6/24/2006 - Jason Oliver invited me to "try a tri" with him in Provo on June 24, 2006. I was totally unprepared and
had no idea what to expect. I suffered through the 800M swim, doing breast-stroke most of the way. Then, 10 miles into the 12 mile bike ride my rental bike broke
and I had to "scoot" the last 2 miles. I did a good job on the run, which is the only discipline I had ever actually trained for. My time was a dissapointing
1:42, but
it left me wanting more and the desire to get better. |
7/15/2006 - Having one tri under my belt, I had a much better idea of what to expect. But the first order
of business was upgrading my equipment. Thousands of dollars later, I had a brand new Canondale bike (and all of the accessories), a new Ironman swimming wetsuit,
and books about swimming. After a few weeks of intense training on my new bike and daily workouts in the Gold's Gym pool (and 10 pounds less of body weight), I did a lot better in my second tri - the Xango Echo Challenge:
1:28,
a cool 14 minutes faster than my first effort. |
8/26/2006 -
For the Jordanelle Tri, I successfuly recruited Debbie and Adam to give it a shot. This is us prior to reporting
to the starting line. |
8/26/2006 -
Debbie and I getting psyched up for the Jordanelle Tri, Debbie's first Sprint Triathlon. |
8/26/2006 -
Having two triathlons under my belt, I really focused on the swim and bike. For the swim I focused on technique as taught
by Terry Laughlin in Total Immerision Swimming. What a HUGE
difference maker proper technique makes! I cut my swim WAY down (00:15:28) and actually got out of the water in the top 7 of my
age group. I had a top 10 finish in my sights when I suffered a flat tire in mile 10 of 14. I tried to fix the tire
as fast as I could (20 minutes), but the delay put me out of contention with an overall time of 1:41. Good thing about triathlons is that there
is always another one to look forward to! |
8/26/2006 -
Debbie did a great job, completing the entire course in 2:02. She only began training for the even just one month
in advance, losing dozens of pounds in the process. She's looking forward to continuing her positive momentum
and completing the next Triathlon, the Odgen Valley Tri, in under 2 hours. |
9/16/2006 -
After the debacle at the Jordanelle Tri, I decided to go crazy and signed up for the Olympic distance for the last
tri of the year - the Odgen Valley Tri. I trained my fanny off, swimming 1 mile/day, biking 100 miles/week, and running
25 miles/week. The three weeks of consolidated training paid off with a time of
2:50.
This is a picture of Adam and I before the race - note, the swim was replaced with a 3 mile run because it was FREEZING cold. |
9/16/2006 -
Just three days before the race I talked Adam into upgrading to Olympic, which he did. This is us after race, celebrating
our moral victory and just glad to be alive!
|
9/16/2006 -
Finally made it home. I was sad that the tri season is over, but look forward to a good winter of training so hopefully
I can make an attempt at a few half-ironmans in 2007.
|
9/16/2006 -
Debbie turned in another impressive performace with
2:06, which
is great considering her limited training schedule (babies are a full-time job!!)
|
