Louisiana Red River Triathlon Official Website

The "Nitty Gritty" Details (User Opinions)

Eric W.
Gadsden, AL

  (07-17-2009)

"Well the race didn’t go as well as I wanted, but I finished. I started off the day before getting sick, bronchitis and cold type stuff- Val kept telling me to just decide that I wasn’t sick. But you know its not going to be ideal when I don’t even eat dinner the night before.
The day of the race I took a bunch of meds so I could sort of breathe. My swim went well in the muddy river, we had a current which helped. I think my swim was 22 minutes or so. Normally on a 50 free in the pool i take around 50 seconds at a distance pace- and a 22 minutes 1.5k ends up working out to about 45 seconds. I didn’t have the best strategy though. Because I was unfamiliar with the course I stayed about 75M out from the shore. I didn’t see until later but most of the swimmers swam out to the center of the the river to get the most current. dumb on my part.
I did well on the bike averaging around 22mph. I didn’t get cramps which I attribute to the 4 endurolytes that I popped before the race, but I made another mistake. I didn’t want to wear my Garmin Forerunner in the water so I bought a cheap timex to keep my lap splits. I didn’t think about the fact that I had pulled my cycle computer off my bike so I on a course that involved several laps I didn’t know how far I had gone. I had a gu packet that I ate too early so I kind of bonked on my run.
I had great transitions between the segments, but my run was deplorable. 6 miles of slow running in hot and muggy Louisiana I was passed so many times on the run it wasn’t funny. I finished 35 seconds off my goal pace of 2:30:00 but my run was over an hour. an hour 10k is pretty bad, even for me.
I didn’t run the race I wanted to but I did it despite not feeling well so I am not too disappointed. I finished 4th in my age group so no hardware. Then I had to drive 8 hours home through the night and I lost my voice. I had to stop and take several naps at rest areas but I made it home in one piece and in time for work the next day."

Reviewed by a: First Time Participant for 2008