Don't Be Scared Monster Sprint Tri

I participated in the fun and not too scary Dallas Athletes Monster Sprint Triathlon today. The race consisted of a 300 meter pool swim, 12 mile bike, and 5K run.

I finished in 1 hour, 11 minutes, and 31 seconds for 11th out of 27 in the men's 35-39 age group ... and 40th out of 230 total participants overall. (I think a couple of the times in front of me are flawed, though - two people must have only done one loop of the bike course because they averaged 29.1 and 27.7 MPH respectively, which was WAY faster than the rest of the pack). Derek finished strongly as well with a 1:14:08 time and 60th place.

• Swim: 6:02 (1:51/100yd pace)
• T1: 1:39
• Bike: 37:52 (19.0 mph average)
• T2: 1:07
• Run: 24:54 (8:02/mi pace)
• TOTAL: 1:11:31

Full results at http://www.doitsports.com/groups/results/timers-calendar.tcl?group_id=91 (look for "10-28-2007 / Monster Triathlon")

[Update 10/30: Looks like the results were updated - now Derek and I are in 58th and 38th place. :-) ]

The morning weather was pretty cold - mid-40s. Taking off my shirt for body numbering at 6:30 AM was a little painful. In fact, I was pretty happy that my T1 time was only 99 seconds, considering that I had to take time to towel dry and put on a long-sleeve T-shirt for the bike (it would have been too chilly to not do so).

The pre-race atmosphere had lots of "spooky" music (including the "Monster Mash", Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and The Edgar Winter Group's "Frankenstein") and a fog machine was spewing steam over the pool at the Keller ISD natatorium. I had a good swim - 6:02 was just 17 seconds slower than my announced/goal time of 5:45. I passed several people and was only passed by one. Climbed out of the pool and ran out the exit for T1.

The bike course was surprisingly hilly and the times/speeds reflected that; the fastest speed was 22 MPH - usually there a few people at 23 or 24 MPH. However, the roads were in excellent shape and it was an enjoyable ride.

The out-and-back run course was very nice ... good (paved) park trails with no sharp turns other than the turnaround. I'll have to come here again to do some training runs. The only bad thing was that I had a small cramp in my calf at the start of the run but it went away after the first half mile. I had only taken 2 SaltStick tablets (one before the swim and one at T2), figuring that I wouldn't be sweating very much with the cooler weather. But in light of the cramp, I think I'd better stick to taking at least 3 SaltStick tablets (1-2 before the race and at T1 and T2) for all my tris from now on. My guess is that the SaltStick at T2 didn't have enough time to kick in for the run.

Afterwards, I met up with Derek and Jonathan at the finish area, said hello to Misty (the Fort Worth TNT Tri Team Coordinator) at the Team In Training booth, and we grabbed some pancakes for breakfast and watched the other participants coming through the finish line - especially the costumed ones. We saw a witch, Wonder Woman, "pimp guy", woman in a sombrero, and few others.

It was definitely a nice race (except for the cold) with the added bonus of the venue being less than 10 minutes from my house. I'll definitely do this tri again next year. Actually, since it looks like the Dallas Athletes St. Patrick's Day Tri is at the same location with the same course, I'll be doing that one in March.