2012 Twinsburg Indoor Triathlon Race Report - Counts?

For about two years now.  I have flirted with the idea of doing a triathlon.  Even my bucket list is topped with the dream of doing an Ironman.  Why have I been dragging my feet?  Swimming.  I suck at swimming, I don't know what i'm doing, and I am very afraid of swimming in open water.  All these reasons make it easy for me to not hit the pool at the gym.  This year I have made more of an effort to include swimming in my workouts.  So, when my good friends Christian, Kristy, Jessica, and Mason signed up for an indoor Triathlon.  I decided it was time for me to give it a TRI.

The race was fairly simple.  Each segment was 20 minutes and you were to swim, bike, and run as much as you could.

Swimming
I had no real goal during the swim other than not to drown or embarrass myself.  I was in the first wave of racers and we shared a lane.  Thankfully, I was with another swim noob and I did a good job of staying out of her way.  I kept it fairly simple and used my for form of flinging my arms to propel myself forward.  I am still in the process of learning how to breath while swimming the freestyle stroke and only managed 300 yards in 20 minutes.

Bike
My plan was to attack the bike and make up for any points lost during the swim.  Fortunately, the bike measured the distance and I decide to go on the attack.  I went out fast with the intent to finish first.  Too bad myself and everyone else didn't realize the bike did not register anything over a 120 cadence.  This was easily achieved as the resistance was set waaaaay to low.  You were basically flinging your legs around in a circle and not riding.  I finished with a respectful 10.20 miles in 20 minutes.  Sadly,  I was only .01 from first overall in the bike.  Since there was a limiter on the bike, everyone had roughly the same distance.  The only difference being who was up to speed the quickest.  So, I did not make up the points I had expected.

Run
My goal was pretty simple.  Ease out of the rubber bike legs and run a solid pace for the remainder of the run.  I easily accomplished this and was only lapped by the speedsters Mason, Jessica, and Kristy.  I did 24 laps, which worked out to be 2.4 miles or an average pace of 8:20.  Not too shabby for not putting out a race effort on the run.

Summary
Well, I had a great time and I am looking forward to doing more Triathlons this year.  I have already registered for my next indoor race on 3/18 and joined the Cleveland Triathlon Club.  My biggest news is that I also invested in some private swim lessons.  I am pretty satisfied with how the race went.  I am just a little sad that I came within a couple points of placing in my age group.  I've never placed in anything yet and it would have been special to have done it in my first TRI.  On the bright side, I just want to do it more at the next race.  So, does this count?  Am I TRIBeal now.  No, not yet....but very soon.  I know how much harder it is to run and ride outside.  I can only imagine how much harder the outdoor swim mixed the other events will be.  So, I'm not considering myself a Triathlete yet.  The good news is that I learned that my brick workouts are paying off as I felt pretty great in the days following this event.

I also want to send a special congratulations to Jessica Bagwell and Kristy Hill.  Jessica placed 3rd in her age group and Kristy Hill WON overall female!!!  Great job and there first ever TRI too.  Big congrats!

Left to Right Mason, Jessica, Beal, Kristy, and Christian

BEAL