I would like to say that the first week served as a wake-up call for me and that I leveraged the experience that the training team offered – I didn’t.  I did go out and get a bicycle (the one in the picture on the last entry) but even there I was foolish.  A sane person would have sought out advice from the coaches and training captains.  Oh hell, a sane person would have at least gotten a road bike.  Me, being me, decided that I didn’t need a road bike and that a hybrid street bike would work.  The hybrid is a cross between a road bike and a mountain bike.  It tries to be both and manages to be neither.  In truth, I used it for all but my last two races and have used it twice in races that called for a mountain bike (and yes, the downhill dirt trail sections were really “interesting”).

Each week did get better with regards to the organized training sessions.  Within a couple of weeks, I was part of the elite swim group which was nice.  With regards to the team bike rides I would fluctuate between the middle group and the slow group.  Depending on who was leading the group and who was in it.  When it came to the track practices I was the anchor for the “slow & steady” group but I wasn’t alone at least.  For me, whenever I had tried to run it was an incredibly solitary event for me.  Since the practices were held on a track even though I was slow there were always people around me.  Mostly it was just them passing me up but at least told me I was doing great (there was always lots of encouragement).  I did find someone who had a knee injury so we ran and bicycled at about the same pace.  Lousy for my self-esteem that I was the same speed as someone injured but it was nice to have company.  As good as I was doing with the organized training I was an epic failure at training on my own.  I managed to get out on solo bike rides maybe once every 3-4 weeks.  Worse I never even tried to run on my own, something that would remain constant in my training pretty much up until two months ago.  Just remember, stubborn and stupid go hand in hand sometimes.

My favorite part of training was about 3 weeks before the race they held a “practice” triathlon out at Half Moon Bay.  It was a real triathlon in all respects except for a timing clock, vendors, PA announcer and parking issues, but we did have adoring fans.

I had a great swim that day even if I had to use the TNT provided wetsuit (seemed that my surfing wet suit had shrunk while hanging in the garage – seeing a trend yet).  Nothing like putting a fat guy in wet suit that has a brand name of ORCA.  Apparently, the irony of it was lost on the in-shape crowd. Getting back to the story, I was the first one out of the water (did I mention I had a GREAT swim that day).  I will admit I lolly gagged around transition until my running partner came in from the swim so we could head out on the rest of the course together.  We finished the ride in about the middle of the group and headed out on the run course.

After being passed by what felt like EVERYONE she asked if I thought we were last.  I looked over my shoulder and saw one of the training captains running about 30 feet behind, carrying a stack of cones.  He was picking up the markers off the run course since we were the last runners – bit of a spirit killer I admit.  Like all the TNT training staff he was awesome.  He got this huge grin on his face and yelled that we doing great.  He did close the gap and jogged the rest of the way with us.  I have to admit having people with you does make being DFL (dead freaking last) better.  Next time it is the real race day!!