Post 400: A First

My sister Amy impresses me on a daily basis. She works full-time, is a wife, a mother, a sister, and a great friend. On top of all this, she does crazy things like triathlons and marathons. A couple months ago, she talked me into doing the Grand Haven Sprint-Distance Triathlon with her. So for my 400th blog post, I'm going to tell you about my first triathlon (mostly because none of you came up with a brilliant idea for a blog post, though I was tempted to hunt down that bird that attacked me).

All of these photos are by Amy's husband, Craig, a wonderful brother-in-law and triathlon coach!

Here's a shot Craig took of Lake Macatawa while he was waiting for my husband to pick him up from their rented cottage to come watch the triathlon. This is actually much lighter than it was when Amy and I headed up to Grand Haven.
Amy and I arrived in Grand Haven at about 5:50a on Sunday, July 12. The transition areas closed at 7:15a and we wanted lots of time to prepare. Amy showed me how to set up my transition area with my towel, shoes, etc. We headed down to Lake Michigan to get ready for our swim start.

By the time the swim started, Amy and I had both gone to the bathroom about 5 times. I'm sure you wanted to know that. But a nervous bladder runs in our family. I questioned my sanity about 100 times before we plunged into Lake Michigan at about 8:15a.

The swim was okay, though I was about half-way through the 500m swim before I truly felt comfortable. It's really, really hard to "swim" when there are 50 other people kicking and flailing around you. Luckily, it thinned out after a while and I took the outside track to avoid feeling like I was going to run someone over.

Exiting the swim, there was about a mile run to the transition area. Uphill. Amy and I had stashed some sandals at the beach so we wouldn't have to run barefoot or try to put on our shoes when we were still soaking wet.

The picture below is me running up from the beach, getting ready to transition to the bike. This picture breaks my picture rule number one: never take a full-length picture of self in bathing suit. But I had already run past 100 people in just my suit, so there wasn't much dignity left anyway.

Amy was right behind me and ran up to transition out of her wetsuit to her bike. I decided not to wear a wetsuit because I hadn't trained in one, and for a native Michigander, the 65 degree Lake Michigan temp was plenty warm.

Here's me on my bike, ready to go the 20k down Lakeshore Dr. and back. Also breaking picture rule number two: never be photographed in spandex.

Amy looking fabulous on her bike!

Here's the transition from bike to run. I had just dropped off my bike and was starting the 5k run along the Grand Haven boardwalk.

Amy starting the run. Look at the muscles in her arm! She looks so hard core.

And finally. Finally! After 1 hour, 46 minutes, and 29 seconds of swimming (running), biking, and running, I run down the finish chute.

Amy running down the finish chute. We were all cheering her on, and at one point, I might have yelled, "This is all your fault!"

The happy triathletes:

My brother-in-law Steve, Tammi, Kent, me, and Amy post-race. Thanks to Tammi and Steve for coming to cheer us on!

I won 2nd place in the Athena Division. Athenas are women 155 lbs and over who registered as an Athena for the race. There were only 5, people, so don't be too impressed. This is me getting my trophy.

Overall, the race was pretty amazing. It went better than I could have imagined. My goal was to finish, but another goal was to finish under two hours, and I kicked that goal's butt by coming in at 1:46:29.

Again, my sister Amy is amazing and I'm so glad she talked me into this triathlon. I would not have been able to do it without her. Also, her husband Craig (an Ironman!) was an amazing coach and photographer. Last, but certainly not least, my hubby was and has been my biggest fan. He's been calling me "champion" since the triathlon and as soon as we got home, he took my trophy and put it up on a shelf in our living room.

So. Who wants to do my second triathlon with me?