The Mad Dog

Last Saturday I competed in my first triathlon: the (mini) Mad Dog Tri at Madeira Beach! Everything turned out GREAT and I not only finished, I actually came in 3rd!!! Part of my success I owe to the awesome bike that I rented. When I showed up at the bike shop on Friday to pick it up, they said there had been some kind of mistake and they didn't have a road bike for me. So instead, one of the owners let me ride his personal ($3,500) bike!! I felt really nervous about that, but I was thankful to have such a great bike because that thing FLEW! I was sad when I had to return it! It was SO tough running on the beach after swimming and biking. I've never done anything that physically challenging in my life (well, except for maybe having a baby)! I can't imagine how people run a 5K in a regular sprint triathlon after swimming and biking so far, not to mention those amazing athletes who do half Ironman and regular Ironman competitions!! I'd love to do a sprint triathlon next, but I need to build up my swimming endurance some more. Anyways, when I hit the beach on my run, I was spent. I didn't expect the fatigue in my upper body that I experienced from the bike! I had only thought it might affect my legs, but what I really felt was tightness in my shoulders and arms, and that kept me from running fast at first. Once I got into a good rhythm though, I was set. At the turn around point, I noticed that there were 4 women ahead of me. I kept telling myself that all I had to do was beat 2 of them and I would place! So that's what I did, and I'm glad that it worked out that way because it gave me lots of motivation to run faster when otherwise I might have been lazy. I ended up coming in 1st for the running portion! So, overall it was a good day! My friends, and training partners, Andrea and Charity did really well also! They came in 2nd and 3rd in their age group so we were all happy with the results! Next up for us is the Top Gun Triathlon in August where the 3 of us will compete as a relay team. I'm running, of course. Should be fun!

Before the race, with Andrea and Charity:

My bike in the transition area:
Riding (we swam first but I don't have any good pictures of that since we were just a bunch of swim caps bobbing in the water!):

Running:
Finishing:After the race: