If You Can't Get a Good Finish, Hope for a Good Picture...

Raced in the Real Xterra off-road triathlon at the end of March, which was a hard season-opener. Half-mile swim, 16 mile trail ride and four-mile run. I'd never done this race or this distance in a mountain-bike tri, so I couldn't set a goal time. (Mountain biking is slower than road riding.) My pre-season goal was to try to qualify for the Xterra National Championship by earning points in four series races, but I knew I'd be reevaluating the likelihood of that after this race. Reevaluation complete - I'm still a year or two away. I finished 16th in my age group, and the top 15 earn National Championship points. I'd hoped to finish better, but can't be disappointed. I raced as hard as I could, and wouldn't have been able to finish this race last March 30. In fact, I didn't enter this race a year ago because I knew it'd be over my head. So that's progress, and that's what this is all about.

A couple of good things happened. One, there were photographers on-course, so I finally have a decent (and recent) race photo. Two, although the swim started badly, I kept at it and had a decent final leg. (First open-water swim of the year, so I'm not surprised I wasn't comfortable despite having more pool laps under my belt this year than last.) And my lake will be warm enough for training soon.

 

Would have represented in my TriSports jersey, but the XL is on backorder. Hope to have it for my next event either mid-May or early June. In the meantime, there are miles to be logged...