Spirit of Racine Sprint Tri v2.0

I was able to travel to Wisconsin this past weekend for a mini-vacation visiting family and to participate in the Spirit of Racine Triathlon, again, this year. There is one other time in my life that I have been as cold as I was on Saturday. That other moment was when I participated in the Polar Bear Plunge in Lake Michigan on New Year's Day. That January day it was in the thirties and the water temp was not much warmer. However, that dip in the lake only lasted 30 seconds. Friday I went for a practice swim and it was "invigorating" to say the least. Saturday was a very wet, drizzly day, with temps in the low 70s. The water temp was 54 degrees, though. It was cold, but not as paralyzing as I thought it would be. I guess the cold made me swim faster, because I completed the 800m in just over 20 minutes. Luckily, there were no waves to contend with (except when peole swam past me) and the course was closer to shore. Drowning was less likely, but hypothermia was possible!!! I still had some fine motor skills in my hands to unzip the wet suit and get on the bike once I was out of the water. However, I did take a couple of extra minutes in transition to warm up. The bike felt comfortable and I was able to keep a pretty good pace, despite some numbness from the swim and wet pavement. I believe I covered the 12.4 miles in about 42 minutes. After that was the run, which has a few hills along the beach, but I was able to do okay and finished the 3.1 miles in about 35 minutes. Overall, my finishing time was 1:40:14, a new, personal best and an improvement of over 24 minutes from last year's finish. However, at least half of that improvement was due to my on-site cheering section and the extra training support by my friends who swibiru. However, I'm very glad that I finished and had fun, too.



Today's Mileage: 12.4 miles
2008 YTD Mileage: 398.2 miles
Miles to reach 2008 goal of 750 miles: 351.8
Avg Price of Gas in the 'boro: $3.78