An Important Weekend

Taking a break from the current thread of posts about our house sale, I thought I would highlight another significant personal event coming up this weekend. On Saturday, I will be competing in my first ever sprint triathlon, The Caine-Halter Sprint Triathlon here in Greenville.

For those of you with visions of me running on the lavabeds of Hawaii (as depicted on TV) let me explain the sport of Triathlon. There are three major categories when it comes to triathlons; Sprint, Olympic, and Ironman. Most people tend to think of Ironman triathlons when they hear the word "triathlon." An Ironman is a 2.4 mile swim, a 112 mile ride and a 26.2 mile run. An Olympic varies but is in the range of a 1500 meter swim, a 25 mile ride and a 10k (6 mile) run. The Sprint is all different shapes and sizes, but the one I'm doing Saturday is the shortest I've seen; a 300 yard swim, a 9 mile ride and a 5k run. And while it may be short, it will not be easy.

I've been training for about 4 months for this, but basically started
from scratch. I was a new cyclist, my endurance for running was back to coach-potato status and I have never been able to swim more than 10-15 feet without stopping. And while I have some concerns about Saturday, I am as ready as I'll be and am starting to get excited (and anxious) about the event.

I said earlier that I am competing. If you were to see me during the event, you might question that statement, but competing is exactly what I'm doing. Not as much against the field, but against myself. My goal is to finish the event and to finish strong. I am thinking that 1 hr. 45min is a manageable target, but the bottom line is that I want to finish.

We'll see what happens. My training is completed, all that's left is the competition. Game On!