Strawberry Fields Triathlon Junior Elite Cup

Dad and I flew to Los Angeles, CA on friday morning and drove an hour through horrible traffic up to Oxnard, CA for the Strawberry Fields Triathlon. The top two juniors would qualify to go to the Junior ITU World Championships in Australia in September, and although i missed out on these places, i am still very pleased with my result and the experience.

Race morning the water was freezing, about 60 degrees, and there were swells from 3-6 ft. Everyone expected the swim to be rough, and sure was! The first 5 minutes of the swim was really rough, considering getting through the first break of waves and getting kicked in the mouth as we were swimming around the first bouy. After that i made my way to the outside and passed as many people as I could only to find myself leading a gap from the four front swimmers about 20 sec ahead.

I rode a lap of the bike alone until i was caught up by a chase pack, that worked well together for the most part. I made sure to stay safe going around the 180 degree turn.

The run played out much better than last weekends race in Clearwater. I stayed somwhat controlled for the first lap and then just let it rip the second lap of the 5k. I caught about 3 guys in the second lap and finished strongly in 7th place. I was really happy with the result considering i ran much faster off the bike than in clearwater. I also overcame some obstacles in the swim to come out of the water in 5th. Overall it was a good race, and a great experience.

Watermelon 5k and MPM triathlon

Its a been a really hot and humid summer here in FLA. Race morning of my 5k proved to be no different. At the starting line i saw alot of familiar faces of high school kids i had raced a couple years ago. It was a fun race, i tagged along the back of the front pack for a while until i got dropped and then just waited for the 2 mile mark to pick it back up again. Although it was really hot i felt decent and was able to run about 15 seconds off my best time.

The following weekend i woke up at 3am to drive an 1hr and 30min down to Cleawater Beach to race the Morton Plant Mease Sprint Triathlon. Last year the race was cancelled due to bad weather so i was excited to compare my fitness now and that of 2 years ago. At the starting line i thought of an ITU swim start and how fast you need to take out the swim, so i practiced that here and was succefully first to the first bouy and first out of the water. The long run to T1 was painful considering the cobblestones we had to run over. I tried then to get into a rythmn on the bike so as to not loose so much time to Spencer and avoid getting caught by Lucas, who proved strong on the bike and run. Coming off the bike i gave it everything i had on the run for the first mile and then succumbed to overheating, and lack of nutrition, i finished the race in 5th overall which was not bad considering i dropped 6 minutes off my time from 2 years ago.