My first Tri............

So this past weekend I completed my first tri in Galveston, the Lonestar Triathlon. I am officially a triathlete. I am still no clear on my feelings about tri's since the race was crazy. This is how it went.

I took Friday off to head to Galveston. We had a beach house on Bermuda Beach.....it was a dump and overpriced but only 6 miles from Mood Gardens so whatever, right? I arrived in Galveston around 4, picked up the keys and met up with Maggie, Joey, Rachel Janice & Teresa at packet pick up. We wandered around checking out the event site and walked over to the swim start. It was pretty windy and you could see the current in the bay.....it made me want to throw up or cry or possibly both. Everyone was so super supportive and helpful. They are all seasoned triathletes and without their help & encouragement I would have never made it to that point.....standing there with my race packet in my hand, checking out the start.

We were starving and headed out to get dinner at the Rainforest Cafe. This was Jordan's suggestion. Jordan is Joey & Rachel's 5 year old son and a really cool kid. The wait was INSANE but we waited and finally had dinner on the table about 1:45 later. We grubbed then headed back to the houses. I was sad at that point since we were in different houses. I was by myself in our house. Coby, Gilbert, Frank & Barton would not be arriving to the house until after midnight. Todd's dad was in town so he was not able to make the trip with me and D'ann and her friends were arriving Saturday afternoon. So...there I was alone the night before my race freaking out and it was way too late to have a beer or something to chill out. I decided to watch a little tube before hitting the sack. There was a knock on the door....it was Todd. He wins the husband of the year award. I was fine....I would sleep and not freak out. He was my savior. He also stayed up to wait for the latecomers so they would not wake me up. I was really worried about that before. We talked after dinner as I drove home and he could tell that I was upset about being alone. He said that he was hitting the Supercrash show but was really about an hour away at that point. It was the best surprise ever.

My alarm went off at 5:00 AM.....it seemed so early. I hopped outta bed, got something to eat and all my race stuff together. It was time to head down to the race so I woke up Todd and the downstairs crew. They all rode separate and met me there. I called Maggie to meet up. She was amazing. She helped me set up my transition area and ave me TONS of last minutes tips. We were kicked out of the transition area and headed over to the swim start where we ran into my 2nd crew. They assured me that I was going to do great. Now.....here is the most important part that I left out. There was a severe weather warning. A HUGE string of thunderstorms blew in Friday night. The wind was strong and the sky was about to do some serious dumping on us. Before the start there was thunder but despite the weather the race went on as planned. We lined up according to our designated wave starts. Maggie stayed with me until it was time for my wave to enter the water. It was the longest, most sickening wait of my life. I felt like I was going to hurl. We slowing entered the water which was warmer than I expected(76*) and waited......I was in the very back of the wave...and we waited. It was the longest 5 minutes of my life then the horn blew. We started to swim. Oh, I forgot to mention, it was my first time to swim in open water too. The water was salty, choppy and overall pretty icky to swim through. It was definitely different. I was having difficulty sighting the buoy and boat land mark and I kept drifting way off track. I was in the water for close to 30 long horrible minutes which seemed a lifetime. I was kicked, swam over sucked in salt water and hit as the wave behind me caught up and passed me. I kept moving forward and the side stroke was my best friend. I could site better doing that over the crawl. At one point I almost freaked out but knew that the water angels where there on their surf boards watching me and keeping me on track. I finally hit the huge orange buoy.......literally. I swam right into it and made the gal sitting there chuckle. I could see the flags to stand up and I was never so happy to stop doing something. I felt the carpet under my feet and stood up making sure not to stand too soon and hit the oyster beds below. Oh....I forgot to mention that during the swim it started to drizzle a bit...that was really reassuring know that at any second I could be struck by lightening.

So....I was finally out of the water and I walked, no not run, until it finally sunk in that I was out of the water to the stripping station. I had taken my wetsuit off down to the waist. At that point I saw my crews, my peeps, my support team. It was nice to hear them yelling out my name and it helped me snap out of the PTSD of the swim. I plopped on the ground and before my but was completely down the volunteers had grabbing the suit and peeled it off in once swoop. I was up and ran to T1 for my bike. I could tell that the temp had dropped while I was in the water and the wind had picked up. The front was here and rain was coming any minute. I remembered what Erin kept telling me, "be sure to eat ", so I did after strapping on my helmet and shoes to head out for the bike. It was windy and once we were on the seawall even it was even stronger. It was a cross wind too so there would be no benefits of a tail wind. The bike was flat, which was nice but the cross wind was strong. It felt like it could just push me over at some points. I kept a steady pace although it was a bit slow due to the wind. About a mile left on the bike and it started to rain....no, that is an understatement, it started to DUMP water monsoon style. It was pouring down rain and I could barely see, it was cold and hurt when it hit my skin. It felt like needles as it came down. It slowed me down to a crawl since I was worried about crashing since I could barely keep my eyes opened from the rain. WOW......that was a challenge. As I turned back into the complex I saw Rachel, standing there in the rain. She was cheering for me drenched from head to toe. She also reported that Joey was waiting on the other side of the run start with a hat for me to wear!! YEAH!!!

I made it back to T2 and there was my stuff in a huge lake of water& stuff floating all over the place. I changed shoes, chugged a bit of e-load and took off for the run. As I left the trans area I saw Todd and my friends. They said I looked great...they are such fantastic liars but it was nice to have then there. As I turned the first curve there was the Austin Tri gang under a shelter. As I ran by Joey caught up to me with a hat. It was like he handed me a winning lotto ticket. As soon as I put on my magic hat all was good in the hood. I could see and the stinging rain was off my face....life was good again. The run took us all through the Moody Garden complex and the Arc that was being built:). There was a nice 4-6 inches of water to face along the entire route. My shoes felt like lead but I felt good. Running is my comfort leg of the event. It was an easy 5K and I knew that I would be done with the whole thing in less than an hour. As I was winding and sloshing to the end there were small groups of soaking wet volunteers. I made sure to thank them as I went by. I was happy to see, Judy, the ultimate cheer leader out there with the Texas Iron group. As I ran I was thankful that I had run with the Hill Country Trail runners in the past. Running through water was nothing new for me so I kept on running despite passing several people who were walking. I just wanted to get it over and get out of the rain. I also thought about the Austin Fit 21-miler 2 years ago. It poured rain the entire 21 miles so this was cake. I could see the finish line and tried to pick it up a bit at the end to cross the finish line. It was a quite finish since it was raining so hard but, the husband of the year, Todd, was there to cheer me on as well as Joey, Maggie, Teresa, Rachel, Janice and Jordon. I was never so happy finish something and wanted to just hug the volunteer who handed me a soaking wet towel and water bottle. Unfortunately, due to the weather, I have no pics to share. As soon as the official pics are up on the site I will post some photos I remember seeing them out there under a few shelters.

Times: Swim- 26.27
Bike- 51.07
Run- 32.49

Total event: 1:56

My first thought was, " I am NEVER friggin' doing this again", but due to being a victim of F.O.M.O. & a few days to forget, I am ready to start training for the next event. I know I need to seriously work on my swimming form, breathing on BOTH sides and a few other things. Despite my text message to my coach, Panther, that I am sticking to Du's, I will take on one more because I have faced the worst possible race conditions. It can only get better from here.

One last thing...the thank you's. I am so blessed to have an army of people behind me. They have been encouraging, supportive, helpful beyond belief and overall kick-ass friends. There are way too many of you but you know who you are. We swim, we ride, we drink, we run, we die together in the Jack & Adam's core class, we drink, we dance on bar tops, we train until we feel like we are gonna barf and basically have a blast during it all. I am so glad to have you all in my life and behind me 100%. I would not have been able to tackle my first tri with out you guys. You are amazing friends......THANK YOU!!!!