Maple Grove Triathlon

My goodness it’s been a long time since I wrote a post! Ooops.

On August 24th I participated in the Maple Grove Sprint Triathlon. I did this race last year too and had so much fun, I knew I wanted to go back. I questioned my decision when I realized that I needed to leave the house by 4:00 AM!!! As it turns out, getting up to go to someplace fun isn’t so bad even if it’s the middle of the night. 🙂

I found my way to the parking lot with no troubles and started my long walk to the transition area. I visited with a very nice lady from Germany who was doing the long distance race that day. She was using it for a training day for a bigger race this month.

I got my packet and body marking and realized I was in the very last wave – friends and family. It’s not a problem, everyone is really nice in that wave and it’s less competitive, but it meant an extra half an hour of waiting to start, which I was afraid was going to make it hot outside – as it turned out, that want so bad either.

I found some friends that I knew were going to be there, made some new friends and basically just hung out for the next 3 hrs until my wave started.

They changed the swim to 2 people every few seconds. I was nervous how that would work, but I kind of liked how it worked out. There was one place half way to the first bouy that was crazy busy with people, but other than that, the swim was really good. I was 37 seconds faster than this race last year – I’ll take that!

(for those of you that don’t know me personally, that’s me behind the bikini, not in it)

The transitions for this race are really long. Unfortunately for me, these being a little slower for me this year made my race a little slower. Ok, so it was only 19 seconds slower, but still!

Out onto the bike and into the wind. Good grief if I could catch a break on the wind during races this year I would be a happy girl! But the bike was good. The good thing about being in the final swim wave, there’s lots of people to pass while biking! 

Then onto the run. I remembered that last year people had some sprinklers going to help keep us cool during the run, and they did again this year, thank goodness, because it got hot out there.

My run felt pretty good too. I was able to pass a few people – honestly usually in triathlons, I get passed while running – so that was a huge confidence booster that maybe all this running work is paying off!

I was able to really pick up the pace once I made that final turn to the park. I was nervous I would run out of gas before I got there, but I didn’t. I gave a strong effort at the end and finished looking strong.

My finish line photo kinda got bombed by a guy, but what to do.

I had a great race and I was very proud of my efforts. I wouldn’t let myself look at last year’s results until after the race was over because I didn’t want to be disappointed in myself on race day. So when I finally got to look and I realized I was so close, I was a little frustrated, but when I realized it was in transition, I was a little less frustrated. My run was 9 seconds faster and my bike was 13 seconds slower, so with my faster swim time, I would have beat last year. Oh well, now I have to go back again next year!

Have you ever gotten so close to something without realizing it?

Any fall goals you want to share???