2015 Year in Review

December 2015

   Greetings and salutations this holiday season! I hope this note finds you well. For me, 2015 was another crazy year of travel and racing. I added to my lists of state attractions- 4 more highpoints for a total of 46; 7 more Capitols for a total of 40; and 4 more marathons for a total of 12.

   My Grand adventure of the year (pun intended) was to run/hike across the Grand Canyon, starting at the south rim, pausing at the north rim, and returning to the south rim in one day. Six Austin friends and I flew to Arizona in April for the 45-mile trek with 10,000 feet of vertical loss/gain/loss/gain. It took me 19 hours, starting at 4am and returning after 11pm. It was grueling, but it was also incredibly beautiful. The Grand Canyon is truly one of the greatest natural wonders of the world, and I would recommend everyone visit some day. Just make sure to go below the rim, it's a very different perspective than you can get standing at the top.

   I completed two more Ironman races this year for a total of six, but just barely. Ironman Lake Placid is a very hilly course, and I arrived in July undertrained. It chewed me up and left me for dead, but my feet just kept moving. When I finally entered the Olympic speed skating oval late that night, with less than 10 minutes to meet the 17-hour cutoff, and the crowd was whipped up and cheering for ME, it was by far the happiest Ironman finish I've ever had. Ironman Maryland in October was an ordeal of an entirely different sort. While I was en route for the race scheduled for the 3rd, I got news it had been postponed due to Hurricane Joaquin. Since I had a car and the time, I took a road trip to visit some points of interest. It was unprecedented and somewhat miraculous that Ironman was able to reschedule the race for two weeks later, so I flew back. There were fewer athletes and volunteers than there would have been for the original date, but the crowd and volunteer support were on par with any other I've done, which is to say it was excellent and did not feel like an afterthought. The course is pancake flat, but the weather was quite challenging with high winds and cold temperatures. It was bad enough the swim course had to be altered due to a small craft advisory for the Choptank River, making it dangerous for the support boats, let alone the swimmers.

   I made a trip to Utah in June to complete the "triple crown"- Capitol, marathon, highpoint. On Saturday the 13th I ran the Utah Valley Marathon, a point-to-point race that ends in Provo. Even though it's net downhill, there are a few uphill sections, and downhill is hard on the quads. I finished with my second-quickest marathon time yet. Sunday afternoon I started an overnight hike in the Uinta Mountains to Kings Peak, the highest in the state. It was roughly 30 miles of mud, snow, and rain all by myself. It was not the safest or most pleasant thing I've ever done, but that builds character, right? The three other state highpoints I visited this year were Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Vermont on two of my trips northeast for Ironman. The other state I did a marathon was Oklahoma, in November at the Route 66 Marathon in Tulsa. I also did my first ultramaration in 2015 as part of my training for the Grand Canyon, a 50-kilometer (31-mile) trail race near Austin.

   Other race travel was to Nevada and Oregon. At the end of February I made a return trip to the USA Stair Climb Championship, held at the Stratosphere in Las Vegas, but I also took a couple of days to see "Not Vegas." It was snowier than I anticipated, so I did not go to Nevada's highpoint, but I did tour the Capitol and visit Great Basin National Park. I went to Oregon to validate my "Just Plain Nuts" moniker and join in a 12-person 200-mile relay run from the base of Mt. Hood to the coast with one week's notice. It was the kind of craziness and sleep deprivation you gladly sign up for again the next year. Non-racing travel consisted of ice climbing in Colorado in January and two trips to Virginia, one in June for a Meister family reunion, the other for Thanksgiving.
   With a total of 43 timed events in 2015, I can't cover every triathlon, duathlon, stair race, trail race, and road race I did. I will, however, highlight two particularly interesting weeks, one in which I won three medals at two races, and one with three very different races (a beer mile, a 5k, and a stair race).
   Looking ahead, I plan to spend New Year's doing 4 races between Eve and Day, a 5k and a full marathon both days. I was unable to complete the "double-double" challenge last year due to injury and poor weather. I will be doing the Austin Marathon in February, a marathon in Hawaii in March, half Ironman races in April and June, and full Ironman races in August (Boulder, Colorado) and November (Panama City Beach, Florida). I also would like to hit the highpoints of Hawaii, California, Nevada, and Maine to finish the 50 states.

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year,
Michael

To keep up with all my news and musings, follow my blog, Facebook, twitter, and Instagram @mldarm.

Crazy Running Week (@FloBeerMile / #TRE15 Indie 5k / LWTDD / Decker Challenge)

Even for me, last week was a crazy and diverse week of running-related events. Starting with the FloTrack Beer Mile Tuesday night, The Running Event (a trade show) and its Indie 5k Thursday, a unique stair race in Oklahoma City called Little Willie's Triple Dog Dare Saturday, and concluding by cycling the Decker Challenge half marathon leading the 3rd place man. It has left me exhausted and sore, and upped my total number of timed events in 2015 to 40.

Superhuman Sunday #FastestManAlive #TourdeDonut

On November 1st, with the help of some tricks of time, I was able to run 7.4 miles in 5 minutes and bike 24.8 miles in 44 minutes. While it is actually possible for a human to ride a bicycle 25 miles in 45 minutes, that's either very rare talent or down a very big hill, neither of which I possess. Nor do I possess a time machine.
However, by leaving my house at 1:34am before the time change, running 7 miles and returning home at 1:39am, after the time change, I can claim to be the fastest man alive. Heck, at 88 mph, with a flux capacitor I could have actually travelled through time. Other than the trick with the time, it was a pretty normal run, just in the middle of the night. It was actually fun, and coming soon after a 3am run at Hood-to-Coast made me wonder why I don't run in the middle of the night more often. It probably has something to do with the sleep factor.
The trick with the bike ride, later in the morning after a few hours of sleep, was that in the Tour de Donut you receive a time bonus for donuts eaten during the ride. The ride starts near the "race director"'s house (this is not a formal event, just for fun and to raise a little money for charity) and stops at Krispy Kreme, Shipley, and Dunkin Donuts before ending at the top of a hill near the start. I didn't do nearly as well as I had hoped. I really would have liked to have ended up with a negative donut-adjusted time, but I didn't eat as many donuts as I had anticipated, and spent too much time eating them. My elapsed time was 1:55 and I received a bonus of 6x 3min (KK) + 3x 6min (Shipley) + 5x 7min (Dunkin). I did tie for the most number of donuts eaten, but frankly this was a much less competitive year than last, with past winners absent. It was a kind of beer mile level of awful fun. I, for one, do not intend to even touch another donut until next year's race. I'm not sure if (or how) I'll train next time, but I'll at least try to beat my first time.

Ironman Lake Placid

I'm not an emotional person. Heck, I often think of myself as a robot. I have something akin to "resting bitch face." I do smile, but usually it's to appear human when I meet someone else's gaze, or so my race photos look okay. If you saw my album of race photos, you might say I always look good, but (a) I've only posted the ones I thought were good and (b) I probably posed myself for that photo to some extent when I saw the camera operator. Even at Ironman, my smiling finish line photo is a put-on, because I'm more happy to be done than happy to cross the line. In contrast to that, my finish line photo at Ironman Lake Placid in July is the truest, deepest smile, possibly in my adult life. I first witnessed the frenetic energy of the final hour of an Ironman two years ago, on the spectator side of Ironman Wisconsin. For my money, it's the best party on Earth. So at the end of a grueling, shredding day, when I entered the finish chute at 11:32pm, on the Olympic speed skating oval, and my name was called, and the crowd went wild FOR ME, it was the most joyous moment I could ever imagine.
Of course, what "allowed" me to finish in the magic hour was a gruelingly long day getting eaten up by the brutal hills of the Lake Placid course. So just to officially finish, with less than 10 minutes to spare, felt like just as much of an accomplishment as any of my four previous Ironman finishes.

TX Marathon Relay / Kerrville Tri

In what will likely stand as the most decorated week of racing of my life, in one week's time I finished first, second, and third in my category at two different races. The first and second were as part of two teams for the car2go Marathon Relay in downtown Austin, and the third place was for the sprint distance triathlon at the Kerrville Triathlon Festival. Specifically, first in the corporate engineering division for my company team, second in the open mixed division for my race team, and third in the men 35-39 age group.

Hood-to-Coast Relay

I don't like some of the connotations of the term "bucket list." I am very much a list obsessive, and I do have lists of things I would like to do "some day," mainly races and mountains, but I don't want to just tick boxes or do things because "you have to do them." While I have done plenty of things to tick the box, I always try to make the most of the experience, and make it an adventure if it's not interesting enough on its own. If I were to lose interest in completing a list, such as visiting all the State Capitols, I would shelve the project and focus on things I'm more interested in. Furthermore, it's not like I will ever complete my bucket list; much like the hydra, when I check off one item, two more take its place.

Which is a long way to go to say that I have wanted to do the roughly 200-mile (it varies a little year-to-year) 12-person Hood-to-Coast Relay for a while, but hadn't actively pursued joining or forming a team. Several friends of mine, along with other Austinites and their friends, have done the race in years past. When two of those friends were injured, I put my name in to fill in. Someone else took that spot, but Saturday 8/22, less than a week before the race, another team member had to drop out, and my friend messaged me asking if I could jump in at the last minute. After checking that flights were reasonable, I had to check with my boss that I could take two days off of work on such short notice. With approval, I booked a flight and became the final member of the Fat Cheetahs.
The logistics of Hood-to-Coast (HTC) are daunting. I studied what I could before the race and still hadn't the slightest idea of how it would work. Molly, the team organizer, is clearly some organizational wizard to forego the already complicated standard scheme of two 6-person vans and devise a 5/7 rotation scheme. I don't know the history, maybe this was pioneered by someone else, but it's still hard to wrap my head around even after having been through it. I can't possibly explain the mechanics, but it works out to the "off" van having 5 people and the "on" van having 7 people, one of whom is running. Add onto that coordinating the arrivals and departures of 12 team members, it's way more than I would ever attempt to coordinate.
Beyond the individual team logistics, the HTC organizers have a crazy task to assign every team a start time from 5am to maybe as late as 5pm on Friday. They must have some huge pool of data they use to estimate everyone's leg time based on their stated 10k pace, then come up with an estimated team time which they use to have everyone finish within a certain time frame. Essentially, the slowest teams start earlier, and the fastest teams start later. We were assigned a 1:15pm start time.
All 12 runners, plus Molly (who didn't run this year) and her son, drove up to Timberline Lodge a little before 1. Mt. Hood looked significantly different than last time I was up there, for a Christmas-day climb in 2013; there was very little snow on the mountain. I watched the 1 o'clock wave go off, wandered around a bit, then the team gathered up to cheer our first runner off at 1:15. At that point, van 1 was "active" and went to exchange 1 for the handoff; I started in van 2 and we went to exchange 3 to hang out for a while at a convenience store. The fact that leg 1 ends at exchange 1 further confused things, but at least we had time to figure things out before the fatigue and sleep deprivation set in.

Before the rain started and before the traffic jams, pretty much the whole active team went to watch/cheer the transitions. Let's just say the enthusiasm waned a bit once the rain started overnight. From then on through Saturday, the traffic got so bad at the exchanges the van didn't always have a chance to park before the exchange happened. Several times the next runner had to jump out of the van just to be at the exchange to meet the incoming runner, and didn't always get a chance to take that potty break they wanted.
I was runner number 7, so I ran legs 7, 19, and 31 at 6pm Friday, 3am Saturday, and noon Saturday, respectively. The race organizers grade every leg based on distance and elevation profile, and my legs were 5.4 miles moderate, 5.8 miles "very hard," and 4 miles moderate. I'd say the grades were fairly accurate, though with the very hard leg being in the dark in the middle of the night, it didn't seem that bad. I haven't done a lot of night running, this was definitely the longest, and I kind of liken it to my also somewhat limited trail running experience- that you have to run more by feel than the watch, and you'd better not be looking at your watch. I didn't find it that bad running on a very dark small road in the middle of the night, I reckon almost every car on the road was part of the relay. My biggest problem with that leg, beyond the dark and the hills, was the tilt to the road. Whether it was deliberate for drainage or just that the road is old and in poor repair, the left side of the road, where we were running, slopes decidedly to the left. I developed a blister on my left foot during this leg, and I think it was due to that foot being "downhill."
The race has somewhat arbitrary rules on safety gear- every runner from 6pm to 9am has to wear a reflective vest with lights and carry a flashlight or headlamp. Since my first leg started just before 6, I had to wear the gear even though the sun was still well above the horizon, and I was wearing sunglasses. The vests also carry an "ick" factor, since they are always sweaty when a runner finishes their leg, and we didn't have enough vests for everyone to get their own. I did bring my own headlamp, however. Apparently it's a lot brighter than other peoples were. The headlamps of some of the people I passed in the night were so overpowered by mine, it didn't even seem like they were on.
There is a thing in this race about "roadkill," that is passing another runner. Some teams had "kill counts" ticked off on their van, this wasn't something our team was tracking. I didn't keep a close count of the people I passed, but it was somewhere around 20 combined for the three legs. On my first leg, our van passed as I was passing another runner and the driver had his phone to take pictures or video, at which point the woman gave a dejected "Aw man, kill in action." I was passed something like 6 times. It wasn't until my last leg (with an almost a hockey stick profile- long flat shaft, then straight up the blade to the finish) that I got "chicked" as I sputtered up the hill.
Between breakfast Friday and dinner Saturday, I didn't have a real meal nor any real sleep. The vans were loaded with snacks, so I didn't go hungry, but due to the time constraints and having to run every 8 hours, it just wasn't possible to have a regular meal. About the closest I got was Saturday morning at an exchange that was serving breakfast. I got pancakes and eggs, but I only ate about half of it before handing it off to a teammate. Theoretically we could have gotten a decent nap from about 10 to 2, when our van was off, but it just wasn't working for me. We were in the parking lot of a high school, and exchange point. The school was set up with showers and cots or something like that for sleeping for a few dollars, but those who had been there before did not recommend it. With 5 people in the van moving around and such, plus other vans coming in and out, I could not sleep. The irony was that I did fall asleep for about 5 seconds when we were driving around before we got to the school. Later in the morning I was so exhausted I was desperate for even a moment's rest to "reset." Fortunately I managed to sleep for a few minutes at one of the exchanges before my last leg.

The weather was apparently the worst this race has ever had. The finish line party had to be cancelled because all the tents got blown down in the wind. The worst of the storm was around 4:30am, shortly after my leg ended. I could see some lightning way off in the distance when I was running, but only got rained on for the last half mile, and not too badly. Mary, who ran the next leg, got the worst wind and rain. The lightning was very close, and she described the rain as just going sideways in front of her eyes. There was some drizzle when I started my leg, plus it was cold, and I was worried about dumping rain and being cold, so I ran with my light rain jacket on, but took it off within the first mile and left it tied around my waist. The rain got heavy again around 10am, and I was worried I would have to run in the rain, but it cleared up and the sun even came out not long before I started. My shoes did get wet from the wet road, but it wasn't too bad. There was a long stretch of road that was covered in leaves, plus an occasional branch, brought down by the storm.

The wind was still pretty strong on the beach later in the afternoon, to where you felt sandblasted. Since I finished in van 1, and was the last for that van, once I was done, we went straight to the beach house. We had a chance to shower, eat some pizza, and relax for a while. At 4 we went down to the beach to see our last runner, Hans, in to the finish. I think he was pleasantly surprised to see us. Because he had been running with his head down so his cap kept some of the sand out of his face, I don't think he saw us until he was to us, at which point we all ran the last 100 meters to cross the finish mat together.
All in all, I had a great time, it was a lot of fun, and I would do it again. Although next time I would plan it more than a week in advance and fly out Monday instead of Sunday to get a little more time at the beach.

Jack's Generic Triathlon

I slowed down this year at Jack's Generic Triathlon versus the past two years, but I'd say I have a pretty good excuse- I barely survived Ironman Lake Placid one week prior. Actually, my swim and bike times weren't bad, to my surprise, it was just the run that was really slow. My swim was two minutes quicker than last year (my time from two years ago is messed up, plus the course was slightly different), my bike time was 30 seconds slower than 2 years ago, which was three minutes slower than last year, and my run was a good bit slower than either. Other than the relatively slow time and a massive blister, it was a pretty fun morning with my "triathlon family."

Couples Triathlon

Third time is not always the charm. My third time doing Couples Triathlon was my worst. Not my slowest (I was a little slower in 2013 right after Denali), but my worst. My overall time was only two minutes slower than last year, but the swim was cut down to 500m this year from previously being 800m. But really it wasn't just that I had a terrible run that made it the worst, it was that I got such a bad calf cramp in T2 I was actually limping later in the week.

ALA Dallas Stair Race / Lake Pflugerville Tri

For me to do two races in one weekend is hardly unprecedented and not that ridiculous, particularly considering the combined time was less that 1.5 hours. To do two races in two cities, one week after running a marathon and hiking 28 miles to the highest point of another state, is why they call me "Just Plain Nuts." After getting back from Utah late Tuesday night, going to work Wednesday through Friday, I drove to Dallas Friday evening. I went to Dallas for the postponed American Lung Association Fight For Air climb, now moved to the Reunion Tower (site of May's Heroes Memorial Climb). After that race I turned around and drove back to Austin for packet pickup for Sunday's Lake Pflugerville Triathlon. I would say I had a decent showing in both events; I definitely felt the previous week's exertion in my legs and maybe more so in my cardiovascular system, not having truly recovered.

The Rookie Tri

My third time doing the Rookie Tri was my slowest yet, but I have a pretty good excuse. Whereas last year I did this race a day after doing a 100-mile bike ride, this year I did it one week after a 45-mile hike/run across the Grand Canyon and back (aka Rim-to-Rim-to-Rim or R3) in 19 1/2 hours. Considering my quads were so sore I could barely walk down stairs the two days after and a bad blister on my left big toe hindered walking on flat ground, that I was only 30 seconds slower is pretty good in my book.
After getting home late Monday night, I did some light workouts through the week. A bit of swimming and biking was fine, but the two attempts at running did not go so well. I didn't manage more than a couple miles, and not a very good pace. I picked up my packet on Saturday and my only goal for the race was to have fun.
When I set up my transition Sunday I made the unfortunate discovery that I didn't have insoles for my running shoes. That's definitely something I should have checked after barely getting over a bad blister. I briefly considered doing the run barefoot or use my only other footwear- flip flops. I decided the shoes would be the best option, and hopefully it wouldn't be too bad for two miles. I was feeling a little pressed for time, but kept running into friends and had to say hi. I had plenty of time in the end, and of course I like seeing my friends, but I was a touch frazzled.
Like most triathlons seem to be doing, this race has changed from a wave start to a time-trial start, so there was some clear water at the start, but even over 300 meters there's plenty of overtaking. I didn't really pay much attention to the other people in the water other than a bit of a pileup at the second turn and again at the exit. My swim time was slower than slower than previous races. I would say it might be because the swim exit timing mat was closer to transition, rather than being right at the water's edge, but that would mean I was slower getting on my bike because my T1 time was slower as well.
Somehow I had my best bike split, however. I'll give credit to my fancy bike and to chasing my friend. This was my second sprint tri with the bike I bought from a pro triathlete after Ironman Wisconsin last fall. I'm sure its aerodynamic advantages over my old bike make a miniscule difference over 11 miles, but it is lighter which does make a difference on a rolling course. My friend David passed me as I was getting strapped in coming out of transition, but didn't just zip away like every other race. I actually caught up and passed him briefly before he passed again. He never did get too far ahead of me, and psychologically dragged me along with him.
My run was my slowest yet at this race, but I amazed myself by running a steady 8-minute pace for two miles. I did get a small blister on my left instep, but it hasn't been problematic.
I hung around for quite a while after the race, long enough to see a few friends and teammates get awards. I could have used a nap in the afternoon, but wound up going to my friend's house for a post-race party.

CF San Antonio Run/Climb / Natural Bridge Caverns Trail Half Marathon

After two weekends of disappointing racing, I had a good weekend of back-to-back races in San Antonio, very unlike each other, and both a little different than anything I've done in the past. Saturday was a stair race, but starting with a 1-mile run (actually it was a little short due to construction); Sunday was a half marathon but on trails and a fair bit of elevation, a bit steep in a couple spots. I finished 17th overall in the combined run/climb, but I was ninth quickest on the stairs, a far sight better than last week in Dallas. While my time Sunday of 2 hours even was a little quicker than two weeks ago at 3M, the course was probably a mile short, so it would have been slower; it still was much better in that I put in a consistent effort throughout the race. While my weight hasn't dropped appreciably, it has been trending in the proper direction. Altogether, I feel this is a good indication my fitness is finally heading back in the right direction.

3M Half Marathon Race Report

If the 2015 3M Half Marathon went poorly for me, I really only have myself to blame. Arriving super late, just before the start (and being in the port-o-potty line when the gun went off) was obviously my fault, as I somehow got it in my head that the start time was 7:30 and only realized at 6:15 that it was actually 7am. I certainly can't blame anyone else for my lack of training that led to a slow time and sore legs; this race was only my fifth run of 2015, and was twice as long as the next longest. I could attempt to blame lousy weather and allergies for the lack of running, but that's just an excuse. Plenty of other people were out running in the same cold rain and with the same cedar fever. I'm not sure I could have fully prevented the horrible blistering I got on my left foot, but I could have taken steps to mitigate it. If I had been properly prepared, it would have been a good day for a good race- the weather was mid-forties, sunny, with mostly favorable winds. As it was my 2:03:43 just barely cleared my lowest performance benchmark- quicker than my best run in a Half Ironman (a 2:05 at Galveston 2014). I finished in 2493rd place, which means I probably passed 3000 people since I started almost at the back of the 5485 recorded finishers. If you add up the number I passed miles 0-4 and mile 13 and don't subtract the number that passed me miles 4-12 it could be substantially higher.

Monster Mash / Atlantic City Marathon Double

If you read my previous post about my road trip to Ironman Wisconsin, I hinted at having something a bit crazy planned for my next state highpoint. Well, after I decided to try and do a marathon in every state (roughly the time of number 3), I started looking for fall marathons, particularly anything within reasonable proximity of a state highpoint I hadn't done yet. I wound up focusing on Delaware, since it's a super easy highpoint and it's something of an outlier on a map of completed highpoints, being surrounded by states I've already done. I found two marathons quite close, the Monster Mash Marathon in Dover, DE, and the Atlantic City Marathon (New Jersey). I wasn't sure which I wanted to do, and then I realized since Dover is on a Saturday and AC the next day, it would be possible to do both in one trip. I floated the idea in my head for a while, ran it by my running coach, put it out to my Facebook friends, and essentially couldn't come with any reason NOT to do a double. I figured if I can finish an Ironman, there shouldn't be any reason I couldn't do marathons on consecutive days. So the weekend of October 18-19 added two tick marks each to three state lists- marathons, highpoints, and Capitols (bringing me to 7, 42+DC, and 32 respectively).

Kerrville Tri Race Report

For my last triathlon of the year, I once again went out to Kerrville for the "Triathlon Festival," two days of racing with three distances. However I flipped the scripts from last year and raced the sprint on Saturday and volunteered for the half/quarter on Sunday. The reason I didn't go for the half was that being three weeks after Ironman Wisconsin, I had no idea what shape my body would be in. Of course I couldn't do the quarter if there was a longer distance on the same day; regular readers will know my crazy wouldn't allow for that. I like to commit to events well in advance, so this was all set in place well before Wisconsin; I feel I've recovered enough that the half wouldn't have been so terrible, but still not advisable. I actually offered to run for a relay team, but they didn't wind up taking me up on it. While I had a decent day two years ago doing this half 5 weeks after an Ironman, it was probably best not to race today.
As for the race I actually did- in a word, it was sloppy. More the weather than my performance- it rained the entire race and I finished with a time of 1:19:12, good enough for 4th in my age group and 20th overall.

Capitol Cruise (Road trip to Ironman Wisconsin via ND highpoint)

Way back a year ago when I volunteered for and signed up for Iroman Wisconsin, I didn't have a plan for how I would get there. Eventually I decided to drive, since it's "only" about 1000 miles from Austin. Some time after hightpoint #40 in December, I started looking for excuses to go to the rest of the state highpoints. For fun, I added White Butte, North Dakota's highpoint, as a waypoint on the route. When I saw it doubled the mileage, I laughed it off as a crazy idea. If you've read my blog, you might know that a certain brand of crazy is sort of my stock in trade. My original plan for race week was to volunteer for TriRock on Monday, go to work on Tuesday, and drive straight from Austin to Madison on Wednesday. When the idea of stopping by White Butte creeped up in my mind, it almost seemed sillier to go to work for one day than to take off on a road trip. Of course once I was already going to be in the Dakotas, it was only natural that I would also stop at the state Capitols. Watch this space for my next crazy adventure cooked up around another highpoint.

Jack's Generic Tri Race Report

Today was my fourth Jack's Generic Triathlon, the second since the venue was moved and an intermediate distance (1000m swim/26-mile bike/6-mile run) was added. Overall I was 4.5 minutes slower than last year for a time of 2:34:46. The swim was different this year but otherwise the course was the same. I'm pretty sure the slowdown is because I went 3 minutes quicker on the bike, leading me to be almost 7 minutes slower on the run.

Couples Triathlon

I recently did the Couples Triathlon my second time, and cut 9 minutes off of last year's race. This time the race was two weeks after Ironman Coeur d'Alene and further proves that it's better to train for swimming, biking, and running than just being at altitude (having been hiking at 20,320 feet 9 days before the race last year). This time I paired up with a friend of a friend for the "couple" aspect; we finished fourth in our category (of 23) but would have been second (of 2) in the "mostly strangers" category if we had gone for that category instead of "friends (co-ed)." Of particular note is that this is the first race of the season I've averaged less than 2 minutes per 100 meters in the swim. The previous 4 (from 300 meters to 3800 meters), I've averaged around 2:10. This swim may have been shorter than the advertised 800 meters, but even for 750 meters my average was just under 2 minutes per hundred. Perhaps most interesting, to me any way, is that I set a PR on the Strava segment that makes up the bike course, a course I have ridden many times, most recently during the Rookie Tri.

Lake Pflugerville Triathlon

For perhaps the first time in 2014 (I didn't check that thoroughly), I set a new personal best at a race. I did set marathon and 70.3 bests this year, but those were both races I had never done previously. It may have only been 12 seconds, but it was still nice to beat last year's time at the Lake Pflugerville Triathlon, for a 1:11:27. Quick race stats (these exclude the open wave): I was 13th of 71 in my age group; 53rd of 678 overall; 51st guy out of 396 total men; 161/32/85 ranking for my swim/bike/run splits.

Ironman Texas / UK / Autism 8k / CapTex Tri

In a characteristic whirlwind week+, I spent more than 20 hours volunteering for races and more than that on airplanes. Starting with Ironman Texas, flying to the UK for a company conference, and coming back to volunteer for the Autism Speaks 8K running race and CapTex Triathlon, it was pretty exhausting.

Shiner GASP / The Rookie Triathlon

In what now seems almost "normal" to me, or at least not surprising to anybody, I did a 100-mile bicycle ride on Saturday, and a super-sprint triathlon on Sunday. I had done the Austin-to-Shiner ride twice before, but last year (which I didn't do) they changed the route a little to make sure it was a little over 100 as opposed to being slightly under 100 with the previous route. I hadn't bothered to look at the route map, so I was unaware of this; if I had realized I would have stopped at the last aid station and not pulled into the brewery desperately thirsty. Even after lots and lots of water that afternoon and evening, I was probably still a little dehydrated Sunday morning. While I felt like I did reasonably well at the Rookie Tri, I was a minute slower than last year. Plus my sweat seemed particularly salty.