YMCA Indoor Triathlon - March Race Report

While I did not bring home any hardware with me from the YMCA Indoor Triathlon, I still was very happy with my performance.

A quick refresher: They started holding these indoor triathlons at my local YMCAs last year and in that time frame, I've earned a full set of medals - bronze, silver and gold. It's set up with an 8-minute swim followed by a 10-minute transition before a 22-minute bike. After a 5-minute transition the event ends with a 15-minute run.

So the swim. Yes, I admit. I've been slacking in the pool. Slacking as in today was the first time I dipped a toe in the water since the last indoor triathlon in mid-January. Oops. So I was winging it. And apparently winging it means dealing with goggle malfunctions during the first few laps and realizing how much swim endurance I've lost. Oh well. I took it slow, fixed the goggles and managed to finish 325 yards in 8 minutes. Not my best, but remember, winging it.

The bike went well. Nothing too surprising here. Legs were feeling pretty good and I was sweating buckets. Kept my cadence in the 120-125 rpm range the entire time and snuck in a bit of time in the 130 range. Finished 10.1 miles in the 22 minutes.

The run. Oh my gosh. Looking back I'm not entirely sure this was actually me running. Yet, this is why I'm happy with my performance today. Here's why. The seven of us in my wave lined up at the starting line and the timer yelled "GO." They all took off, leaving me in the dust. Yes, I was in a speedy group of folks. And remember, me? Not so speedy. So I ran. But I pushed myself. I wanted to run at my pace, but I also wanted to push myself and not get too far behind. I was running hard. But at the same time, I wasn't struggling. The faster pace? It felt good. A mile was 12 laps on the track we were running on, so when I finished that 12th lap, I glanced down at my watch.

9:29

Huh?

I just ran a 9:29 mile? During the first mile of a run during a triathlon? And I had already gone for a run this morning (more on this later)? Is my watch malfunctioning? Because I don't know if I've ever run that kind of mile?

I shrugged it off. Kept running. Kept running at that faster pace. And I still felt good. I was getting close to the number of laps I needed to log 1.5 miles and I glanced down at my watch again. I still had 2 minutes left. What was happening? Who is this runner and what did she do with Badgergirl?

I ended up running 18.75 laps in the 15 minutes. And assuming my math is right (math was never my strong point), that's just shy of 1.6 miles. As in, I was running at less than a 10 minute/mile pace during the run portion of a triathlon. And I wasn't dying. I felt good.

I like it.

So maybe I didn't walk away with any hardware this time (the organizer said my 30-39 age group was stacked and we were all right in that 11.5-12 total miles range), but I'm pretty happy with what I did during that run today.

Made me a happy Badgergirl and got me thinking, who knows what could happen this year.