aqua-thon

The sport of aquathlon consists of a continuous, two-stage race involving swimming followed by running.

in otherwords: torture. especially when temps are topping out at 100 and the humidity level is fluctuating somewhere between gross and palpable.

i have been working hard on my swimming over the past say 7 months. its coming along. maybe not at mock speed, but more like lazy river speed. i thought i signed up for the overnight improvement program, but apparently that is only in session when hell freezes over.

the event was old school. and it was awesome. so laid back. what all races should be. instructions included - swim around the lake, put your shoes on, run on the trail, then turn around and run back. easy.

the question became do you warm up for this? being a newbie aqua-thon-er i just kinda did what others did. little jog. little swim.

the water by the way, was 90 degrees. not kidding. there were cool spots here and there that maybe some of us sort of slowed down to relish, but over all the kind of water you might enjoy on a cold winters night, not the beginning of June.

with 70+ racers at the start it was a bit chaotic. i dont have the speed to get out in front of everyone so i tend to get caught up quite a bit in arms and legs and inevitably end up trying to get a piggy back from some unfortunate person.

the swim was two loops (800m) and i swam ok. the first pack was way ahead. beat my by a solid 2-3 minutes. YIKES! grrrr.....

though i will say my transition rocked. up and out and shoes on and gone. makes it a whole lot easier when there is so little to do.

out on the run i felt like frying bacon. it was disgusting. but i wanted to try to push the pace to see how i could go. my heart rate must have been 200, i guess the bike can sometimes give you a bit of relief and allow you time to maybe calm down. but not tonight. no bike :( bad for me as i tend to use that as my catch up. i worked hard on the <3 mile run and passed a few girls.

bobby was working the water stop and when i went by him he didnt say anything to me (he claims different but um, i was there..). nice. so on the return i yelled "helloooooo bobby!" he was none too thrilled. just shakes his head and pretends not to know me. i kinda wish he would have thrown water at me or something...

anyway i ended up gettig my first ever swim (though sort of cheating as it was combined with a run) award. 4th OA, 1st AG and only about 90 seconds off the winner. decent.