Subject: Sweet Podium Finish By: Patricia M.
Written on: Monday September 12, 2011 Message: This Saturday I did the Yucca Triathlon at White
Sands Missle Range. It was an odd distance race
with an 8K run, 45K bike, and 400M swim. I wanted
to do it for a couple of reasons: it was my
birthday, it was a great tune up distance for the
Olympic race Elephant Man in a couple of weeks,
and the base is just 30 minutes from my daughter
and son-in-law's house so I could spend the rest
of the weekend visiting them.
I left
Fort Sumner on Friday afternoon at 4 and went to
the school football game at Capitan and stayed
until halftime (I had to do my duty as the school
superintendent). The Foxes were winning, so I
didn't feel to bad about being a ditcher, and I
still had an hour and a half drive to Alamogordo
(NM is a big state). I got up at 4 AM in order to
make the next leg of the journey to get to the
military base and was at the transition area and
set up by 5:45 AM. I visited around transition and
that was fun. There were a lot of college students
from NMSU's triathlon team there, and I am helping
them organize a triathlon for November, so it was
fun to chat about that race too.
We
took off at 7:30, and I was really pleased with my
8K time of 58 minutes. I know most of you
Ontriers are much speedier than I am, but for me,
this 12 minute mile pace is a SIGNIFICANT
improvement and really surprised me. Frankly, I
didn't know I could do that. I guess it must be
the gift of birthday magic and my new birthday
orange Newtons. I was only three minutes behind
this other Athena that ALWAYS beats me. I kid you
not, she always comes in ahead of me. She went to
nationals in Athena last year, and she is super
cocky and pretty braggy about it.
I
jumped on the bike, and took off, and the first
four miles of the bike are an gradual decline, so
I knew I would be crying on the way back to
transition, but I cranked it pretty hard. At the
six mile point, I passed her, and I know that
caught her quite by surprise. I know I am a
pretty aggressive cyclist, and I know from looking
at my bike splits in races this year that I am
usually in the top third on bike times in races.
I just cranked it hard because the swim is her
best portion in triathlon. I saw her once more
after the turnaround, and then beat it back to the
transition point, and yes, that long slow incline
was a beast. I did the bike in 1:33 and then my
usual pitiful swim of 17 minutes. The great news
was I still beat her by 11 minutes overall, and it
feels AWESOME. I have had other wins this season,
but not over someone who is a recognized, regular
winner. When they were giving out the medals, the
race director just started to hand her the first
place medal, and she had to say, "No, I got
second, she got first." Yes, that is the
sound of my head swelling. Yes, I am being little
miss braggy pants. Yes, I have stapled my medal
on my bulletin board in my office with all of my
bib numbers. Yes, I wore my medal to lunch with
my daughter and son-in-law. Yes, I know it is
silly, and yes, I don't even care. I realize this
is unseemly in a 52 year-old woman.
This strong competitor and I will both
be in the same sprint race on Saturday, and I am
sure she will be looking to redeem herself. I am
going to try to keep her from doing so :-) She is
not doing Elephant Man and that will be the last
one I am doing in the Southwest Challenge Series.
Right now I am third in that series and she is
second. I don't know that I can unseat her from
that position given the current points, but there
is always next year <grin>
Patricia |
