My first title defense: The Traverse City Triathlon

Last weekend we headed up to TC for some fun, training, and to race one of my favorite triathlons. We love the TC area, the bays and hills are beautiful. The beer and food is great. Mix in some friends and you have a Michigan Awesome weekend!

We arranged for some quaint yet Spartan accommodations thanks to JR's dad, in a very convenient location. We were two blocks from the beach and a third of a mile from Front Street. We had a lot of fun relaxing, sitting on the beach, etc., as well as an awesome training swim in the bay on Saturday morning while Ronda SUP'ed. Packet pickup was a disaster, having to drive to Bowers Harbor just to get race numbers, etc. was one thing, but then there weren't enough volunteers and the line was crazy long. In a field. Under the scorching hot sun. We decided that instead of complaining that we should just volunteer, a few of us walked up and eased the bottlenecks. Before we knew it, the line was mostly gone and the race directors showed up to help.

That's when the following exchange happened..."hey, you're the guy from the athlete guide! Thanks for helping us out." All joking aside, I did get put on the athlete guide, and my silhouette "graces" the event t-shirt along with the Half-Iron finisher medals. Pretty cool! I was glad we were able to help and being chosen to be the "Jerry West" of the Traverse City Triathlon is an honor and awesome. Thanks guys!

So taking my celebrity status less than seriously, we began to wonder as defending champion why I didn't get the #1 bib? Fuel for the fire, though I don't think that highly of myself, it's just a little thing. Apparently there was a little trash talk in transition on race morning, which is fine. I love some competition. I happily helped some newbies set up their transition space on race morning and focused on having fun, regardless of outcome. There's of course a serious side that comes out once the race starts, but being relaxed and laughing is a great start to race day. After a PB&J PowerBar (seriously tasty!), I ran for a few minutes, got some warm-up strokes in, and then it was go time.

Wow, the swim was choppy. Great practice for a few weeks from now. I lost JR's feet about 100 yards in, but found 4 other guys who were holding a nice pace. I tried to stay with them the best I could, not knowing who was "just a good swimmer", and who was a real threat. I practiced my shorter strokes and kept breathing (I have a bad habit of holding my breath even though I turn to breathe). Before long, the bottom came back into view and it was up the boat launch and into transition in 5th.

I ran past JR in T1, knowing he swam 5.3 miles on Saturday and was probably beat already, offered a little encouragement, and got to it. Wetsuit off, shoes on, helmet on, grab the bike, go!

What I didn't know as I mounted my bike and headed off for the hilly 12.4mi ride was that I had actually passed all 4 guys ahead of me in T1! So I rode like a mad man. I flew by tons of duathletes and Olympic distance competitors, but no sprinters. About 6 miles in, you ride down the center of the peninsula.  Here it was super windy and it was all I could do to stay upright and going straight. It seemed as though the wind was coming from both sides, just jolting you around. Thankfully it isn't a long stretch and I was down to the final couple miles. Surprisingly, I was so focused on trying to catch whoever was in front of me that I never looked at my watch to see that I put down a PR sprint distance bike split over such challenging terrain. I was having a great race!

T2 was quick. My "real competition" did an OLY relay instead, and was in transition waiting for his team. A little encouragement from him as I slipped on my Saucony A6s and I was off.

The run at the TC Tri is special. It's more trail run than most would like, but it's a unique touch that keeps things interesting. I bolted down the road and settled into a comfortable rhythm. As I passed the first aid station, the volunteers shouted out directions for the other distances. I asked, "Sprint?" To which they replied, "Oh, right here! You're the first one!" I honestly thought I was still chasing someone, my parents and Kristin made no mention of it, which had scared me into thinking that maybe I didn't even stand a chance. Oops. Turns out I would have more than a 4 minute lead off the bike, which widened to nearly 6 minutes by the finish. I tried to not let up though, embracing the suck. Finally the finish was in view and I cruised in for what might be the course record time!

I had a great race, all of the disciplines combined were great. Last year I got lucky. I guess this year I got lucky, too, with Kyle not racing. I couldn't have done it without some amazing support though: my parents, my friends, my bride and Ironmate, Michigan Awesome, and of course PowerBar's great lineup of sports nutrition!

Next up is the MITI full-iron relay, featuring JR's swimming skills, my ability to suffer for 5+ hours on the bike, and Timmy's FIRST marathon (sucker!). Looking forward to it! Until then, keep dreaming!

Fremont's "West Michigan Tri"

Back to Fremont after a year hiatus and another attempt to win this race! Would Jimi show up and make me bridesmaid again? Before we get to that, let's talk about my lovely bride...(not Jimi!)

Kristin vowed to try anything once, triathlon included, so this is the one she agreed to do. She at least needed to experience what it's like to be on the other side of that mesh fence, and she might as well get it over with. Race morning was cold, rainy, and less than enticing. Thankfully, the rain cleared up and the temperature was great. Otherwise I think I'd have been in big trouble! We got our stuff set up I transition and Kristin had a veteran racer racked right next to her to help her out (haha). We walked through the major steps of the race again and took off on a short warm-up run. We both munched on the new PowerBar Harvest Energy Bars before the race. They are so good! We both highly recommend them.

We actually got put in the same wave, so that was cool. So were Jill and Jill, and a few other friends of ours. As we were lining up on the beach, I caught glimpse of a face I recognized from swimming USS a long time ago. I decided that I'd draft off of him on the swim and see where the rest of the race sorted out. I said good luck to our group of friends and lined up on the front. The horn went off and we were out into the water and around the first buoy in a matter of seconds. It's a short swim! Off and around to the second buoy, just trying to stay on the feet in front of me. All of 2.5 minutes later, we were on the beach and running into transition. Kristin's swim would take longer, apparently the first buoy turned into a log jam and people could barely swim. But she survived.

T1 was a blur, found my bike, slammed my shoes on, clipped my helmet, and ran to the exit. First out of T1, barely.

The bike was going to be fast for about 80% of the course, due to a ripping wind. We climbed the first hill out of transition and to our shock, there were no course marshals directing traffic. I was in the process of re-passing the leader (had some trouble clipping in...), and couldn't see around him. Turns out there was a car right but all he could yell was "ah!". Thankfully the car slowed from the crawl it was already moving at and no one got hit. Keeping that in mind for the rest of the race, at the next stop I actually stopped and ended up having to wait 10 seconds or so for traffic to clear (despite there actually being police officers at the intersection, they were all chatting on the gator atv). Thankfully, I still had a decent gap and managed to build on it over the bumpy roads. Then we turned into the wind for 1.5 miles. The longest, bumpiest 1.5 miles in recent memory. I just put my head down and tried to find a solid rhythm. Finally, the route turned back to a well-sheltered cross wind and I flew back to transition. Kristin would later complain about how windy it was, yet she managed to knock out a 16+ avg on a hybrid bike, despite only riding 3 times this year!

T2 was in and out. Flying dismount on the bike, shoes slammed on, visor in hand, and gone. As I bolted out of transition in my bright orange Saucony A6 shoes, I heard the volunteers telling the next athlete where to dismount. I probably had a 45 second lead.

Good thing I knew where I was going. The course was not very well marked and not all of the volunteers were at their corners yet. In fact, I followed the truck that was dropping them off. Still a great grassroots race though! I kept looking back to see where the next racer was but didn't see anyone. For a moment I almost let up, but remembered that there could be someone in wave 2 and forged on. I had a great run, thanks to some inspiration from Mrs. Jones (positive vibes), the minivan driver who nearly killed me in a crosswalk (angry vibes), and thinking about how Kristin was doing the same race (positive vibes). After what seemed like an eternal stretch, I came around the corner to the final straight, zipped up my Michigan Awesome kit, straightened my PowerBar visor, and cruised across the line with a big smile.

After waiting 7 minutes and stalking every finisher to get a glance at their race number (numbers determined race wave), I could be certain that I took the overall win, FINALLY! I walked back up to watch Kristin finish, she did great. One of her fastest 5k runs yet (if not the fastest, she doesn't really track that sort of thing)! Congrats to her, we'll see if we can convince her to do another, though she vowed against it. Also, great races to all of our friends as well. You guys did awesome.

Thanks to my dad for coming up to support the two of us, JMast too. A nice post-race lunch at Spanky's pizza, a local favorite, was well deserved!

Next week is TC Tri, so I'll post up another update next week on that. Time to prepare to defend my title there...keep dreaming!