East Canyon Tri

Going into August, I usually anticipate my training taking a BIG hit as we take our final vacations, celebrate 2 birthdays and get 4 kids started in school. I plan my longer races earlier and/or later in the season with shorter ones in August because I never know what my training is going to look like at that point. This year, I chose to do two local races in August. The first was Herriman Black Ridge, the second East Canyon.


TriUtah East Canyon looked like a great option for me. It was a first year race and I'm always excited to try something new. They were also offering both a sprint and an Olympic distance. I figured I would wait until the week before to decide which distance to do, based on how much training I got done those final few weeks.

As I prepared for East Canyon, my training looked a little like this:
3 weeks out: A little sprint race, then a day off that turned into a week off
2 weeks out: A little trip to Disneyland that resulted in zero workouts and several churros
1 week out: An exhausted mama starting all the kids in school and adjusting to the new schedule = zero workouts.

Longest. Taper. Ever.

Sprint it was! :)

I was so happy that my teammate Sherri was going to race with me. I have high pre-race anxiety when it's a course I haven't seen or an area I don't know well. It made me feel much better to have a friend with me. We met up to carpool about 6pm, and after a short stop for vehicle trouble, we drove up to the course. There is relatively little parking so we dropped our bikes off the night before. We ran into Coach Heath who I knew was speaking, but didn't know was racing.  I joked about my lack of training and how I wasn't sure what I was doing would be racing, but I would be participating :)

After that little stop, we drove the bike course. I realized that I have biked a big portion of the course recently, during Rockwell Relay Pamperfest, but I biked it backwards! This was going to me MUCH more fun since I climbed it last time and this time, I'd get to enjoy the descent. I knew there was a significant downhill with lots of sharp turns, so I felt better seeing it in person before actually racing it.

After we'd seen the course, we stopped for some Cafe Rio (holla!) and headed to Kaysville, where we were lucky enough to stay with Sherri's sweet brother and sister-in-law. It was so nice of them to let us crash there.

We had a late night, so morning came really early, but we both felt ready to go. We loaded up and drove the 30-40 minutes back to the course. We set up T2 and hopped on a shuttle to take us up to the race start.


Our race started at 8:30am. As a mediocre swimmer, I've said before that I just do my thing in the water. I'm not going to be breaking any speed records and when I try to push it, my form gets bad, I wear myself out, and I don't go any faster. So once again, I just did my thing. I actually felt great! For once, I passed a few people in the water. That pretty much never happens to me. I was certainly nowhere near the front of the pack, but I felt like it was a good swim, for me, at 18:56.

Coming out of the water, there is a steep, long ramp, which makes for a long T1. I left flip flops there, thinking it would help me run for a faster transition. However, TriUtah had carpet laid down and I think I would have run faster just using that. Instead, I kind of shuffled up the ramp in my flip flops. Once I got into the actual transition area, I rushed through, but accidentally got my wetsuit stuck on my back wheel, which tipped my bike over and sent my Gatorade spewing all over! Oops! I got my wetsuit untangled pretty quickly and headed into the bike.

The bike is my favorite portion of any race. I was especially looking forward to the downhill of this race. I am pretty timid on curves and steep descents. I was riding quite carefully but a couple of miles in, I went into a blind curve, I was riding my brakes, and I hit a pot hole. This sent me into a skid and I lost control. I heard things flying out of my bento box and hitting the road, but I regained control and kept on going. I rode very carefully for the next couple of steep miles until my heart stopped pounding out of my chest, then I let it fly. The course was gorgeous! It was a small enough race that I was out on my own some of the time, which left me to just enjoy the beautiful scenery around me. I finished the bike in 39:22, which was 2nd overall, just 15 seconds behind the overall winner.


My T2 went without issue and I was in and out in less than a minute. My legs felt heavy but I told myself it was just 3 miles, I could push through it. I felt my legs come back about .75 miles in and started to pick up my pace. My first mile was an 8:40, my second mile was 8:28 and my 3rd mile was 8:10. I was happy that I'm finally starting to run negative splits, since I historically burn out before the end. I loved the out and back course. A mile and a half seems so short so being able to turn around and know you're in that final stretch always makes it seem easier to me.

Overall, I was very happy with my performance, especially considering my lack of training! When results were posted, I found out I came in 1st in my age group.

 Sherri and I both spent a good amount of time visiting with other racers. It turns out that the ladies who came in 2nd and 3rd in my division, Dianne and Valerie, were from Idaho Falls (where I last moved from) and we have some friends in common. I enjoyed talking with them and getting to know them a little bit. We made fast friends and I hope to race with them again soon. I always enjoy getting to know other racers at every event.

My only complaint about the race was the way they chose to do awards. Because it was a first year race and they weren't sure what kind of a turnout they would have, they chose to give medals to the top 25 overall finishers. In theory, that makes sense when you don't know how many racers you are going to have. However, I didn't like the idea that the men and women weren't awarded separately. What ended up happening is that 22 men got awards while only 3 females did. It would have made more sense to give the top 12 men and top 12 female, or something similar. It's never going to be even if you have the men and women competing against each other. Being the picture junkie that I am, I grabbed my 2 new friends and hopped on the podium for a keepsake picture anyway :)

Overall, the course was beautiful and fun! The race went off without so much as a hitch, which is amazing for a first time race! I always expect hiccups, screw ups etc for a new race but as far as I saw, this one didn't have any. I was impressed with the race directors and how well this was put together. There is no question in my mind that I want to go back and I hope this event continues in future years.

Special thanks to TriUtah, Coaches Heath and Mahogani Thurston, TriEdge, Kestrel, Switch Eyewear (have I mentioned how obsessed I am with my new Axo's?), HEAD swimming, Gu, Flexr, 3B Yoga, and to my awesome team who I love!