The North East Triathlon-turned-Rainathon - Sunday August 27th, 2006

On Saturday August 26th I drove two hours north up through Baltimore to the small town of North East, Maryland to participate in the North East Triathlon. The event was scheduled for a 1500 kilometer swim in the North East River, a 40 kilometer (24.8 mile) bike around Elk Neck State Park, and a 10 kilometer (6.2 mile) run.

I arrived at my first USA Triathlon sanctioned triathlon on Saturday around 4 p.m. in time for packet pick-up, to get my bike checked over, and figure out the course for the race the next morning. There was enough daylight left in the day that I got a chance to go out for a short ride and run to see some of the course before eating some dinner and getting to sleep early.

I awoke at 4:45 a.m. on race morning to the cracking of lightning and a raging thundershower outside my hotel room. It hadn't rained in weeks so why this morning of all times??? All of us staying in the hotel drove down to the race site where everyone was parked in the grass field turned mudslide lot and sitting in their cars hoping for the storm to pass. The race was scheduled to start at 7:30 a.m. so at 7:00 I decided to brave the rain and got my bike and gear and headed to the race site. It was still lightning so the race director decided to cancel the swim portion of the event and make it a duathlon - run, bike, and then run. It would be my first ever duathlon.

By the time of the race start at 8:15 a.m. the storm had passed and the sky had cleared. It turned out to be a beautiful day. I ran the initial 5K in 20:45, biked the 40k in 1:15:11, and ran the final 10K in 51:27 finishing overall in 2:30:26 good for 84th

place out of about 300 finishers. I was happy with my performance in my first duathlon but it was insane how many 40 year old women were flying by me on the bike. I am definitely getting fitter and faster and more and more addicted to the active lifestyle. It was a great weekend and I got to meet quite a few triathlon lunatics who I identify with too well. I can't wait for the Odyssey Half Ironman in Lake Anna State Park down in Fredericksburg, VA on Saturday September 16th!

Woohoo!!!