Recap of 2010

I cannot believe that I did NO posting on this blog from April 2010 (before my first tri) until now. That's a lot of happenings that didn't get recorded!

So as a quick recap:

I did the Canby Gator Grinder sprint tri as my first tri. I ended up dead center for my age group. I felt good about an 11 min swim, a decent bike, and a pretty slow run. I'm looking forward to improving on all the times in 2011.

My second tri was the Blue Lake Sprint in early June. This was my first open water swim. It didn't go well. I'd only worn my wetsuit once prior to the race and due to a newly formed tiny tear, didn't pull it on all the way. It was choking me. That, combined with the racing HR from the start of my second race and I almost had a panic attack. Plus, 880y looks REALLY long in a lake! AND I had the sun in my eyes for the first part and couldn't see. I ended up side-stroking almost the entire swim! The bike went ok and the run was my usual plod. I did sign up for the Athena class (women > 150lbs) so even with a lousy swim, I still ended up with a second place medal!

After that, I did a LOT more open water swim practice and felt much, much better by the time my next race rolled around. I did a practice tri at Hagg Lake put on by Athlete's Lounge in mid-July that was fun. The trail run was really cool even though I felt like I was tripping over my feet. I did ok, but it wasn't an official event.

Then I raced the Mid-Summer Sprint Tri at Blue Lake on August 1st. This was almost the identical course to the Blue Lake tri earlier in the year. The only difference was that the bike was extended to be 17 miles to make the whole race a 19.2 mile race as part of Amica's tri series. I did MUCH better on the swim, was slightly faster on the bike and the run. Yay, me! I did not race it as Athena though as I had planned to not qualify by then (even though I still did).

My last event of the summer was the Crater Lake Century. My husband and I drove to Crater Lake on the third weekend in August and it was a wonderful event. Great support, great ride, great weather and we had so much fun. I *think* we are going to try and do this ride again in 2011.

All in all, I'd say that 2010 was a pretty damn successful first triathlon season for me. :-)