Indian Springs Sprint Triathlon – A ‘Tri the Parks’ Series Race

A fantastic race with many of my Endurance Concepts teammates!  In my third season of racing I continue to learn something new at every race.  Little did I know the mental challenge I would face in this one!  The swim was 600m and I was out of the water in 12 minutes feeling good. 

T1- 27 secs - fastest in my AG

The challenge came on the bike section of the course.   This race had 15 miles of rolling hills.  After heading out on the bike section of the course I realized I was having some problems with changing the gears on my bike.  I soon noticed the wire that connects to my rear derailer was popping out of my aero bars!  After gliding through all my gears I realized that I was stuck in one gear and about to climb the one big hill on the course.    After barely making it in the wrong large gear, I was then in too small of a gear for the downhill and flats on the course.  It was hitting me at this point that I would probably have to do the entire bike course in one gear!    Mentally this really started to bring me down as I continually clicked through all me gears only for nothing to happen. 

4 miles in and 11 to go.

I pulled my foot out of my shoe and kicked my rear derailer in an attempt to get it moving.  IT WORKED!  Finally able to change gears again, it still took me a few miles to mentally recover from the set back and get my head focused again on the race.   

T2 – 43 secs - fastest in my AG

By the time I reached the run I was able to post the third fastest run time in the women’s field, and fastest in my AG by over 3 minutes.  I still managed to finish in 2^nd place AG.    You have to be ready for anything to happen in a race.  I knew I would finish the bike leg but I didn’t know how hard it would be – physically and mentally.

Amanda (3rd AG) and me

Congrats to my many other teammates there who all did great!  Thomas P was the overall winner, Coach Dan won his AG and took 4^th OA, my buddy Rob R placed 3^rd overall (not on team EC), Amanda was 3^rd in her AG, Eddie F was 2^nd AG, and many more, Go Team!

After the race I brought my bike to Atlanta Cycling and had to have the whole thing rewired.   She’s behaving much better now. 

Coming soon are blogs about 2 more races I have completed.  Thanks for reading!