Scott Tinley’s
The Scott Tinley’s triathlon was on October 4th (2 weeks after nationals). It is part of the Tri California Series, like Pacific Grove Triathlon.
I had to get up at 5:30AM, the first early morning race I had done it a long time. The race started at 8:00AM, and it took about 30min to drive to the course. It was in a beautiful setting, worth the drive! The air temperature wasn’t warm, in the 50’s and to top off the fact that it was cold it was also raining. SWEET!
Swim:
We started the swim with the pro-men for a 2 loop swim. It was hard for me to decipher which were men and women, after about a minute I realized I was swimming behind a few guys and eventually moved up to the two women that I wanted to keep in sight for the reminder of the race. On the 2nd loop of the swim we ran into some age-groupers that had started in waves behind the pro’s, this was fun. We were weaving in and out of them, this ended up working to my advantage cause this is were I took the lead. Both the girls went wide around the turn buoy (to avoid the age-groupers) and I took the inside.
Bike:
The bike was moderately hilly (at least there were flat sections) but it was also very slick, it was not supper technical except for a few turns. I was in the front of the women to start, and I got a motorcycle escort, SWEET! This actually worked great, I knew that the two girls were strong rides but I wasn’t sure how I would do. So the whole time the motorcycle was acting like a carrot in front of a rabbit. I kept trying to catch the motorcycle!! (This was a non-drafting race, we were not allowed to ride together….this race you are supposed to solo;). I road really well, and I even caught a pro-guy on the bike (he was all decked out with a nice time-trial bike, helmet, disc wheel, the works….) and I was on my road bike and I am a girl! I was supper pumped about that!
Run:
I came off the bike with almost a 2 min lead. It was a 2 loop run course and I had yet to preview the course. The first lap ended up being the preview. I was told there was a pretty good size hill towards the end of the loop, but when I was running up on the hill the first words that crossed my mind was "You have got to be kidding me!" It was huge and on the 2nd lap a lot of age-groupers were walking the hill, I didn’t blame them, I wanted to walk up it as well. But I wanted to keep my lead so I kept trucking up the hill, and in the end I kept the lead!
I got more points for the overall series. It’s the best of 3 three races, Pacific Grove was one of them; the last one is on November 8th. And I have a shot at the series title. Exciting!