I set a lot of goals this year. In February, I ran the Yeti race, a snow shoe race on Cypress Mtn. In March I participated in an exhausting Adventure Race which took me close to 5 hours to complete. I finished 2 of 5 Trail Races. I also completed two long Road Bike races, one that was 160km Fondo race, that took me close to 7 hours to complete.
Last year as the riding season was ending, my riding buddy John came up with a suggestion to do a triathlon this year and it inspired me to tackle that goal. I've always admired anyone who could do them. The one issue I had was that I could not swim (more than 10 meters anyways) and even worse, I was very afraid of the deep end. Even so, I liked that goal so I registered for adult swim lessons last fall. Since then, I've taking swim lessons 2 times a week and so far, I taken some 100ish swim classes. Imagine to learn to blow bubbles and do the pencil swim at 52, not a pretty sight at all. What's more, it took me more than 60 classes to get out of beginners level...augh! It took me that long to get over my sheer fear of the deep end...omg. It's a phobia that I still have to manage. I knew it would be a stretch as I wasn't quite ready, but I signed up for the UBC Triathlon in July, all be it a short one. The swim portion 400m with a max time of 20mins. Till the week before the tri, I could not swim 50m continuously without resting at the end of each length. The pool I learned in was 25m. When the event came, I saw the 50m pool and freaked out. I literally was the last person in the event (only 38 in the short tri). On my 4th lap, I tired and panicked a bit and mid-length I switch to the back crawl till I could catch my wind and recovered and then switched back to the front crawl. I finished the swim without drowning (hurray!) and even passed a few people. On the bike I ripped it and even from the way back of the pack, I just killed it, I managed to catch up pass 12 people on such a short course and then on the run I passed 2. My wife mentioned that many of those students don't have carbon bikes.....yup, but I'm not 20 either! so I figure a fair trade. I finished 2nd in my age category...ok there were only 3 of us, but overall, I finished 22 of 38 even though I was last to start.
Next, I registered for the Mec Tri, Sprint Distance, in August. A 750m swim, 20k bike and 5k run. I chose this Tri as it was an indoor swim, but even so, I needed to complete some 30 laps. Still a big challenge for me. As the event came, I felt a fair amount of nervousness but I did it, and did it all front crawl. So I completed my first Sprint Tri. Now I'm focused on my first Open Water Tri, a Sprint Tri on Cultus Lake. Wish me luck!
