RR: Mad Beach Triathlon 2011

1/2 mile swim, 15 mile bike, 5K run
One of my favorite local races. I enjoy watching my progress as a
triathlete by looking through the results archives. The 2011 version:
Swim 18:17 for the swim which is over 2 minutes faster than last year.
Still can't believe it, even with the perfect swim conditions. But I
measured the course on google maps. It was 1/2 mile down the beach.
Bike 43:10 20.8mph which is my fastest bike split ever. Very
impressive coming off a strong swim effort. I finally have some bike
shoes that could be loosened up enough to take my feet out before the
dismount. Chose not to practice this technique for the first time on
race day.
Run 28:50 24 seconds faster than last year. Again impressive given
the faster swim and faster bike. The last half of this run is on the
beach. We lucked out because there was some hard packed sand from the
out going tide. Still tougher than running on concrete. Two women in
my age group passed me in the last 1/4 mile. Almost caught one of
them but couldn't make progress when we moved onto the soft sand for
the finish. Apparently they had been stalking me ever since I passed
them on the run. I hear this voice say "there she is, now go get her"
and these two girls fly by. I'm not used to being stalked. Lesson
learned. Will be adding a few sand runs to my schedule.
Nice solid progress. Again, I really feel I should be a lot faster. I
want age group nationals but my time is still a good 7 minutes away
from that. But I have to be honest with myself: consistency has not
been there. The workouts I have made are not quality. The chaos that
is the end of the semester/beginning of a new semester has taken it's
toll. There have been real real reasons to miss workouts but that
doesn't change the fact that no workouts = no progress.
Now that life is settling in for the next 10 weeks, consistency will
go up. Hard work got me here, it will move me forward.