All Alone…

Keeping with HP05’s inability to write small blogs, here is another long re-cap of this past Sunday

There is something to be said for spending quality time alone. HP05 is a huge fan of alone time and decided to keep the tradition of going to Hampton, VA to ‘race’ in a sprint triathlon alone. A 4 hour drive down the back roads of MD and VA and some beach time sound like a good Saturday, which they were. Stay overnight and Sunday, race day.

Now this was HP05’s first full tri on her own. Her training has pretty much been nonexistent since the GCBS back in June, as that was her main goal for 2006. HP05 would now like to describe the goods and the bads of her race. Just some pointers that the rest of the world might be able to learn from…

The Bads
· Learning at 6:30 am you might not be able to race because you are missing a plug on your handle bars
· Discovering the water temp is 77 and EVERYONE has a wet suit but you
· A 30 minute delay on the start of a race, when it’s already a really hot day
· Getting stung in the hand by jelly fish. Then in the shoulder. Then one latches onto your left ankle and you try to kick it off looking awfully foolish
· Riding your bike with stinging pain in left leg due to jelly fish
· Hitting a pot hole at mile 3 to get a flat front tire
· Forgetting how to change a flat tire
· 30 minutes to change a flat tire and to start biking again
· Get to T2 and hear your friend’s name being called across the finish, who biked with a mountain bike
· Starting the ‘run’ and not being able to keep down the water and clif shot just taken
· Having the WORST RACE EVER and have people tell you that “you look great” and “only 2 miles to go”

The Goods
· Watching the sunrise over the ocean/lake/river
· Carrying medical tape to make a faux plug for your bike handle
· Running into a friend you didn’t know would be racing that day
· The kindness of a man named Fred who took me to his house (and not be creepy) to help change the flat tire
· Thinking about how this will be blogged during the bike and run
· Going through all of The Bads, and still finishing
· For the fist time, not caring about time
· Talking to other races, who saw me with the flat, impressed that I still fished the race because they would not have
· Driving home proud because quitting is NEVER an option