TTT- Day 1

Back home after a whirlwind weekend.  4 races in 3 days sure seems to make a weekend fly by fast! The short of it is, TEAM EDWARDS FINISHED!  The rest, you will have to read.....

So rewind back to the beginning.  After a week of packing up a ton of crap to take, we left out at 8 AM Friday morning to make the 4.5 hour drive down to Portsmouth, OH.  We picked up my teammate along the way and I honestly had no idea if we were going to get everything into the truck.  Holy lots of stuff between camping, racing, bikes and my husband motorcycle!

We arrived down to Portsmouth about 1:30 and started setting up camp.  That is when the clock went into warp speed.  By the time we were setup it was time to get our packet, then back to camp to get ready, then back to transition to get started to get ready for race one at 5PM.

Race 1:
Race one was a super sprint.  It started with 250 yard swim which would go off as a time trial start with 2 people every 3 seconds based on a time we had put in when we registered.  I have no idea what I put in now but I was number 194 out of about 400 for the weekend.  Now it was such a short swim but the kicker was that the water was coming in at 56 degrees.  Between that and being a slightly weaker swimmer, I opted for the wetsuit and the neoprene cap.

Christian, the dolpin who zooms through the water and Team Edwards donning wetsuits!

It was quite warm Friday evening in the mid 80s and I was super toasty from the heat and getting on the wetsuit so I hopped in the water for a bit right before the race so I was prepared for what I was going to be dealing with.  The water was very cold on my face but I took some strokes to get comfortable and I thought with as short as the swim looked, that I would be fine!

The time trial start was sort of a new one and it was crazy to see many people done with the swim before I even started.  It was hard to tell where you were all weekend due to these TT starts, but I was thankful to have less congestion at the starts.

As I ran into the water, I tried to get moving quickly as this was going to be a fast race.  I think between my nerves, trying to go fast and the cold water, my breathing became very labored.  I tried to relax in the water but pretty much was wheezing the entire race..stupid asthma!

Side note:  This was the first time I had had the opportunity to use my new TYR Hurricane Cat 5 Wetsuit which I got hooked up with through Team Trakkers/REV3.  I had never even put it on as I was nervous about tearing it.  Yet when I put it on Friday night and first swam in it, I was immediately impressed.  The wetsuit felt very soft and had areas designed to catch water.  I was not sure if it was my recent swimming or this wetsuit, but I felt very good in the water and had a pretty comfortable swim.  All I know is that I am very thankful for this wetsuit as it ROCKED!

The swim was over pretty quickly and I made my way to transition.  As quickly as I could, I slid the wetsuit off and exited to mount my bicycle.  Going into the race, my plan was to have a solid effort Friday but I did not want to go gangbusters and pay all weekend.  The course included one big climb followed by one big decent with 2 hairpin turns.  Overall it was a decent effort although I know I could have passed a few others on the descent but it seemed a lot of riders were all over the road so I figured I would just be a little more conservative. I forget my exact splits but I think it is safe to say the bike course was short.  Official times have not yet been posted. The whole bike I continued to breathe hard and then it was out onto the run course.  The first half had a slight uphill grade and I was breathing hard.  At the turnaround I upped the effort and tried to pick some people off but passing with that many people going in both directions on a tight course was a  bit challenging at times.

Just getting a look now at official results.


Swim:  5:37  Rank 187
T1: 1:01
Bike:  12:48 Rank 208
T2: 0:42
Run:  6:41 Rank 128
Total Time:  26:51  Rank 155 


I was breathing hard and made my way down to see some friends sitting in the cold water and I plopped my heavy breathing butt down in the water and attempted to catch my breathe.  The nice thing about the weekend's races, was that they provided a good bit of food after every race so I helped myself to some pasta and a salad before heading back to camp.  Friday night was fun and we had a big bonfire at our campsite and the Cleveland gang gathered round for many stories and post race laughs as myself and a few others kicked our legs up in my Recovery Pump pants which were a hot commodity for the weekend!

Just when I thought the night was over and I pulled the covers up over my head, there was one last surprise waiting for me.  I started screaming and jumped out of bed after being stung by a bee right in the meat of the arch of my right foot.  Now anyone who knows me knows when I get stung this leaves some pretty good reactions.  My husband hopped up and grabbed some benadryl and sting ease ointment and I tried to take care of it right away.  My foot had started to swell pretty good and I limped when I put weight on my heels.  Seriously???  WTF?  Why me?  How does this happen on big race weekend to me right in such a critical spot?  I had trouble sleeping that night as my foot was aching but I was sooo not planning on letting this impact the weekend....to be continued.....