Well, my friends--I DID IT!! I finished my first triathlon. Oh, I wasn't speedy by any means, but that wasn't my goal. My goal was to finish, and finish I did, so I'm counting the experience as a complete success!
The night before the race was rough. I felt mentally and physically prepared as I could be so I didn't think I would be nervous, but apparently my subconscious never got that memo. My insomnia picked a lousy time to again rear its ugly head and I spent hours tossing and turning, getting more and more stressed and finally just plain angry. I was so darn mad that I'd spent literally MONTHS preparing for this race, and then I was sure it was all going to be ruined by the fact that I simply couldn't fall asleep!
Thankfully I finally fell into a fitful sleep, although I studiously avoided looking at the clock (Insomnia 101) so I have no idea what time it was. I got up at 5:45 a.m. and again although I was all ready to go, my body betrayed me. I couldn't eat a thing and was literally sick to my stomach out of sheer nerves. I left the house around 6:15 a.m. and headed up to the reservoir to meet my friends.
I'm so very thankful that my friends and I did this race together, because once I met up with them I calmed down considerably! I was still anxious, but at least by that time I was able to eat some food without the threat of seeing it again shortly.
We got ourselves all set up and then it was time to get into our wetsuits and prepare to swim in the COLD water.
The water temperature was 66 degrees. The air temperature was right around the same number, but let me assure you that even in a wetsuit, that is pretty darn chilly.
The swim portion of the race is 750 meters, which is 1/2 mile. I've done that distance many times in the pool and even in this same reservoir, but for some reason it seemed longer on race day. The swim course is a triangle--you go into the water on one end of the beach, swim out and around a big round yellowish buoy, then back to the other end of the beach. The first leg of the swim was extra hard because we were headed right smack into the newly-risen sun. That meant every time I lifted my head out of the water to sight the buoy and make sure I was headed the right direction, I was blinded by the sun and its reflection off the water. The big round yellow buoy and the big round yellow sun hanging right directly above it were difficult to distinguish in those conditions and I'm sure that cost me some time and some focus. The second leg of the swim heading the other direction was much easier. I was happy to find out that my swim time was faster than my normal training time in the pool!
The next event of the race is the 12-mile (20K) bike course. I had ridden the course the week prior so I knew what to expect. I had a minor technical problem with my bike's gears on about the last 2 miles causing me to have to push harder than I would have liked, but I'm just thankful it didn't happen earlier when I was going up and down the big hills! I didn't time myself last week so I'm not sure how my race time compared, but I felt like I was going faster on race day so I'm sure I improved.
The final leg of the race is the 5K run (ours was technically a 3.5 mile course rather than a 3.2). This was the event I was most worried about because although I've been running a 5K an average of once a week for months now, it just has not been getting any easier for me, and that's without doing a swim and a bike first! The course was very hilly. They were small hills, but it was pretty constantly up and down without much flat in between. I've had to do all of my training in the gym on a treadmill because they offer babysitting, and it's impossible to replicate that hilly course on a treadmill. I wish I'd prepared by running the run course ahead of time like I did for the bike course.
Normally my pattern is to run 5 minutes, then walk for 1 all through the distance. Because I'm a wimp and can't run up hills, my pattern went completely out the window and instead turned to walk up, run down. I felt like I did much more walking than running and thought that for sure I had completely blown my time, but in reality I was only 3 minutes slower than when I do all of that running!
Coming into the finish line was such a great feeling! My sweet little kids met me and ran in with me, my dear husband took pictures and cheered, and many of our friends were there cheering for me as well. I feel so proud that I was able to set a goal and accomplish it! The training took a long time and does not come easily to me, but I wanted to prove to myself that I CAN DO HARD THINGS--and I did!
And if you made it this far, I want to share one more thing: this song was sort of my theme song for my whole race and training. I wasn't able to wear an iPod during my race so I had to just sing it in my head. ;) Please watch and listen--I think it's so inspiring! Makes me a little teary-eyed every time.
Tomorrow morning at the still-dark hour of 6:00 a.m. I'll be hauling my happy self and my wetsuit, bike and running shoes up to the nearby reservoir for my very first triathlon. I'm nervous, but I do feel ready for my race. I've been preparing and training for months now and I'm ready to just get it over with, already! My goal for this race is just to finish respectably. I'm not fast so I'm not going to win anything, but even if I'm dead last I'm just going to have to own it and be proud of the fact that I even finished! I'm going to imagine all of you there at the finish line, yelling for me! :)
I didn't mean to maintain blog silence for so long but honestly,
blogging just got pushed WAY down the priorities list. Right now, if it
doesn't have to do with my race or my booth, it's pretty much not
getting done. I am crafting like a madwoman and still I know that I'm not going to be able to get done as much as I would like. It's frustrating but at the same time, I'm working on booth stuff literally every spare minute I have so at least I can feel like I'm doing my best. As much as I hate to admit it, I'm definitely feeling like that decision to sign up for two markets a week apart was a mistake, because my fear is that instead of having one really packed-full booth, I'm going to have two 'okay' booths. Again, I hate that reality, but I'm doing my best and I can't do any more than that.
I signed up for my first sprint triathlon! I've been training for a few months now, I just haven't said anything about it here yet. My race will be September 15 so I still have some time to train, which is good because I'm going to need every minute! The photo of me above was last week at the local reservoir (which is actually the race site) when I had just completed my first half-mile open water swim. You should have seen the funny look Porter gave me when he saw me in that get-up. :)
A sprint triathlon is the shortest distance. My particular race has a 750-meter swim, a 14-mile bike ride, and a 3.2 mile run. Which for me might as well be about a zillion miles. You have to know that I am NOT athletic at all. AT ALL. In elementary school, I used to sit at recess and read a book (usually the latest installment in the Baby-Sitters' Club series) rather than run around playing soccer or whatever. I never liked sports, can't hit a ball, hate running. This whole swim/bike/run thing is so far out of my comfort zone, it might as well be in outer space. Every single time I get in the pool, on the bike or the treadmill I think, "I am out of my mind. There is just no way I am going to be able to do all three of these things in a row because just doing one at a time wipes me out completely."
But. I AM GOING TO DO IT. My new motto for myself is "I can do hard things." I want to show my kids that they can work hard and do things that don't come easily to them. I want to show Maren that even Mommies can be physically strong. I want to prove to myself that I can set a goal and finish it.
