To Tri or Not to Tri

A rally was held today in the general vicinity of my left calf; I can hear the Gastrocnemius and Soleus shouting slogans like “Down with the knee!  Down with the heel!”  My right calf is responding in kind, although in a subdued manner.  Now, in hindsight, perhaps I should not have played benevolent dictator and forced my calves to run through the cramps.

Yes, I’m sore.  Incredibly sore, after the triathlon yesterday.  Teach me to do a triathlon under the following conditions:

• Tail end of a chest cold (decreased lung capacity, hello?  mucus!)
• No training for the last month
• 4 hours of sleep
• Dual calf cramps during the run

The swimming part was my bag of tea, but by the end I was already exhausted.  Halfway through the bike, I wanted to quit — I had a persistent catch in my chest that wouldn’t go away.  When I started running, my calves rebelled and seized up.  I had to run-walk 75% of the run, with occasional stretching at stop signs or any vertical surface along the way!  I thank my athletics experience in high school for giving me the mindset to just keep going (plus the embarassment of quittin’).

The results are in, by the way.

My time:  1:01:44 (one hour, 1 minute, and 44 seconds)
Place:  186th out of 350+
Place in splits:  53rd place swimming, 194th place biking, 241th place running.

Obviously, I need to improve my biking and running fitness!  The best time at the tri was a 47 year old man who got 39:15.  Whoo.  A full 22 minutes faster than me!   The third place winner got 93rd place in swimming and still got third place.  The swimming part really is the least important, sigh.  Too bad.