Polarbear Duathlon madness!

I enjoyed reading everyone's guesses about my latest questionable decisions.

Some were pretty legit, a 50 miler? Why not!! (UGH) And while Tri's or Ironman races might seem legit it appears that my poor swimming skills have been forgotten. To add to that, *some* people like to think I'm being cute: "oh gosh, I can't swim, OMG WATCH ME KICK YOUR ASS!!!" But no, I honestly am a terrible swimmer and also do not plan to get better!

And Danielle. It is more likely at this point to find me Ironman training then deciding to produce playmates for Hank. My lady parts are beat up enough from biking, thoughts of birthing a child cause me to spasm in horror!

 

So what did I do? A DUATLON! And it was SO FUN!

 

 

The whole gang at the competitors meeting.
Which I stopped paying attention to when I discovered that I did not know all the rules.
UGH. That's the way I plan!
Luckily Eric knows the rules for this sort of thing and set me straight.

With 6 whopping days of biking under my belt I knew I would not be competitive. I took a look at the prior years results just to confirm and indeed, I certainly could have won the run if there was no silly biking involved. Gosh!

I was very hesitant to blow my load in the first two mile sprint as I had never, ever biked after a run and had NO idea what was going to happen. I knew what my run would be like post bike (awful) but also knew that people would be out riding me by 10 or more minutes. Not the kind of time that could me made up in a teeny run. So why bother hustling? (because that is what I do...)

Also.... I very distinctly remembered what happened to me at this time last year when I ran balls to the walls for no good reason. 5 months of various injuries followed and NO, no thank you. So conservative was the plan.

Look at my effing leg muscle. I am a beast!
This is the end of run one. Easy peasey.

I did the first run in 16:18 which was a reflection of my terror of running too fast and screwing myself on the bike. (um. that sounds wrong? whatever.) I had a tough time holding back as the frontrunners took off but I wasn't in it to win it so I moseyed on. (and hated it. but smart move for sure.)

I cruised thru T-1 in 31.8 seconds, remembered to buckle my helmet, mounted my bike after the mounting line and took off in a blaze of glory.

Yeah....

I'm not really a biker yet so it stands to reason that I was a little uneasy. The good triathletes blew by me like I was standing still which (of course) made me unreasonably unhappy. I got over it, remembering that there was no way I could win so I might as well enjoy the torture!

I made it thru the bike in 41:14 and wobbled my way thru T-2 in 31.7 seconds.

I then teetered out, laughing, to try to run on my shit show legs.

It was a sight to behold.

I wobbled along and more or less settled into a pokey rhythm after a half mile or so but my legs were kinda iffy. Not terrible but certainly not normal by any stretch. It was an enjoyable run although I was fairly certain at one point that I had become lost which was rather disconcerting. Luckily, I had not but gawking around looking for other runners/directional flags/something helpful did not help my "speed." Hah! (apparently the course was well marked with little orange flags but, not having listened to the pre race meeting I did not know this. however, I DO now know how to pass people legally on my bike so it's still a win?)

The BEST photo EVER!
I was happy to have made it.
Second run in a molasses slow 24:27 for a final time of 1:23:21

Typically Eric and I are the athletic power couple.
Too bad Coach Kelsey had to show up with her Hubs and ruin that for us!!! :-)
Eric smoked me. Jerk!

The best part about the race was seeing ALL the friends!!!
And eating donuts. Mmmmmmmm..

So overall I'm really proud of my newfound skills. I just wanted to finish alive and under 1:30 so I'm just winning all around. It wasn't a big pack of finishers (30 women) and I placed 9th which is not a disgrace although I was considerably off the lead pace (gosh I wonder why? out biked by 15 minutes that's why!!) I definitely want to do this again, it was so much fun and a nice change from the arduous marathon running that I enjoy so much.

It was the first time out for quite a few of my friends too, and they all did awesome! (and most of them are brave enough to swim, crazy!)

So there's the big news, I'm now an amazing multi sport athlete and as soon as darts replaces the swim I'll move on to Tri's as well!