City of Mesa Halloween Triathlon

Mesa, Arizona

This was the inagural race and it went smoothly. Tri Family Racing did a great job as always. The City of Mesa provided nine police officers to ensure us safe bike course which I really liked. The shirt design was my favorite so far of the Tri Family Races, and was sponsored by Iron Gear Sports. The medal was the same cool Halloween logo as the shirt and I was happy to get one. There were several dedicated athletes who wore full costumes and medalled in them. All and all a fun Halloween morning.

Playa Del Rey Triathlon

Playa Del Rey, California

This race was a beach start. I was a little sore and not looking forward to swimming after the tough 2.4 miles I swam only 18 hours before but I warmed up and had a decent swim. The bike course was flat and I felt I turned in a pretty strong performance. There was a slight drizzle for almost the entire race. I was doing good until I hit the run. I don’t know why, but the muscles in the front on my legs in the shin area just cramped up and turned to rock. They became inflexible and painful. Every step hurt. I slowed my run and suffered until I reached the half way point aid station. There I stopped and tried to stretch my legs. It helped and I was able to run better. I hated stopping. I haven’t had to stop on a run for a long time. I am still not sure what happened. This was a well run race by Sporteve. I met a lot of friendly people at this event.

Distance Swim Challenge

Santa Monica, California

This was a unique and inaugural event. There were people doing 12.6 miles. I don’t think I am ready for that. In fact in order to swim this race you had to qualify. I was only qualified to swim the 2.4 mile distance. Participants swam from pier to pier along the Santa Monica coast line. We were required to come ashore and get checked by medical staff at each leg of the race. The swim was a challenge for me for sure. I have never swam that far before. It became even more challenging as I was coming ashore for the first time. I got pounded from behind by a big wave that sent me tumbling. This was not the first time this has happened to me in my life, but it was the first time after swimming over 1.2 miles. Normally I hold my breath and wait for the wave to lose its force. Try doing that after swimming hard for more than a mile. Your lungs don’t have the patience. I was so completely focused on getting air that I did not realize my goggles had come off. I managed to recover from the wave and searched for my goggles for several minutes with no success. I lost valuable time, but I did not want to have to swim for another 1.2 miles without goggles in salt water. I had to give up the search and make the decision to continue without goggles. For the next 1.2 miles I counted off every 10 stokes and then raised my head to make sure I was on course. It was cool to swim past the Santa Monica pier with everyone looking on. This race was put on by optimis sport. It must have been a logistical nightmare given all the swimmers starting at different points and times. They did a great job and I was glad I was able to participate. I want to try a longer distance next year.

Prospector Triathlon

Lake Pleasant, Arizona

While all the greatest triathletes were competing in Kona I decided to do an olympic triathlon out at Lake Pleasant. This was the inaugural race. I decided to swim without a wet suit due to the water being 76 degrees. Now I believe that a wet suit is an advantage. I guess I had to Experience it for myself. I never get passed consistently in the swim. Wetsuit after wetsuit kept going by me. The buoyancy does make difference. I will always wear a wetsuit when legal for now on. There was a lot of wind and the some of the choppiest water I have ever experienced. I have to mention the run up to transition. It was like a half a mile up hill on some very rocky terrain. I wore flip flops for the first time and I am glad I did or I would have tore up my feet up. It was kind of like a swim followed by a duathlon the run was so long. The bike course was up and down, up and down, I actually used the second ring. It was good thing my running legs showed up today because the run required them. It was a two lap course. The course required 2 loops. The loop was a long steady downhill, followed by a long steady uphill run. That steady hill caused more walking than I had ever seen before in a race. I didn’t walk, and I actually preferred the uphill today to the down. The hill wasn’t super steep, just steady and relentless. They gave updates about kona in the transition area. We had was great temperatures. The only place I felt heat was the run, but even then we had a great breeze most of the time. 4 Peaks racing gave us all the oppurtunity to compete today.

4 Peaks Racing

Seville Sports Club Triathlon

Gilbert, Arizona

I really like this race. It is the second time I have done it. The Seville Sports Club is a beautiful place to hold this event. Tri Family Racing did a great job as always. My son did well and placed 2nd in his division. The logisitics of everything just works well for this race. The bike course is smooth and flat and I really like it. The swimming facility is luxurious. I will do this race over and over again because I enjoy it so much. I dropped over a full minute off my swim time from the spring which is amazing given that the swim is only 300 yards. I also improved my bike split by almost 7 minutes. I will look foward to doing this one again.

Pacific Coast Triathlon

New Port Beach, California

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I celebrated my 42nd birthday by doing this triathlon. It was a good pick too. There was a kid’s race also for my son Christian. This race takes place in a very beautiful place called Crystal Cove in the Newport Beach area. It is part of the Best of the U.S. Series and made both Competitor Magazine and Inside Triathlon Magazine’s best race list. It was also the race chosen for the USAT Sprint National Championships last year. I can see why, it is really a great race. As I mentioned earlier, 2007 Ironman Champion Chris McCormack (Macca) was there competing in the race.

I loved this race. They really don’t do a good enough job of selling this race. The race had the great with free smoothies among other things. The transition area is on a cliff above some beautiful coast line. You walk down a steep path to the beach which makes you start thinking about running up that path after the swim. If the path were any steeper, it would need steps. You walk down the beach to the swim start as you watch the pounding surf. Last year the lifeguards canceled the swim portion and turned it into a duathlon run due to dangerous surf. This year came close. In fact my son Christian got pulled out of his swim for safety by a life guard, even though his swim had already been severely shorted by officials.

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The Swim
This was my first beach start. So cool! Don’t get many of those in Arizona. I loved sprinting into the pounding surf. Now having grown up in Southern California, I was not anxious about getting through the surf like some. However, I learned a valuable lesson. I just ran into the surf and dove into the first wave that hit me like I have done all my life. In the past I had not been wearing goggles. My goggles got knocked of my face a bit and filled with water forcing me to deal with that issue. That distracted me from the surf and the next wave caught me off guard and I aspirated sea water. Then I was trying to swim through the surf coughing up the water and trying to clear my lungs. While getting batted around by the surf I took my first real good kick to the face from another swimmer. It took me several minutes of coughing under water to get my lungs clear. It was breathe, cough, breathe cough for quite a while. Meanwhile I lost ground on the swim. After we cleared the breakers the ocean was still rolling with swells which made swimming a little harder. On the low end of the swell it would drop us occasionally into kelp. You would be swimming along and then suddenly your visibility is blocked by fans of kelp. It was awesome! Heart pounding, out of my comfort zone adventure on the swim! I friggin loved it. Then you hit the beach and have to climb that path. I walked it with vigorous strides. No one else was running either. I think I know why. There was no blood in my legs and my hamstrings were threatening to cramp as I tried to run. I decided a cramp would threaten my finish and it was better to be safe. Especially since I had just done an Olympic distance triathlon the day before. That hill is a killer.
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The Bike
As I began the bike course some heavy mist rolled in. I had to take my glasses off because I couldn’t see with all the water collecting on my glasses. I have a leash on my glasses and I am glad I do. I saw more than one pair of glasses lost on the course that had obviously fallen. The entire bike course took place on Pacific Coast Highway. The course was interesting from the stand point that it had many areas where you couldn’t visually tell if you were going uphill or downhill. I ended up having a really decent bike split although I am not sure why.

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The Run
The run starts out normal enough but there is a gradual and steady incline that eventually wore on me. I don’t know if I was feeling the race the day before or the incline, but it became difficult for me. Right about the time I was really tired of the incline the course moved into some dirt trials a top the cliffs with the ocean below and then headed steeply down through this little village where the trail met the beach. Running on the beach was beautiful. The shore wound its way through some rock formations. Talk about a scenic run. I wish I could have enjoyed it more, but that sand was making my legs burn something fierce. After the beach was a hill that almost stopped my running. I knew about the hill. Everyone knows about the hill. I had even scene it on U-Tube. I told myself I was not going to quit on that hill and I didn’t, but that hill slowed my run to almost no forward progress at all. Once you get to the top it was a 600 meter slightly downhill dash to the finish in which I picked up speed and passed a few of my age groupers. My legs seemed full of super-charged blood after that hill. Or maybe I was not running fast at all and it just felt like it after that hill. Chris McCormack won the race in just under an hour. I would have liked to watch him run that hill. One of my favorite races to date.

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Last year this race was the USAT Sprint National Championships

San Diego Classic Triathlon

San Diego, California

This race made Competitor Magazine’s Top race last year for Southern California. Also, this year 2007 Ironman Champion Chris McCormack was there competing in the race. My son Christian met him and got his autograph as he volunteered handing out GU on the race course. When I was planning this weekend, I looked at a lot of races. There were triathlons taking place all over southern California this weekend. I chose to do two of them back to back because I just couldn’t resist either race. It is not often that my wife Lori is in Indiana giving me and Christian permission to race our hearts out. What was interesting about Chris McCormack being there is that he chose the same two races I choose for this weekend. Race officials did not announce that he would be competing in the race. In fact, but for my son Christian telling me, I never would have even known. The bike course had some pretty butt kicking hills for me. These San Diegans called it a flat course and made mince meat of me on the hills. The course took us past a clifftop military cememtery with the lines and lines of white headstones backdropped against the ocean. The cementery is a top a cliff over looking the ocean and was very moving. McCormack did win the race with a time well over an hour faster than me. How does a human being do that? He was even 4 minutes faster than me in the swim and I had a very strong swim. It was a good race and I always enjoy when a hotel sponsors a race and everything is so close and there are no parking issues. The race was sponsored by Moment Cycle Sport who did a great job.