Race Review: Black Bear Triathlon

First race of the season is done with! And unlike other years it was an awesome experience, which is very surprising considering that I feel the most out of shape this year but maybe I'm not in as bad condition as I thought...yippee for me.

Leading up to this race I have been struggling with breathing and being able to get my heart rate up while running and when cycling hard. My bike time trials have been significantly slower, like 2-minutes over an 8-mile course and running has just been dreadful. So needless to say I expected nothing to be pleasant about this course.



The Black Bear Tri is hosted by CGI Racing (http://www.cgiracing.com/) who do an amazing job of hosting an event. There were absolutely no glitches within this race and we started exactly at 8:00am. The only thing that I would have liked differently was to have mile markers on the bike course because idiot me has lost the Garmin charger and had no way of knowing where I was on the course. Black Bear takes place in the Poconos of Pennsylvania which is super hilly with lots of twists and turns on the descents. At first I thought I would totally suck on such a hilly course because I am so used to dragging behind Luke who cranks up hills. It turns out I did really well on the bike course and only had 1 woman pass me. Once I entered transition I just focused on breathing slow and easy. I did not want any chance of hyperventilating and not being able to pull it together for the run. So off I went at a nice easy trot. I kept a consistent pace and my legs felt strong. There were times when I was telling myself to pick it up but freaked out once my breathing got a little out of control. So I maintained a good pace and a good attitude. My overall time was a 2:50which sounds slow but everyone's time were way slower on this course so I was really happy with my finish. I was 7th in my age group and 21st overall female. Not bad for still feeling sluggish and out of shape.
Next race up is a sprint distance at our local pool which means a yucky indoor pool swim but this race has always been a challenge for me so I am looking forward to racing hard. I will be continuing to work at tempo running during my training so I can gain back some confidence when having to run hard.
It has been super hot in the Northeast which has made training great. I love the HEAT! That's all for now.

Swim 20.20 (3rd fastest female)
Bike 1:25
Run: 1 hour and 25 seconds
Overall time: 2hrs, 50min, 35 seconds