I traveled to San Diego the first weekend of the month and participated in the Mission Bay Triathlon, which was a Sprint Triathlon (500 meter swim, 10 mile bike, and 3.1 mi run). Unfortunately, Bill was unable to accompany me to this event as WTI was in full force. However, I was was fortunate to have my friend, Heather, travel with me as her husband was also competing in the event. She was of great help as she taught me how to correctly rack my bike and provide me with some good race tips for the following day. While in town, I also got to meet up with my friend Stephanie and her husband, Matt, for a pre-race dinner, just like old times! Side note; they are the duo responsible for fixing Bill and I up back in North Carolina :) It was great to see them as it had been over a year since I saw them last!
Anyway, compared to last month's Somerton Tri, the Mission Bay Triathlon was a much larger event and held in honor of the first Triathlon ever to take place on Fiesta Island in 1974. The course was nice and flat and perfect for newbies to the sport like myself. I was pretty nervous for this race considering there were alot more people and the transitions can be a little daunting since you definitely don't want to look like an idiot finagling with all of your race gear during each transition or fall over while getting your bike out of the rack since the clips on your shoes make it difficult to run or even walk in. Fortunately, everything turned out great!!
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| Finishing.... |
In fact, my transitions were pretty quick, but there is definitely room for improvement. The largest improvement that I need to make it my speed on the bike. I got absolutely trounced in this portion of the race (ironic because I thought I was going pretty fast haha). On the flip side, I was very strong in my other areas as I was 2nd female out of the water out of 528 women and I was able to maintain my speed in the run. I finished 6th in my age group and 27th overall for women. I was pretty pleased with my results, but I can tell you that just being around all the athletes and seeing some pretty incredible individuals of all ages cross the finish line have only inspired me to want to compete in more events in the future! Events like this definitely get my competive juices going, just ask Bill or my parents :)
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| On the bike... |
The next race that I have scheduled is the Blue Water Triathlon up in Parker, AZ the first weekend of November. I was scheduled to do the long event, but switched over to the sprint event as the bike portion was quite lengthy (32 miles), which is more time than I would like to devote on the bike during a race! Someday, I will do an Olympic Distance, but felt that it was a still a little premature as I didn't get as much training in as I would have liked after the Mission Beach Tri. Fortunately, I am back swimming pretty regularly with the Yuma Heat in the mornings and have linked back up to the Yuma Bike Club - so I am slowly finding more people to train with who will keep me accountable ;). I am really looking forward to this race since WTI will finally be over and Bill will be able to travel with me!
In other race news, Bill and I have been notified that the 1/2 Marathon that we had signed up for on New Year's Eve has been postponed until 2012, which was disappointing. Therefore, we will not be spending our New Year's Eve running through Palm Desert, CA. However, we were given the opportunity to switch our entry fees over to the P.F. Chang Rock N Roll Race up in Phoenix on January 15th, which we have done. Therefore, we are going to have to get both of our butts into gear and start picking up our mileage to get prepared for that! We also have an extra FREE entry fee if anyone is interested in running it with us:)
As you have probably figured out while reading this post, October was jam packed with WTI activities for Bill. We didn't get to see too much of each other as he was busy flying most nights and I was busy working during the day. However, I did get a chance to check out an exercise that he participated in one evening. It was a practice mission where they were landing to drop off and pick up people. I enjoyed being a spectator as I always get to hear about all of the stuff that he does, but rarely get to see any of it. Here are the photos I took:
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| Flying off into the Yuma Sunset :) |
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| Bill and his Helicopter |
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| Coming in for the landing... |
Here is also a quick clip on WTI and footage from one of the biggest operations they do during the course:
http://www.youtube.com/user/MCASYuma#p/u/6/iLOMHT_ivxI
Approximately 130 Marines, instructors, and students participated in this noncombatant evacuation operation exercise at Kiwanis Park in Yuma, Ariz., Oct. 21.
WTI has officially wrapped up as of yesterday and all the students have gone home until a new class returns in March 2012. Until then, I will enjoy having Bill around the house as well as finishing out our travel plans for the year. We are getting super excited for our big trip to Hawaii next month! As it turns out, everyone from both sides of our immediate families are going to be able to meet us out there for our family wedding ceremony. This particularly excites us as we will get to meet our niece, Lily, our nephew, Silas, and sister in law, Irish, all for the first time! We are most definitely looking forward to spending time with our families in a tropical paradise!
Hopefully, as we move into the Holiday Season, you will have the opportunity to spend time with friends and family next month as well! Until next time...
