Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Triathlon Update: T Minus 25 Days

First of all, I don't think anyone reads this blog other than perhaps my father and two brothers. But I have these persistent delusions of writing grandeur, so I'm gonna pretend like my readership is both numerous and interested.

...

It's 25 days until my first Olympic distance triathlon. I've been training consistently (for the most part) for months. And I've been training, what feels like to me at least, pretty darn hard for the past several weeks... about 2 hours a day. You know... swimming, biking, running, core workouts, even some weights when I can sneak them in. (This commitment, by the way, is nothing but a warm up to real triathletes.) You may recall from my previous triathlon update, I have been experiencing some amount of angst about my upcoming race. I think the term I used was "suffer fest".

However, all of this effort from yours truly has led to a significant reduction in my terror threat level. If I may borrow from our government's simplistic terror advisory system:



I am proud to announce that my triathlon terror level has been reduced from SEVERE (red: a severe risk of an embarrassing flame out) to HIGH (orange: a high risk of an embarrassing flame out).

Further, I am ready to cautiously predict that by race day, August 16th, my terror level will be reduced to ELEVATED (yellow: an elevated risk of an embarrassing flame out). This will only hold true if I keep my sweaty nose to the workout grindstone.

However, please keep in mind that at any point situations may change on the ground and/or in the air that may call for a rapid increase in the threat level. We'll just have to stay vigilant, keep our eyes open, and put our faith in our higher power.

In the meantime, I'd like to make a time prediction. This is usually a bad idea... predicting one's race time -- throwing down the gauntlet with such precision. But here goes:

1500 meter swim: 42 minutes
transition one: 4 minutes
24.8 mile bike: 1 hour, 32 minutes
transition two: 4 minutes (predicting a port-o-let stop to pee right about here)
6.2 mile run: 1 hour, 23 minutes

Total time: an underwhelming 3 hours, 45 minutes

There you have it. Place your bets. I'm tired... I'm gonna hit the rack now.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I predict a 37 min. swim due to a rush of adrenaline and fear.

transition one:2 min. to tie shoes plus 2 minutes to find pink bike with tassels.

24.8 mile bike ride:1 hour, 22 min.
transition two: 12 minutes to pull bike seat out of ass, plus another 2 min. to pee due to porta-potty-stage-fright.

6.2 mile run- 1 hour, 28 minutes
Total time. An awesome 3 hours, 45 minutes!!!!

Anonymous said...

"First of all, I don't think anyone reads this blog other than perhaps my father and two brothers."

Not true. I read your blog daily.
-W