile) run.  I completed the event in 2:05:17 - 287th place out of 291 people.  

Not quite dead-last, but pretty damn close.

Anyone who calls this a “mini triathlon” or a “baby triathlon” can kiss my ass.  There is nothing mini or baby about this distance when you are 225 pounds of Nick Tahou’s fed, Labatt cooled, mass of couch potato like myself.  To me, this was the hardest physical thing that I can remember ever doing.  Period.

The Swim

As I took my warmup in the water, I felt pretty good about the swim.  Sure it was dark and muddy, couldn’t really see in front of you, but the water was warm and my stroke felt good.  We had a wave start, with 4 different groups of people starting every 3 minutes.  As luck would have it, I was in the first wave.

After the horn went off, I let everyone else start swimming before I started.  I wasn’t going to join the mele of swimming in close quarters.  After everyone had gotten a few feet out, I joined in.

For the first 50 yards or so, everything was going fine.  I was swimming well, breathing well, and just focusing on my form.  And then, just before the first turn buoy, it all started to go to hell.

I got slapped across the back from a random arm heading in the absolute wrong direction.  A bit freaked out, I lifted my head only to be hit from another arm, heading in almost exactly the opposite direction.  I am heading straight at the buoy and one arm is heading towards 9:00 and one is heading towards 3:00.  Then someone grabs my ankle.

What the hell is going on?

From that point on, I was never ever really able to gain my composure in the swim.  I was forced to back-stroke or doggy-paddle often to just keep my head above water.  At one point, I was floating on my back, trying to catch my breath, when from behind me I see a CHURN of water.  Turns out the next wave was about to run me over!  I rolled onto my stomach just in time to have a girl swim right over the top of me and just keep going.

After about 300 yards, I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to make it.  My shoulders hurt and I was having a hard time keeping my breath.  They support crew kept asking me if I was okay, and I told them yes.  I was going to make it out of the lake under my own power.

I got out of the water a little over 18 minutes later.  I was staggering like a drunken sailor and didn’t even have the strength to waive to my kids.  I was like a walking zombie.  

The Bike

The bike went the best out of everything.  It took a little over 3 miles to calm down from the swim and finally catch my breath.  But once I did, it was pretty uneventful.  I managed to pass about 12 folks or so while on the bike, and probably myself got pass 6 or so times.  

There was one downhill where I was really flying.  I was pedaling hard in my top gear, down on my aero bars, puttin’ the boots to her. I’m not sure how fast I was going, but it was awesome.  I got off the bike 55 minutes after I got on it.  I was happy with that time.

The Run

Oh the run.  Maybe I should call it the walk.  My previous best for a 5K was 31 minutes.  That was not going to happen today.  As I started to run out of the transition area, it felt like my chest was going to explode!  My heart was racing and I couldn’t catch my breath.  I was absolutely exhausted.  Between the swim and the bike, my body had told me that this wasn’t going to work.

I started walking about 100 yards from the transition area, and then for more than 1/2 of the entire 5K.  My body was really struggling.  Every time that I would run for 100 yards or so, my heart would be racing again.  I just had to keep walking.

As I’m walking, I am getting passed by the few people that I had managed to beat out of the water.  I am watching people go by with age markings that say “60” or “54” or “59”.  These people were running.  Damn.  I managed to run the last 300 yards across the finish line, with no energy to “sprint” across the finish.  Time on the “walk” was 48 minutes. 

Moving Forward

So it’s obvious that I have a lot of work to do.  My next sprint triathlon is in 5 weeks in Peachtree City.  I have already talked with my coach and we are going to focus on improving my swim (Job #1) and improving my fitness, including losing at least 10 lbs before the race (Job #2).  

I feel that if I had a better swim, I wouldn’t have been in such bad shape for the rest of the race.  And if I can lose weight, that will turn more of my energy into propulsion versus carrying weight.  Besides, if I look that fat (the pictures above), I can’t imaging what I looked like before!  It’s time to start dropping LBs again!

I am very glad that I did it.  Overall, I enjoyed the day (everything but the swim).  I am confident that by keeping at it, I will get much, much better at things as time goes on.  

I have completely re-dedicated myself to achieving my Ironman goal.

Bring it!