Well, most of the details leading up to this fine race have been covered, but I must say how much I LOVED racing Camp Yuba! RaceTri always provides such a fun race atmosphere.
I went into this race calmer than I ever have. I had no expectations. I put no real thought into how fast I hoped to swim, bike, or run. I was going to just go with how I felt. I'd been experiencing a mental block up until the week or so before this race. I decided I needed to pull my head OUT of the game, and just race remembering how much I really love this sport.
Camping the night before with the gals on the team was a blast. I had so much fun just chatting and laughing it up. The camp out was fab - seeing the stars all night and the brightness of the moon was epic.
Race morning I snagged a good spot in transition (since we were there seven hours early... haha, not quite). A nice guy named Skyler was next to me and let me borrow his bike pump. For some odd reason his pump was not pumping but deflating my tires. I could NOT get my tire to fill up - grr! I messed with it for a good twenty minutes before I got it covered. So odd how sometimes simple things (like pumping a tire) can become so difficult. Anyway - I just was having fun chatting with people pre-race, and it was great to see so many familiar faces.
When it was time to start, I threw on my wetsuit and headed down the boat ramp. I kept commenting to other racers how far the furthest buoy looked. Everyone assured me it was correct - which for the sprint meant it should have been a 750. Well, I love swimming, so whatever, I wasn't too concerned if it was a little off. Well - come to find out it was an extra long swim. It ended up being .86 miles. I still came out of the water the second woman. Carlee Tulett beat me out - that girl is fast and awesome!!! I wanted to stay in the water right by her, but hit a group doing the Olympic whom I couldn't seem to get around. Anyway - I hopped on my bike feeling good, and not really frantic. I just started cycling away, pushing hard, but with the rough road I felt like I was creeping. I almost ate it on a section of the road where it had a sharp turn (glad I avoided that!). I didn't see too many people on the bike out, but saw large clusters on the way back toward transition.
The run - I loved this run more than any run I've done on any race. Maybe it was because of where my head was at, all joy and no pain. The run felt effortless ( minus the last climb to the top of the hill), and I think I ended up having my fastest run split on a sprint.
Best bonus to this race was that I took 2nd place overall for the sprint. That was just the icing on the cake considering I had no expectations for this race. It was awesome to see all the girls finish, and other triathlon friends. THe atmosphere was friendly and great! I will definitely keep this on my agenda in years to come!
Thanks to Kestrel (for making me faster on my bike than I could be alone!), Gu (Peanut butter - YUM!), HEAD swimming (I am SO in love with my goggles, I will never switch to anything else!!), Flexr Sports, Bearpaw, KSwiss (killer new race shoes!), and of course to all my TriEdge girls for being so fun to race with - Love you girls!
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