One nice bonus to doing the CapTexTri is that they give you all of the official race pictures for FREE! Here’s a visualization of what it was like to be me for a few hours on race day. I’ll curate the best I can, but let the pictures do the real talkin
Before the race got started, I was all nerves. You’ll recognize this picture from my race report, but I chose to stay out of sight from the official cameras before the race. Thanks Ev for putting this one together!
My first Olympic Distance (aka International Distance) triathlon is in the books! On Monday I finished the CapTexTri held completely in downtown Austin. We swam in Lady Bird Lake, biked up to the Capitol and along the water, and ran through the Dallas-y condos that seem to be popping up all over the place. Despite the unsettling warning about possible e. coli in the water from all the rain we had, I’d say everything went quite successfully!
I’ve done an average-at-best job about keeping you, the people of the Internet, up to date on my triathlon lifestyle. Case in point, I’m signed up for the CapTexTri this coming Monday! Less than a month ago I decided it would be worthwhile to get a sort of training “status report” by doing an early-season race. Now that race is here and I’m actually really excited about it!
Two years ago I took on the CapTexTri sprint distance with moderate success. Now I’m signed up for the Olympic Distance. The swim, which is 1500 meters, loops around Lady Bird Lake. The latest report is the water temperature is 69*. That makes it wetsuit legal, which at the risk of overheating, means I’ll be wearing a wetsuit.
The bike course is a six-mile loop around downtown, completed twice for the Sprint and four times for the Olympic totaling about 24 miles. It’s a rather technical course (90-degree turns, hairpins, laps), so I’m not sure how I’ll fare. Last up is the run, which is two laps of the 5k course (6.2 miles total). I had a great run when I did the Sprint. Hopefully I can repeat that this time around. As for the weather, well, it’ll be warm, but that’s no surprise.
So what am I expecting time-wise? For the swim, if I could be out of the water in 30 minutes, that would be huge. The bike is going to take well over an hour. Let’s say an hour and twenty minutes. And the run will hopefully finish up in less than forty-five minutes. Tack on seven minutes for transitions and we’re looking at a potential total time of two hours forty-two minutes. Can’t wait for the first tri of the season!
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p>Game on!
Hi. Don’t take this as “You never tell me anything!!” It was just a mistake and I thought I had told you. It looks like I forgot to mention that I’m signed up for a triathlon this Sunday. Yep. I signed up for it like 2 days before switching over to marathon training and I guess never really brought it up. In any event, I wanted to let you know that I’ll be tri-ing it up at the Couples Triathlon this Sunday out at Decker Lake (the same place where
I did the Rookie Tri).
The Capital of Texas Triathlon took downtown Austin by storm on Memorial Day. I registered just two weeks before for the Sprint distance, figuring the Olympic distance would be too much for my second-ever tri. Compared to the Rookie Tri this race felt like the big leagues. There was serious prize money ($12,500 to the winner), pro athletes, and plenty sponsors and vendors. It also had more than its share of breakdowns and issues, but I won’t get into that here. Here’s how everything went for me as I’m still trying to find my way in this whole triathlon jungle.
As I’m reading through the participant guide for the CapTexTri I’m finding tons of useful crucial information that I didn’t know that I didn’t know. Who would’ve thought, right? I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Triathlons are a whole lot more complicated than marathons. For a marathon all you need to know is what time the race starts. It helps if you line up in the appropriate “wave” based on your predicted finish time, but really you just have to go pick up your race number the day before and then just show up to the race. For a triathlon, not so easy.
Well it’s already race week for the Cap Tex Tri! That came around pretty quick, but I suppose that’ll happen when you register 17 days before the race. First I need to remind you (and myself) that the race is on Monday, Memorial Day, and not Sunday. So don’t go sending me all those “good luck” texts, tweets, facebook messages, voicemails, candygrams, Tiff’s Treats*, or anything of that nature a day early. So race week means take it easy, right?
get your game face on
Since the Rookie Tri a few weeks ago I’ve had a hankering for defining my race calendar. This transition to triathlons has been fairly smooth, but I’m missing the structure and direction that I’m used to with running. You see, with running I usually had two or three races queued up. My tri calendar, however, has been disappointingly empty. I’ve my eye on a few races but hadn’t pressed that “Register” button. Until now!
