Wellington Starter tri 19th Nov

Well , i decided to do the Wellington Starter tri at scorching bay, it was a easy 600m swim , cycle 24km and run 5km , all on a flat course. I was decidedly nervous about racing as my wrist is still a problem nearly two months on and i have only done one sea swim . ( not to mention the new wet suit i just bought )

I the day started with me picking up Sam at 7am, it was funny see the remains on the Saturday night life with mildly sobering guys walking home . We one of the first arrive, the bonus with this that we got a very good park . I had to have three goes at the actual park has i decided to reverse into the park

I think my next milestone was getting into the wet suit ... this is very "fitting" item of clothing. It seems to attracted a lot of man handling to get the suit on correctly . So my advice to "single" tri guys is to get good at putting on wet suits and you don't where your hands could be required .

One of the highlights for this event was the ramdon visit of pod of Killer Whales aka Orcas ; http://www.flickr.com/photos/clairemoava/304806490/ and has my flirk comment say's "Ocra is also a brand of wet suit in NZ, so there also alot of ocras on beach " , but the competitors were not the same size of course .

So tri are executed in the following order swim , cycle and run . So first up was the swim . This is the discipline i am at least practised at and i have only swam in the sea afew times in my recent history . I decided to just take my time as i know i can swim until the cows come home. In the turn home one of the girls kick the rope around the bouy and its all over for me with my limited eye sight i started to panic when i could not see the buoy or Sam ... So my swim time wasnt the best . I got to transition and had afew moments LOL .

The best leg . the cycle ; http://www.flickr.com/photos/clairemoava/304806488/. I loved the open road with my beautiful bike and even a bit of sun struggling though the weather beaten clouds . It wasn't my best time for 24 km , but it was middle of the road and left of the white. I did enjoy cycling past the priest and waving , she was was surprised but i got a big smile..

Homeward bound - the run to the finish . I found this a bit boring has we were running over part of the cycling course and we did this loop twice too . . But there was an interestedly funny marshell on the turn around which kept me entertained .

My times were ... i was happy with them but i pretty down the food chain in the order:

Total: 01:30:59
Swim: 00:14:17
Cycle: 00:49:12
Run: 0:27:30

I am thinking i need to :

• get some swim swimming lessons (mr_ginger is taking me on Sunday)
• swim once a week, at least
• getting more running in (take 2 mins off that time)
• cycling is ok , just getting back on road bike wil see 5 mins off that time .

I am wanting to do the xterra event in April, to bet my time from last year . 1 km swim , 30 km MTB and 11km run. So i need to do another before then huh ? . There is local one on 1st April , but maybe another before then ?.