Ever since I had a taste of my first half Ironman three years ago, a big goal for me is to go sub-6 hours. I feel that it’s something I can easily accomplish. Each year I’ve continued to improve and become more familiar and comfortable with the sport. After four half Ironman races thus far, however, my personal best is a 6:29 from 2010’s hellishly windy Boise 70.3. I know that everyone was much slower that day, that I couldn’t control the weather, that I would have cycled much faster if conditions were better, that I actually placed decently in my age group. But I was focused on that time goal like Gollum’s fixation on that seemingly innocent little ring, so I couldn’t help but feel slightly disappointed.

Then Ironman Canada came and went and I had a race that exceeded my expectations. I would have gladly traded in every bad race or training workout that year for the day I ended up having, and after my biggest race of the season I was at an all-time high. I had just done an Ironman, for schmuck’s sake — I could do anything. No, I could crush anything. I was going to do a marathon and I was going to kill it. I was going to do a bunch of 70.3s next year and they’d all be under 6 hours. Hell, I’d be creeping up on 5:30s. I’d improve across the board and make this sport my bitch. Nothing was going to stop me.

And then, amid my marathon training, I developed Achilles tendinitis. At first it developed as a slight tightness and ache at the beginning of my runs. Then, with each step I’d take, the tightness would last a little longer. Eventually the pain kept me company throughout my entire run, but I’d stubbornly soldier on because I wasn’t going to let a little stiffness bring me down. I had just done an Ironman, damnit, and now I was going to blow my old marathon time out of the water.

That marathon never happened for me. I had to stop running completely, and as frustrating as it was to be told by my coach to eat a $140 entry fee (fucking Rock ‘n Roll and their wallet-rapingly high costs) and not race, I knew I had made the smart decision when I couldn’t even run twenty feet to cheer for Jason as he passed by without having my Achilles seize up. And so, instead of conquering a marathon and posting a 20-minute PR, I stayed off my feet and cycled through the winter.

It would be five months before I’d run again. I feared that I’d be starting at the very beginning and would be as bad as I was when I first begun running years ago. The thought of losing all my running fitness had nagged at me throughout those five months. When I did start striking pavement again, I was surprised to discover that I hadn’t slipped as far down the ladder as I’d thought. Teresa had assured me that my cycling would help keep my running strength up, and it did. But still, after a great year of runs and workouts, having to start even a few steps back was discouraging.

My running injury affected me mentally a lot more than I thought. I put on weight in the off-season and felt lethargic and weak. My swimming felt off, my running was neutered; the only thing I felt confident about was my cycling because I practically lived on my bike over the winter. By mid-June I had just started to ramp up my runs — I felt as if the season was already half over, and I had only just gotten started.

At my lowest points, I’d look up my teammates’ race results and lament that they’ve all gotten faster while I’ve been standing still. I’d compare my outdated half Ironman times to my teammates’ latest races from completely different courses and unreasonably tell myself that everyone is getting better at this sport but me. But the reality is that it’s not me against them. It’s me against me.

I’d cry on Jason’s shoulder, my thoughts heavy with doubt and my heart aching from being so irrationally worried. “You’re too hard on yourself,” he’d always tells me, and he’s right, of course. I finally confided in my coach and she called me immediately, talking me down from the ledge over the course of a nearly 40-minute phone call. She knows what it’s like to be injured. She knows what it’s like to work so hard and still not have things go your way. “Sometimes it’s just not your day,” she said. She’s right too. “You can’t compare yourself to anyone else. You have to just focus on yourself. Your day will come, I know it will.”

Embarrassment flooded me as I thought about what Teresa has gone through these past couple seasons, how her ulcerative colitis has landed her in and out of the hospital and sidelined her from enjoying her career as a professional triathlete. She loves triathlons more than anyone else does, yet she refuses to let her illness get her down or rob her of the joys and thrills of the sport, and here I am whining and feeling sorry for myself because I’ve gained ten pounds and am not improving as consistently as I expect to.

I watched my boyfriend race in Boise, and I felt ashamed once again when I saw one of my teammates, Barb, out there on the course, grinning from ear to ear and having the time of her life. She’s a lot older than me and slower, yet she doesn’t give a shit what that clock says when she crosses the finish line. To her, the simple act of racing and finishing is thrilling enough, and being healthy and active is what’s important, not beating herself up over precious minutes.

Two weeks later, I stood on the sidelines at Ironman Coeur d’Alene, cheering on my teammates who had set out to conquer 140.6 miles that day. After a long day of spectating and hollering, I watched them all roll in one by one. Some were fast, some were steady, some were slow. But it didn’t matter — the looks on their faces as they each approached the finish line reminded me why I love this sport so much. They may have had individual, private goals when they woke up that morning, but each looked just as happy and proud as everyone else when they crossed the finish.

My first big race of the season, the new Rev3 half Ironman in Portland, is on Sunday, and leading up to the event I have been plagued with a plethora of emotions ranging from doubt, fear, a lack of confidence, to indifference. I don’t know what Portland has in store for me; it’s been nearly a year since my last endurance race and over a year since my last 70.3. At this point, however, I’ve decided to stop worrying, and once I made that decision I felt as if a huge weight was lifted off me. A large part of my team will be there to race, and being a part of such a fun and encouraging group will be enough to push me to do my absolute best and try to have as much fun as possible. Whether I cross the finish line in under six hours or if it takes me closer to seven, I’ll be thankful that I’m healthy and fit enough to participate and try not to take my body for granted.

I still get down on myself, and I know that the doubt and worry will always be there, but I can at least try to control how it affects me. This week I’ve been battling an injured hamstring and a tight right shoulder, but aside from some treatments, ice/heat, and stretching, there’s nothing more I can do but hope it gets better by Sunday and deal with it if it doesn’t. That’s what this sport is all about: adapting to various problems thrown your way, be they injury, weather, mechanical issues, or mental blocks.

It’s easy to look at all the fast, fit girls on my team with their ridiculous abs and envious race finish times and try to aspire to be like them. To compare training hours and worry that I’m not doing enough each week. To look at the numbers on that scale and swear off pizza for the rest of my life. What’s difficult is constantly reminding myself that I’m only competing against myself, and I can be my greatest ally or my biggest foe. This season so far I’ve been the latter. Now it’s time to nut up, quit sulking, and remember why I got into this sport to begin with: to challenge myself, get in better shape, and to have fun. It’s time to conquer my enemy.

Back in 2008, I was training for my first half Ironman, the not-quite-half-Ironman-distance New Balance race in Victoria. I was a sorry sight, riding on a borrowed road bike with mountain bike pedals and swimming even more terribly than I do now. I was basically the Tai to Teresa’s Cher if this were the movie Clueless.

"Rollin' on a road bike..."

Teresa urged me and Jason to do the Issaquah sprint triathlon so we’d have a little bit of race experience going into the Victoria half Ironman. Since it was my first tri, I was ridiculously nervous.

Swim Summary

The swim was a teeny tiny 400 meters — it would take you longer to get your wetsuit on and off than it would to actually swim that distance. Of course, I was convinced I was going to drown. I swam with a handful of other girls in my age group, stopping at every buoy to gasp for air and gaze longingly at the shore.

Swim time: 10:29 (2:37/100 meters)

As embarrassingly crappy as my swim was, it marked the only time I’ve beaten Jas during the swim portion of a race. Since this was his first ever open water swim, he panicked and flailed in the water and I ended up edging him out by a minute or so. (Check out the only Mediocre Athlete post my lazy boyfriend has ever written for a recap of his swim from that race.)

Transition 1

My transitions have always been decent, even from the get-go, and my first race’s T1 was a respectable 2:14. I think I’m just anxious to get out of my stupid wetsuit as quickly as possible. No matter the reason, my transitions aren’t that bad.

Bike Summary

I hopped on my borrowed bike and made my way along the 15-mile course. It’s an out and back and I just puttered along with all the other racers. I didn’t have a bike computer at the time, so I had no idea how fast I was going or what my cadence was (it was probably pretty shitty). I momentarily went the wrong way when I followed some schmohawk who took a wrong turn, but thankfully the race volunteers quickly corrected us.

When I was a few miles from transition, I was descending a hill when I noticed an odd noise coming from behind me. “That doesn’t sound normal,” I thought, so once I got to the bottom, I got off the bike and checked my rear tire. It was dead flat. Great, I’d gotten a flat tire during my first triathlon and not only did I not know how to change a flat, I didn’t have any tools or spares with me so I couldn’t even attempt to figure it out. I kind of stood there for a while, not knowing what to do, before eventually click-clacking down the road while pushing my neutered bike.

Eventually my teammate Beth came along and, bless her heart, stopped to try and help me. She had a spare tire and tools, but the only problem was she didn’t know how to change a flat, either. We both fumbled around for a bit and got as far as taking the rear tire off before looking at each other, stumped and covered in sweat and bike grease. Jason rolled up and stopped, but since he didn’t know how to change a tire either, he resorted to staring at us quietly before offering up an extra spare just in case and taking off.

I felt so helpless and frustrated. I should have been done with this stupid race by now, but instead I was stranded on the side of the road with a shitty bike with one flat tire that I didn’t know how to fix. My mood kept switching from anger to embarrassment to amusement. As Beth and I continued to fumble, I looked up and saw a tiny middle-aged woman running across the street with a pump in her hand. She pulled a Nick Burns, Your Company’s Computer Guy on us and commanded us to “MOVE!” before taking over and expertly changing the flat. I stood there and watched her in awe. This lady knew her shit. (She informed us she cycles and that we indeed did not know what the hell we were doing.) With my tire now fixed (it was a good thing Jas stopped to give us a spare spare, because we broke the valve on Beth’s and ended up needing a backup) and feeling eternally grateful to both this Good Samaritan and to Beth, I took off and finished the rest of this godforsaken bike ride.

Bike time: 1:26:23 (a whopping 10.4 mph)

When I rolled into transition, it looked like a ghost town. Most everyone had been finished with their race for quite some time now while I still had to run three miles. Because of my ridiculous stubbornness (thanks to both my Korean mom and my Kelley genes), however, I soldiered on, intent on finishing this fucking race. I can’t quit my first triathlon! No matter how terrible my finish time, I needed to cross that finish line.

Transition 2

Because my transitions have always been halfway decent and since I was fueled by “my bike totally sucked” rage, I practically hurled my bike at the rack, grabbed my shoes, and was in and out of there in 1:29.

Run Summary

My legs were relatively fresh thanks to the excruciatingly long rest I had on the bike leg, so I blazed through the run course, passing the handful of people who were still racing. Most of them looked miserable, but a couple of people looked as pissed as me, which led me to believe that they also had some bike issues. The run course was pretty crappy — I ran through sprinklers, an industrial business park, and through a wet and grass clipping-filled soccer field before heading back to the finish. My shoes got destroyed but I didn’t care, I just wanted to put this whole damn thing behind me.

Run Time: 24:31 (8:10 min/mile, which was pretty fast for me at the time)

Overall time: 2:05:07

I came in dead last in my age group, but I did manage to beat a few people overall.

Even though my first ever triathlon was a spectacular failure, I did manage to learn quite a few things:

1. No, you won’t drown during the swim portion of the race — just stay calm and focused and you’ll be fine
2. Know how to change a freakin’ tire; you will be tested at some point, whether it’s during a race or just during a training ride (that season I ended up getting five flats, so by the end of 2008, I became a pro at changing tires)
3. Don’t expect the race to go perfectly, because something can (and oftentimes will) go wrong
4. How your race goes depends on your attitude and how you react in the face of adversity
5. Don’t ever give up on yourself

So yeah, my first triathlon was a big clustercuss. Oh well, they can’t all go great, right? I’ve gotten a lot better since then and have learned even more about myself and about the sport, so barring some sort of catastrophic incident tomorrow, I should be able to post a huge course PR. Of course, if I get another flat tire, I’m going to assume it’s the Triathlon Powers That Be’s way of telling me I shouldn’t do the Issaquah sprint ever again…but at least now I know how to change a flat, so even if I go in expecting the worse, I can still come out on top.

The clinic was held at a park, and Teresa would time us from our simulated swim to bike transition, and again from swim to run. She’d shout out our times with much excitement and encouragement, and I’d feel like a freakin’ champ because I was flying out of the fake water and to my little transition spot so speedily. “I so got this,” I thought. “I’mma be so gee dee fast in transition.” I even took notes and photos of the whole process so I could study it diligently and be the fastest mofo in T1 and 2:

A tidy transition setup

That same week, I had my first ever open water swim. Before the workout, I envisioned myself exiting the water like a total pro and expertly stripping off my wetsuit like I learned in the transition clinic. Then, of course, I actually got in the water and everything I learned flew out the window. It was May and Lake Washington was like 50 degrees, so our group didn’t so much swim as flop around in the water and screech due to the hardcore zipper sting (which is when the water seeps into your wetsuit from various entrances, usually the zipper, and chills you the eff out). My workout turned into a 15 minute flail fest as I dully punched the water with frozen fists and heavily plunked my feet in instead of exhibiting anything remotely resembling decent form.

Finally, when my icy torture was over, I trudged out of the water and attempted to do my “speedy” transition.” Unfortunately, the freezing temperatures + Madison beach stairs equaled me sporting windmill arms and rubber legs as I attempted to exit. I MC Skat Katted two steps forward, one step back, threatening to fall into the water more times than I’d care to admit. It was most definitely a sad sight to behold — I think Teresa trained me in 2008 thinking I was physically and mentally handicapped.

At last I managed to creep over to a safe distance away from the beach, where I tiredly pawed at my zipper pull, twirling around like an idiot until I had the strap in my tundra clutches. I yanked my suit down and promptly keeled over when trying to pull it off my legs. By the time I wrestled myself free from my waterproof sausage casing, it had been several minutes and I was pathetically tired from the effort. I had really put my transition clinic knowledge to good use.

Thankfully, practice makes less embarrassing (which is how the saying goes for me), and after enough races I can safely say I’m pretty decent at transitioning. The only thing I don’t do is start out with my cycling shoes on the bike — I tried it at another clinic and was pretty sucktastic at it, so I haven’t bothered to try it out during an actual race. I have considered slipping out of my cycling shoes as I roll into transition instead of running through T2 in them because my Speedplay cleats are clunky mother effers and virtually impossible to “run” in without rolling an ankle. Maybe it’s something I’ll work on this coming season…Teresa would just love it if I bugged her for another clinic so she can watch me zig zag around the park looking like a total spaz.

The pinky toe managed to survive, but alas, I lost Thaddeus von Middlenail. Maybe I’ve been watching too much of The Walking Dead lately, but I coped with the impending death of my toenail similar to a zombie apocalypse survivor having to deal with the fact that his loved one had become infected and was starting to turn.

First, there was hope. Despite hearing from numerous people (including Running Magazine) that my purple nurple nail was dying and would fall off, I thought that maybe if I just left it alone, it would pull through. It’s like if Jas got bit by a zombie and I said, “Well, we don’t know for sure if he’ll turn. Maybe different people have different reactions…yes, I’m aware that a huge bite-sized chunk of his arm is missing.”

So instead of accepting the fact that my toenail was indeed going to fall off, I masked its rapid discoloration with some nail polish.

It’s akin to wrapping a scarf around my infected boyfriend and pretending that he’s now okay:

"Uh, I don't know if this is helping..."

After a while, though, my toe started to throb and I was distraught to discover that pushing down on the nail caused a clear liquid to ooze from underneath it. I thought to myself, “Well that’s not normal,” and resorted to covering the whole mess up with a Band-aid. Out of sight, out of mind!

Zombie equivalent:

"That band-aid oughtta do the trick!"

The toenail eventually stopped oozing and things got quiet for a while. When I finally took the nail polish off my toes, I was surprised and a bit unsettled to see that my toenail was no longer purple, but white-ish. It was as if it tried to emulate my other healthy toenails but couldn’t quite pull it off. It looked the color of bone. That couldn’t be a good sign.

Although to be fair, Zombie Jas isn't that much paler than Normal Jas

Over the next couple months, the toenail went through varying degrees of looseness. Some days I’d be able to wiggle the hell out of it, while other days it’d feel more firmly planted, giving me false hope that things were finally looking up…

…until one fateful night when, while Jas and I were sitting on the couch, watching TV, I halfheartedly wiggled my toenail to assess its condition, as I’ve grown accustomed to doing. To my horror, it was super loose. In fact, after a couple wiggles, I was able to successfully detach it completely on the right side and along the bottom, leaving a 1/3 attached toenail that resembled the spine of a book. Oh god, it had finally turned. I was looking at Zombie Toenail.

Don't ask me why he's still wearing the scarf

I was devastated. The little guy was supposed to pull through, not succumb to the sickness and die! After sadly flicking my deceased toenail back and forth and thoroughly grossing my poor (non-zombie) boyfriend out,, I knew what I had to do. This bad boy needed to get removed, and the sooner the better.

Since I was a nail-losin’ virgin, I didn’t know whether to take the thing off myself or to consult a professional. The problem with my toenail was that it was actually still pretty firmly attached on the one side that was left, as if it was clinging on in futile hopes that it would somehow prevail. I didn’t really feel like torture porning my own toenail out with a pair of pliers, so I asked Dr. Perry about it when I saw him for my foot issues. He was like, “Uh, yeah, I think I can remove that for you,” but by the end of my appointment he must have realized that feet are gross and wanted nothing to do with yanking a zombie toenail off my smelly foot. He said he didn’t have the right scissors at his office (riiiiiight), so it wasn’t happening.

Per his recommendation, I called my general practitioner and made an appointment to get the nail removed. The receptionist assured me that he was pretty sure this was something the doctor could take care of and even joked over the phone, “Hell, I’d remove it for five bucks.” However, the next day an employee called me back and said that my doctor wasn’t able to do that sort of procedure. What the hell, who knew a loose toenail would turn me into a leper.

I called the medical center’s podiatry department and found out that it’s just one dude who works there, and he was up to his eyeballs in feet until mid-January. No way was I going to wait that long to dispatch of my little piggy. Back to the drawing board. I called another doctor in Capitol Hill and found out that he only works with patients who have no insurance. Frustrated, I began to consider the “tie one end of some string to my toenail and the other end to a doorknob and then slam the door” approach.

Finally, after my fifth attempt to locate a doctor who was willing to see me sometime before the Mayan apocalypse, I was successful. I shelled out fifty bucks to consult with a foot doctor for roughly five minutes as he clipped my nail off (what the fluff, I could have done that) and kicked my self esteem in the balls by saying I have freak feet. He didn’t even give my toenail a proper burial, instead just flinging it in the trash like it was nothing. I wanted to keep it and string it onto some dental floss to make a little necklace keepsake for Jas (kidding).

I’m sad I lost my toenail. We had some great times together — me clipping it every once in a while, scratching Jason’s legs and making him yelp in his sleep, having it protect my toe whenever I stubbed it or dropped cans on it — and it was a bummer to see him go. However, as David Attenborough has taught me in many BBC series, life is a glorious cycle and I’ve already got a new toenail sprouting up and halfway grown in. When it’s finally done growing, I shall march up to the top of a cliff edge and hold my foot up over my head, belting “The Circle of Life” at the top of my lungs.

I hope you’ve learned from my experience, dear reader, that you are not immune to toenail zombification. It can happen to anyone. Sure, it may be a long, arduous process filled with naivety and hope, but in the end, it will turn and you’ll be forced to put it down. You never know what may cause it — for me, it was 140.6 miles through Canadian wine country — but the end result will be the same.

Prologue
The half Ironman was on a Saturday and boasted a point-to-point bike course (meaning two transition areas instead of one) and a 2 pm start. On paper that sounded awesome — you got to sleep in instead of getting up at butt crack of dawn o’clock, and you could get a proper meal instead of choking down oatmeal. Huzzah! I put off signing up until the week of the race because I had been having knee problems lately and wanted to make sure my body felt healthy before shelling out a couple hundred dollars for the race. Unfortunately for me, they closed online registration the week of the race so I had to sign up in person.

Traveling to the Race
Jason and I loaded up the Subee, strapped our bikes onto the hitch and drove the 8 excruciatingly boring hour drive through eastern Washington, most of Oregon and into Boise. The drive pretty much consisted of the following:

• brown nothingness
• brown nothingness
• brown nothingness
• ridiculous thunderstorm
• brown nothingness

Pre-Race Preparations
We finally got to Boise, and the next day Jason and I headed to the Expo Center to pick up our registration packet. I had to sign up in person and was forced to bequeath my unborn child over to the Ironman brand (Jesus Christ, race-day sign up is so freakin’ expensive). I also decided to rent race day wheels to see what they were like. They were kind of pricey but still tons cheaper than buying a set of race wheels (which can cost $2,000 and up).

Check out those sexy race wheels

After Jason and I finished up at the Expo Hall, we drove over to the swim start so we could drop off our bikes at T1. After a test bike ride, we got in the water for a 10 minute swim, and holy hell was that water cold. I flailed around for a couple meters before running into a group of idiot kids who thought it was a good idea to take a dip in the sub-60 degree water in bikinis and swim trunks. I had the following conversation with one of them:

Him: “Are you still cold even in your scuba suit?”
Me: “Yeah, this water is pretty cold.”
Him: “I’m freezing! How much did your scuba suit cost?”
Me: “It’s not a scuba suit, it’s a wetsuit.”
Him: “Oh…how much did your wetsuit cost?”
Me: “$650.”
Him: “Really? I only have $5…how much does it cost to rent a wetsuit?”

At that point I was thinking, “Screw you, junior, I’m not lending you my suit,” so I swam off and finished my miserable workout.

Race Day
The next morning we woke up and went downstairs to eat breakfast in the hotel’s dining area. I grabbed a bowl of cereal but upon looking down at it, I felt a sudden wave of nausea overtake me so I only managed to poke at it with my spoon and not eat anything. When we got back to our room I promptly threw up. Twenty minutes later I yakked again, barfing up water and foamy stomachy goodness. Jason looked at me with a mixture of empathy and disgust, asking if I was feeling okay and if I should race. I called Teresa for advice.

Teresa: “Was it something you ate the night before? Do you think it’s food poisoning?”
Me: “I don’t think so. If it were, I would have been sick last night.”
Teresa: “Yeah…do you think it’s nerves?”
Me: “Maybe. I’ve never had this happen before.”
Teresa: “Hmmm…you’re not pregnant, are you?”
Me: “Dear God, I hope not.”

(I’m not.)

I eventually managed to stop barfing and was able to choke down a protein bar. We got our stuff packed up and Jason’s parents took us to the IHOP for a pre-race meal. I ordered whole wheat pancakes but had no appetite and couldn’t eat any of them. Feeling miserable, I looked over at Jason and saw him with his head in his hands, looking exactly how I felt at that moment. We were jittery, stressed, and unable to eat.

After lunch, Jason’s parents started driving us to T1. Ten minutes into our drive, I realized that I had taken the computer off my bike the night before and had accidentally left it in my hotel room. I started to panic, thinking about how I needed my computer to check my cadence and ensure that I was keeping between 85-100 rpms, and that if I didn’t know how fast I was going I was gonna go insane. Jason’s parents said they’d go back and grab it for me and would try to pass it off to me when I got out of the swim.

I was already stressed about having puked twice and forgetting my bike computer when we decided to add “getting lost on the way to the race” to the mix. Since a ton of roads were closed because of the race, we had to take this ridiculous detour to get to T1. We finally got there, only to get yelled at by race officials that we weren’t allowed to get dropped off at the top of the hill where T1 was. Jason’s parents had to drive us all the way down to the bottom of the hill and drop us off at a park that was about 3/4 of a mile away from where we needed to be. I started walking up the hill with two armloads of gear, my heart pounding from the nerves, when I heard a far-off voice announce, “The transition area will close in FIVE minutes.” At that point I thought I was going to pass out from the stress.

Thankfully, Jason’s sister caught up to me and offered to serve as my gear mule, helping me carry some of my stuff up the hill with me. I got to the start and got marked in record time, then ran over to my bike and frantically began setting up my transition area and shoving anything remotely edible into my bento box. The entire time I was rushing and getting yelled at to exit T1, I kept thinking over and over how bullshit a 2 pm race start and two separate transition areas were.

Swim Summary
The race started but my wave wasn’t going for another 45 minutes, so I sat around and had the distinct pleasure of watching the waves get choppier and choppier due to the increasing winds and ever-darkening sky. By the time my wave rolled around, the reservoir looked like a washing machine on spin cycle.

Before it got choppy as hell, the water didn't seem so bad

Finally, we were off. Waves were hitting me from the right, which is the side I breathe from, so I immediately cursed myself for not following Teresa’s training instructions and practicing bilateral breathing more often. The swim was by far the roughest I had ever done — not only were there ridiculous waves and wind to deal with, but people were running into each other and throwing elbows left and right.

I managed to get to the first turn buoy relatively “quickly,” but it seemed to take eons to get to the second turn point. I later found out that it was so windy that the turn buoys were drifting further and further out, and the race volunteers were telling some swimmers to just forgo the big buoys to save time (they didn’t tell me this — effers!). I swam and swam and swam, and finally I dragged my half-drowned ass out of the water, having swam probably about .2-.3 miles more than intended.

Goal time: under 50 minutes
Actual time: 57 minutes (wind + waves + drifting buoys = terrible swim time, though I’m pretty sure I actually swam closer to 1.5 miles instead of 1.2)

T1
My T1 wasn’t actually that bad — I managed to bust out a 2:34 even after waddling over to Jason’s sister with my speedplay cleats to grab my bike computer from her and tap dancing the length of the transition area to the bike mounting spot. (I really need to learn how to hop on and off the bike with my shoes already clipped in — these thick bike cleats are killing my mobility.) I hopped on my bike, put the atrocious swim behind me, and started pedaling.

Bike Summary
Less than three miles into the 56 mile bike it started to rain. Hard. Really hard. Then it turned into a thunderstorm. Then it started to hail. I was a shivering, snotty mess. Every ten minutes I had to wipe snot from my face onto my tri shorts. My bike was soaked and sticky, and I battled slick roads, pelting rain and hail, and unforgiving headwinds the entire miserable ride. By the end of it my crotch and back were screaming at me to stop and I was actually looking forward to seeing downtown Boise. (I never thought that would happen.)

I was probably about a half mile away from T2 and pedaling as hard as I could when I saw a tiny squirrel shoot across the street. It let out a ridiculous squealing noise right when I got to it as if it anticipated its inevitable demise, but somehow the little bastard managed to escape death by race wheel squishing and barely got out of the way as I barreled down the street. Stunned, I uttered a loud “HOLY SHIT” and the person biking behind me started laughing really hard. (This is not the first time I’ve encountered a creature while racing or training — one time a furry black critter ran across my feet during a half marathon, and during a training ride I almost got hit in the face by a bat. I must give off some sort of pheromone.)

I finally got to T2 and breathed a sigh of relief. Now all I had to do was finish the run and I’d be done with this bullshit race.

Goal time: 3:00 to 3:10
Actual time: 3:19 (Slower than I wanted, but what can you expect when you’re biking through a goddamn thunderstorm. The bike course itself was relatively flat, so I imagine I’d post a better time in less inclement weather.)

Dropping off my snot-coated bike at T2

T2 and Run Summary
I busted through T2 in 2:17 and started the run. I packed socks in case I wanted to wear them for the run, but I’ve raced sockless before and haven’t had any issues, plus everything in my transition area was soaking wet so I figured socks wouldn’t help, anyway, so I ran out with naked feet. The first couple miles felt pretty good, and I was keeping a steady pace through the giant puddles with my wet feet and shoes. At mile 3 my shoes started to rub my feet in certain areas and my feet started to sting a bit. Each mile after that got worse and worse. I knew I had formed blisters and that they had probably already popped from the constant rubbing. Every step started to hurt more and more, and my run deteriorated to a Hillary Biscay-like gait (only much, much slower).

At mile 5 I stopped at a tree and took my right shoe off to assess the damage. To my surprise, the outer rim of my shoe was covered in blood and my foot was rubbed completely raw in two spots. I sighed, put my shoe back on, and limp-ran to the end of lap one. A volunteer was standing between the split (where you either run ahead and finish the race or turn to the right and begin your second 6.5 mile lap), and he shouted at me, “Great job, keep it up!” I stopped when I got to him and said, “I need medical.”

His smile faded and he said, “Okay, okay, we can get you medical attention. What’s the problem?” I told him that my feet were bleeding. He looked down, saw my bloody shoes, and said, “Yeah…um, I have band-aids. Will those help?” I said sure and he started fishing them out of his pack. Then he looked at me and said, “Do you want to drop out of the race?”

I kind of blinked and looked at him like I didn’t quite comprehend what he was saying. I survived a near drowning, rode a miserable 56 miles in the pouring rain, and just hobble-ran halfway through the run. All I had left was one more lap. Why the fuck would I quit now? I muttered a “No, I should be fine thanks byeeeeeeeeee” and ran off to begin my second lap.

The band-aids actually did help immensely for a few miles, and I was able to temporarily forget about the stinging pain and focus on running. My optimism was short-lived, however, and I Robo-Cop’d the last couple miles with a single driving force: medical. Unlike Thomas the Tank Engine’s mantra of “I think I can, I think I can,” the only word that repeated in my mind over and over again was “Medical. Medical. Medical. Medical.”

I finally lurched across the finish line, got draped with a space blanket and was forced to pose for a stupid finisher’s photo before a volunteer guided me over to the medical area.

Goal time: 2:00 to 2:05
Actual time: 2:17 (I hobble-ran a 10:30 pace, which isn’t too bad considering the state of my feet)

Time for Medical Attention
Jason caught up with me and gave an encouraging “Good job!”, then grew concerned when I told him that I wanted to hit up the medical area ASAP. I assured him that I wasn’t suffering from cramping or dehydration and just pointed down at my feet, at which point his mom uttered an “Ohmygod.” (I felt pretty bad-ass for eliciting such a reaction.)

We headed into medical and a volunteer came up to me and asked if I’d been helped yet. I said “No,” and she asked what the problem was. I pointed down at my feet and she went “Ewwww…by the way, I’m not a doctor, but I’ll get one for you.” I laughed and told her that I figured that either she was just a volunteer or she was a doctor with the world’s worst bedside manner.

Jason's sister's rendition of the medical area (where it was "athletes only")

The doctor/medical dude cleaned my feet with saline solution, burned the hell out of them with some sort of devil’s liquid, smeared some ointment on them and wrapped them in blue bandages.

It's a good look for me

My bloody shoes (the inserts are pink Superfeet, not bloody soles)

Bloody right shoe (the worse of the two)

After the Race
The funny thing about the 2 pm start time is that the race organizers wanted the finish in downtown Boise so the athletes could enjoy a “post-race party” downtown and eat, drink and hang out. This is a good idea in theory, but since the weather was apocalyptically bad, everyone finished the race and immediately began packing up their stuff to get the hell out of there and change into some dry clothes. Jason and I were no exception. I returned my race wheels and we gathered up our gear and headed back to the hotel (after making a stop at Wendy’s, of course).

Once I finished inhaling my burger, I stepped into the shower and serenaded Jason with a lovely slew of expletives and “MOTHER OF GOD”s as the hot shower water hit my raw feet and stung the shit out of them. We changed and headed over to Teresa and Mark’s hotel to hang out with them, drink, and, of course, scarf down more food. Naturally, Teresa had a kick-ass race and not only took 1st in her age group but was the first amateur female. She’s a mighty good triathlete. Mark also PR’d and did a sub-5 hour race, and Jason PR’d by 40 minutes and finished in under 6 hours. I, of course, brought up the rear and posted the slowest time in our group.

Goal time: low 6 hours
Actual time: 6:38

I’m pretty disappointed with my finish time. I really wanted to get 6:00 to 6:15, with the ultimate goal of hitting under 6 hours. I still managed to PR by about 20 minutes, but I think I could have done up to 30 minutes better if the weather were less ridiculous and if my feet weren’t bleeding. Oh well.

Final Thoughts
All in all, I think that Boise is a potentially good race that turned out pretty shitty for the following reasons:

1. The 2 pm start time. Like I said, a later start time is good on paper, but 2 pm is too late. I wouldn’t mind a race with a 10 am or a noon start time at the absolute latest, but when you start at 2 you have too much time to sit around and get stressed out and worry about everything that can possibly go wrong.
2. The two transition areas. Two transition areas is a pain in the ass. You have to run around the day before and make sure all your bags are properly packed and drop them off in different areas, and when you’re racing you have to make sure you don’t leave anything out or it’ll end up getting left behind. Also, Teresa learned the hard way that you can’t trust the organizers with your various bags of gear when she realized that someone had stolen her ring out of her bag. That’s pretty shitty.
3. The freakin’ weather. The Boise website summarized the day as such: “Participating athletes saw light rain for a majority of the bike and run course, with temperatures hovering in the low 70s.” That’s the most ridiculous euphemism for “torrential thunderstorm and 60 degree temperatures” I’ve ever seen. Granted, apparently Boise averages an inch of rain the entire month of June so it seems like we just had bad luck this year, but still, don’t frickin’ lie about how terrible it was.

I’d probably still do Boise again in the future, but only if they move the start time back to the morning. I can probably put up with the separate transitions and there’s a strong chance the weather has to be better than it was this year, but in my opinion the late start time was a failed experiment. I can’t say I had fun doing the race this year, but at least I learned a lot and can show off my war wounds to everyone.

Cut #1

Cut #2

Cut #3

Cut #4

I’ll probably try and do another 70.3 later this summer as a redemption race. Hopefully it’ll go better than Boise did. :)

Artist's rendition of me and Jason at the finish since we didn't get a picture together (I loved medical attention more than my boyfriend that day)

Lesson learned: If you have to share a lane with someone, make sure you hop in when he or she isn’t at the same end as you. Also, getting the swimmer’s attention and letting him/her know that you’re going to be sharing is a plus. (I recommend whacking the swimmer in the head with a water noodle, or maybe dipping your toe into the water and going “Yoo hooooooooo.” Or maybe not.)

Scenario #2: Sharing a Lane
Scenario #2 occurred when Jason and I arrived at the public pool near our house to do a swim workout. We showed up after work, so the pool was pretty packed. There were four lanes available: Easy, Medium, Fast, and Very Fast. The Easy lane had 2 swimmers in it and the other lanes had 4. Logically, Jason and I opted to go into the Easy lane because it was the least crowded. (Also, we’re slow swimmers. Don’t you judge us.)

We started our workout and eventually the woman in our lane left, leaving us with an overweight older man sporting baggy red swim trunks, gigantic goggles and some ridiculous pool accessories. His workout consisted of “running” up and down the lane, and he was quickly getting irate that Jason and I were swimming and constantly passing him. He got so irritated that he stopped at one end of the pool, glared at us for a few laps, and finally resorted to complaining to the lifeguard that we were swimming too fast for the Easy lane. Yeah, that’s right, Jason and I got tattled on by an old man who was jazzercizing during lap swim.

As expected, the lifeguard shrugged at the dude as if to say, “What the hell do I care?” Unsatisfied, the man waited until we swam back to his end and started whining to us about how we’re swimming too fast, dagnabbit! (If he had a cane he would have shook it at us.) Jason pointed out to him that this lane was by far the least crowded and that it’s not fair for him to hog a lane to himself just because he’s excruciatingly slow. They continued to argue back and forth (but thankfully refrained from angrily splashing each other), with the man eventually challenging Jason to guess how old he was. Jason’s response, logically, was “I don’t see how that matters.” Our swimming companion countered that he was sixty-something years old, and I’m not sure if we should have been impressed that such a “geezer” was doing a swim workout, guilted into respecting our elders and giving him the lane, or what. We kind of just stared at him until he finished his tirade and left the pool.

Lesson learned: If it’s lap swim hours and you’re using that time to NOT SWIM LAPS, you shouldn’t get pissed when actual swimmers who need to do a workout have to share with you (and repeatedly pass your non-buoyant ass).

Scenario #3: Infringing on Someone Else’s Space
I had the following conversation with my friend Matt over Gmail chat:

Matthew: last night at the pool there was a wait
so the protocol is you put your name on the whiteboard and you start waiting
and then as lanes free up you remove your name

Me: the pool had a wait?
you don’t share lanes?
what the hell

Matthew: nope, no splitting lanes. anyway, i ended up showing at the exact time that like 4 people started their swims
so I had to wait for like 25 minutes for a lane

Me: aw

Matthew: so as soon as my lane opened up, this fat old lady with giant space goggles walks out of the dressing room and plops into my lane
and begins to “water walk”

Me: hahaha
“Ooh, I’m really movin’ now!”

Matthew: so I walked over and said “you’re in my lane, that’s the whiteboard, it’s my turn, out you go!”

Me: haha, nice

Matthew: and she said “well the lane next to this one should open up soon”
so I just stared at her in silence for like 15 seconds until she got out of my lane and proceeded to go into the lane next to it
which had a swimmer in it doing laps

Me: did he get mad?

Matthew: he stopped swimming and told her to get out of his lane
so she went into the lane next to that one
which ALSO had swimmers
it was pretty funny

Me: geez

Matthew: you think she’d get the fucking idea and get out of the pool
and go sit in the hottub and wait like everyone else

Me: so how many lanes did she get kicked out of

Matthew: well, she finally got into open swim
which is the end of the pool that’s full of fatties with large goggles
so she was reunited with the herd
like a whale lost in the bering sea

Me: meeting back up with its pod
did she jump over a kid standing on a wall pumping his fist in the air?

Matthew: FREE FATTTYY
yeah, pretty much
normally i’m not one to make fun of someone’s weight
but if you steal my lane, i’m gonna insult your weight

Lesson learned: If your pool has certain rules, you need to abide by them. Also refer back to Scenario #2’s lesson about being respectful to actual swimmers doing an actual swim workout. Oh, and finally, don’t piss off Matt when he’s swimming or he’ll insult your weight.

I’m pretty sure our first swim was only 1200 meters, but somehow we managed to drag the ordeal out for almost an hour. In hindsight, I appreciate the fact that the lifeguards were able to keep their laughter to themselves. We both swam with our heads almost entirely out of the water, feet dragging under the surface, gasping for air with every single stroke. It was an exhausting ordeal, and quickly became apparent that we should probably seek out some guidance and try to hone our technique prior to our first race.

Over the next twelve weeks we participated in a triathlon swim training class at the Seattle Athletic Club that helped provide us with some basic technique, and took us from being humiliatingly awful swimmers to just being competently poor. During that time we practiced sighting, breath control, and even some simulated group starts. So, as we continued to practice my confidence slowly grew.

Here’s where it’s important to note the two distinctly different approaches Rebecca and I take with regard to our training. Where she tends to be extremely hard on herself and constantly question whether or not she is going to be able to accomplish something, I typically inflate myself into believing that if someone else can do it then so can I. As a result, in the weeks leading up to the race she had wisely decided to get in a couple of open water swims with our training group while I had come up with some excuses and quickly rationalized that “swimming is swimming.”

Fast forward to the day of my first race, the Issaquah Sprint Triathlon. We arrive at the race with plenty of time to setup our transition area. Rebecca and I were both fairly nervous because it was our first race, and I was suddenly becoming concerned about the fact that despite all of the in-pool training, I hadn’t done a single open water swim. However, after surveying the 400 meter course I was able to calm myself by talking through how ludicrously close each of the buoys looked to the shore. “400 meters is nothing,” I told myself. “I can do this in my sleep, open water or not.”

I confidently made my way into the water and prepared for my age group’s start. The gun goes off and I am swimming like I’m in the anchor leg of a 50 meter relay. It’s an all out effort the likes of which I’ve never put forth and I’m in the middle of a strong pack. Unfortunately, amidst my race day excitement and foolish bravado I’ve forgotten that I am NOT a very strong swimmer, and as my lungs begin to give out a sense of panic starts to set in. “What the hell was I thinking?” Now not only am I getting run over by everyone smart enough to go out at a sustainable pace, but I am also one-hundred-percent convinced I’m going to die before I round the first buoy. Somehow I manage to talk myself out of waving frantically for the nearest kayak and calling my first outing a “valiant effort,” and instead awkwardly paddle forward in a modified head above water crawl stroke so terrible looking that a kayaker still stops to ask me “are you okay?”

As I round the first buoy, probably not more than 50 meters in, I’m relieved to find that miraculously there are still a few people behind me. I now settle in for the long stretch parallel to the shore and decide that in order to regain my breath I am going to do the backstroke for a minute or two. So, for the next couple of minutes I transform into one of those zig-zagging d-bags that are almost universally despised (and that I would grow to hate in later races). I settle into a comfortable pace and am congratulating myself on not only regaining my composure but on almost being done with the swim when I hear some guy shouting “Hey!” Not wanting to ruin my flow by looking around I continue undeterred. But, upon hearing a second and much louder shout just a few seconds later I decide to see what is going on. I stop for a second to give an irritated look at the kayaker that has been trying to disrupt my mojo and notice he’s pointing in a totally different direction. Somehow in my swimmin’ groove I’d failed to sight the buoy and was now about 50 meters off course. Ugh.

So, I decide to bag the whole backstroke idea and go back to a more sensibly paced crawl for the remainder of the swim. The rest of the swim is pretty much a blur, as my internal voice kept wavering between a frustrated “I am such an idiot” and the more inquisitive “how could I be so stupid?” After what seemed like hours, but was actually a little under 12 minutes (still pathetic, I know), I emerged from the water looking like a defeated man and angrily trotted toward my easy-to-find bicycle looking incredibly lonely on its rack.

I hear this is how you're supposed to look when you come out of the water.

However, from my embarrassing amount of mistakes I was able to glean a couple of valuable lessons. 1) There is no substitute for practice, and 2) Stay focused on racing your own race. Following this disaster, I tried to get in as many open water swims prior to the next race, and quickly became more comfortable with the mass starts, pacing myself, and staying (relatively) on course. Although the end results have only been marginally better, they have been overwhelmingly less stressful.

I do still hate swimming, but take some comfort in knowing at least I was able to weather the initial storm and can forever brag about how I didn’t drown without even rounding the first buoy.