2008 Scofield Triathlon

I woke up early on Saturday and drove to Scofield for the 2008 Scofield Triathlon. I had heard it was an awesome race so I pretty excited to see what everyone was raving about.

The swim started off perfect. Not too many racers which means I only got kicked in the head a couple of times and the water was amazing. I felt good throughout the mile swim even though I hadn’t swam laps in a month or so. The swim was a double loop around the buoys and I did my first lap (half mile) in just under 14 minutes. The second lap took about 15 minutes to finish so I ended up with around 29 minutes for the mile swim. I was pretty stoked because 29 minutes is a PR for me. I averaged 1:40 per 100 meters which is not too shabby for a mile swim.

The first transition was pretty slow because I couldn’t get my biking gloves on. I really need to work on my transitions. The bike started out great except about 3 miles into the course some guy drove up next to me and told me I was going the wrong way. I ended up going about 5.5 miles off course and decided to just try to convert it into 25 miles instead of biting the bullet and going 31 miles because of the mistake. Also, my leg was cramping up so I didn’t want to go the extra mileage. After telling a race judge I turned my bike around at almost the right point and actually ended up going a little bit longer than I needed to. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to place so I wasn’t too worried. The rest of the bike went great and I ended up with a 1:17 split time.

The run started pretty bad as it usually does. The worst part was the first 200 meters which had a crazy incline. My legs already felt like jello so it just made them feel even worse. The weird thing is that not only did they feel like jello but also big heavy stumps at the same time. It took about 2 miles for my legs to feel normal but after that I felt good. The last half of the 10k felt great even though I wasn’t going to fast. The funny thing is I always question in my head why I run these triathlons during the run portions. It always seems to hurt the most during the run so I just try to forget the pain and think about how good it will feel when it’s all over. I can only imagine how much it will hurt when I do my first full Ironman.

The last .2 miles of the 6.2 were probably the longest I have ever run. I swear it was an extra mile. I saw a lady biffed it hard right in front of me with only .1 miles to go. Her body just completely gave out and she landed pretty hard on the pavement. Thankfully there was a lot of people there to help her including some encouragement from us racers.

It felt so good to finally be done. I finished with an official time of 2:52:33 which is a PR for me. It would have been better if I hadn’t gone the wrong way on the bike but I was satisfied with my performance. I found out later that If I would of ran the sprint distance I would have ended up 2nd overall in my age group for sure with a good chance at taking first. Oh well, maybe next time I will be smart run the shorter distance. I also got to see my good friend Mike Merrell at the race which was a nice surprise. It was his first tri and he did awesome! I highly recommend the Scofield Triathlon for anyone that wants to race it.