The Finish Line

I hate endurance sports. So naturally, my first exercise goal of the year was to complete a sprint triathlon.

Now hear me out — there was reason to this madness. As much as I love playing sports, I’ve never been awesome at any of them. I absolutely hate running, and go biking maybe once a year. It’s also been a couple of years since I lifted anything heavier than my backpack. The only sport I potentially have an advantage in is swimming, even though the only real competitive experience I’ve had was a year on the JV team in high school. So clinging on to the hope that I still remember the proper form and that other people may suck even more than me, I signed up for my first triathlon.

Being the type A competitive person that I am, I started recruiting. First a couple of friends who’d done sprint triathlons before decided to join, and pretty soon I had a group of 10! That’s how awesome and amazing my friends are. Now that there’s competition, the pressure’s on. I set up a 12 week training
regimen that was pretty intense:

Of course I didn’t follow it. I promptly twisted my ankle the second week and took the entire week off to recuperate so I can snowboard over the weekend. But somehow, I did manage to commit to some form of exercise 5-6 times a week.

I’d been running since December, although my pace was still at a slow 9:30 minute per mile on flat ground. I bought a bike in November, and during my second ride (in 3 months), I managed to flip over and land on my shoulder on Golden Gate Bridge (I blame the tourists). I didn’t have a lap pool to swim in, but did get a couple of swims in at my friend’s apartment complex.

Meanwhile my already very fit friends were also getting Gung Ho with their training. Strava can be extremely depressing when your friends are running at least a minute faster than you! Then work started, and I didn’t waste any time signing up for my gym membership. Spin class! Strength training! And most importantly, pool!

March was challenging for my discipline given the start of work. It took some adjustment, but I realized being a morning person working with engineers (where the day pretty much starts at 11AM for most of the team) has its advantages. I soon settled into a morning routine where I go to the 6:30 or 7:30AM class and still manage to get to work by 9AM, before anyone else gets into the office.

Two months passed by pretty quickly and we started talking about open water. Being a diver, I never really thought too much of swimming in the ocean, until people reminded me how dirty and cold the Bay is. I rented a wetsuit from Sports Basement for 30 days, fully expecting to hit the water every weekend at least once. Well, I made it to practice exactly once.

They weren’t kidding about the cold, but what’s worse is the visibility. You can’t see anything in the water, and when you add in the current, I’m swimming in zig zag lines towards nowhere in particular. Breathing took a while to control, and after a while I just gave up trying not to drink the dirty water. It was only a quarter mile swim, how many micro organisms (and pee/poo/other dirty things) can I possibly ingest?

Then the day came. It was the Saturday before Bay to Breakers and of course, I procrastinated on making my costume until Friday night. After putting half of my costume together, I started packing for the race, and was too excited to sleep. Being the experienced racer than I am, when I got up at 5AM, I somehow thought it was a good idea to just ride my bike to the race location? Not only that, my rear tire was almost flat, making the 5 mile ride just a bit more strenuous.

When I finally got there and found a lovely mechanic to pump some air into my tire, I realized I left my race bib (pinned to the tank top I was going to wear for the run) at home. After debating over whether or not to Uber back and get it, I decided that I had enough numbers on me already. It was also a cold and windy day, so I ended up wearing my long sleeve the entire race anyway.

The start of the race was super hectic. I don’t really remember what sound prompted it, but all the women just started running towards the ocean. I stayed to the far side of the pack, scared that people might kick me in the face if I were in the middle of the pack. The buoys seemed so close from shore, but just didn’t seem to get closer. I got tangled in the ropes around the first buoy, but thankfully didn’t get too off course. At this point I already lost track of everyone else, and was basically driven by adrenaline.

The first transition was slow. I grabbed some energy gel and water, changed, and took a while to get on my bike. Since we were doing three loops, I saw most of my friends during the course, but couldn’t figure out how far apart we were in time since we were in different groups. Due to the disorganization of the race, there was no traffic control which made crossing the street pretty treacherous, and a significant portion of the route was full of potholes, and I was super scared of getting another flat tire. When I finished my three loops, I had to stop because I couldn’t figure out where to go. Lost a few more seconds there.

Getting off the bike, my legs were pretty much dead, and people were passing me left and right. I set a goal to catch this one girl in front of me, but she just left me in the dust 🙁 The route was another loop, and when I saw a couple of girlfriends on my way back and realized that I was ahead of them, I got a bit more excited and started sprinting. That lasted for about 30 seconds. I managed to make it to the finish line where my guy friends were already waiting and cheering, and the feeling was absolutely exhilarating!

We found out the results a week later and I was pleased to find out I did much better than I expected. So despite all my whining about never doing another endurance race again, I’m thinking about signing up for an Olympic distance one next year 🙂

The best thing about the race wasn’t about beating people or my own expectations, or even finishing the race. Through setting a goal and following through, I managed to establish discipline for myself, and change my lifestyle for the better. Everything else was just icing on the cake!

So, anyone want to join me next year? 🙂