Race Report: Tri for the Cure 2009

Pre-Pre-Race: So with all the travel I've been doing, I've been getting a lot of reading in, if not a lot of working out. I'm almost finished with the book Mindset, which is written by a woman who has spent her entire career in Psychology studying the effects of failure on people in society. What she's found is that there are two different mindsets - the fixed mindset, and the growth mindset. If you're reading my blog, I'm sure you know by now that my time sensitive, ultra planning, super efficient, perfectionist self - well I am the definition of a fixed mindset. I am what I do, not WHO I AM!

I've read people with the growth mindset - people who take (enjoy?) set backs and use them as challenges and opportunities for growth, and it's always inspired me, but I can't keep with it, because damnit, I wouldn't be perfect then. You can say this book has been a game changer for me, and you would be right.

So, with that said, I went into this race woefully unprepared, untrained, having done zero swimming, little running, and even less biking. Was I terrified? No. Nervous? No, I can't say that I was. I said "What the hell? I paid $100 for this race, at least I can have a good time, right? We're curing cancer here!" So that's what I did. Shockingly I had a way better time than normal!

Pre-Race: The race was at Chandler High, which was oh- less than 10 minutes away. I think I'm in love with this race solely because it's so close to my house. :) We had to get into and out of transition before 6am. I showed up at 5:15, AFTER Lilac, which shows you that I wasn't worried about the time. In fact, I set my alarm for 5am, so I just got up and got in the car.

We set up, and because our race didn't start until 9:13am, we went home, and went back to bed. Literally. Lilac jumped into the princess' bed, and started sawing wood, and I decided that was a good idea, and followed along.

We got back up at 8, and were feeling incredibly unnervous. We got dressed, checked our stuff, and left for the race. We parked across the street, and went to see the sights. We snuck into transition to put our clothes in our bags, and checked out people who were already racing. This is such a fun event because it's all women, all for a good cause, and frankly not a lot of "athletes". I felt entirely comfortable walking around in my bathing suit and swim cap. So did every other lady out there. It was a rare day that was judgement free. We all need a day like that to celebrate being women.

So, about 5 minutes before the race, Lilac and I got into queue, and started putting on our swim caps. We actually both put our caps on with our nose plugs in our hair. We took them off, found our plugs, and started over. Mine was not staying on my nose, but I kept messing with it. The funny thing was that I was so intent on getting my nose piece on, that I didn't even really care that we were quickly moving up in line. Before I knew it, Lilac was shoving off the wall, and I was 15 seconds behind her.

*Note, Tri for the Cure start times go by age. In order for us to race together, Lilac had to be aged up a couple of years. The people running the race knew what happened and didn't seem to care. Neither do I. This race is about being together.

Swim: Again, I've done no swimming. The pool was the perfect temperature, and incredibly clean. It was a good 50 meter pool, and we were to swim 8 snake laps, meaning that we hit the wall, went under the buoys, and swam up to the other end of the pool where we'd hit the wall swim under the buoys. It was a 400 meter swim. As part of my new growth mindset I decided that it wasn't necessary to pass Lilac, just to show that I could. This was about us doing this together, so I had a very leisurely swim. I lost my nose plug in the water about halfway through, and wasn't worried about it all. I just plunged back in. When I caught up with Lilac, I decided to do a nice easy breaststroke, because it was slow enough that it didn't make her feel like I was all over her feet. As always the first 200 stink mentally, and then you get in the groove.

12:13, which is at least a minute slower than last year, and I couldn't have cared less. It was 29th of 44 25-29 year olds, and 25th of 43 in the Athena division.

T1: We trotted all the way to our bikes, which were as far away from the pool as you could be - they were assigned spots. However, the ladies around us had been very nice, and all of our stuff was laid out perfectly, as it had been at 6am. Bra, shirt, skirt, socks, sneakers, sunglasses, helmet, (moisturizer, deodorant, those little gummies, and a bit of water) and we were off! Transitions were untimed in this race - yeah!

Bike: The bike was 8 miles, two loops of the city block from AZ Ave to Chandler Blvd, to Alma School Rd, to Ray Rd, back to AZ Ave. Alma School was a beast with the wind pounding down, and likewise AZ Ave was like rolling downhill - it was quite fun. Aparently my brother drove by during one of our loops - he noticed the running skirts - but smartly decided not to honk, and prevent the freak out, spin out incident. The cops were cheering us on, there were plenty of ladies that passed us, and again, I passed no one, but eventually I'm going to figure out the secret to biking. Until then, I'll just keep cheering people on, and enjoying being out in a beautiful day!

45:38, 41 out of 44 age group, 37 out of 43 Athena. So hey at least three other people (including Lilac) don't know the secret.

T2: off with the bike, off with the helmet, more gummies, more water, feeling good!

Run: The run was a great course. One mini-block traversed twice, small enough that we could easily see each corner. Then you get into the stadium at Chandler High, run around the track and finish off with a bang. I'll admit that the travel weariness/lack of fitness caught up with me a bit here, but I hardly noticed, because we were having so much fun! The volunteers were rocking, we were dancing to the music in the stadium - the Dirty Dancing song was great, if you had seen us doing the mashed potato and the twist while we were running. Great times! At the end, they announced us, we crossed the finish hand in hand again, and got some great pink ribboned medals, and best of all the coldest water I've ever consumed. It was perfect for a 95 degree day.

27:08, 39/44 age group, 33/43 Athena. Go me!

Overall: 39th of 44 age group, 34th of 43 Athena, with a total time of 1:24:59. I enjoyed every minute!