3:30 am. ! Wonder if that's part of the reason ! Haven't raced in 11 months and 8 days. ! Was expecting a long line into the park so ! Got a late start anyway. Barely any traffic to deal with. RMTC showed up in force. Both racers and volunteers. We were everywhere. ! Can't say the same for Parker or Arvada. No Arvadans that ! Saw and the few Parkerians ! Spoke to are taking Tuesday night off. Their coaches are having their best peak so they have a shot @ us. HA!

Jim started the music with some Enya. That brought back memories of the day before this day in history. On August 14, 2001 Enigma, who is practically Enya, was playing on the stereo of the 41' sail boat ! Had spent the night on. We were moored in a bay in an island in Canadia. http://2001abikeodyssey.blogspot.com/ Docked in Vancouver that night.

Yon claims to be in Israel now so there was an alternate announcer. Not a real Aussie. He only even tried once. “Go Sheila” He didn't stand on his hands or toss any shrimp on the barby. ! Sure hope Yon comes back next year.

There was some confusion at the start line-up. ! Wandered thru the line and saw numbers out of order and a lot bigger than mine. ! Was 3 from the front of the line so ! Slotted myself in there and took off. ! Had noticed a lot of the sheilas had walked in slowly. ! Was having none of that. ! Dashed and zigged until ! Was diving in far to the outside of the enemies. More traffic during the run around to lap 2. ! started seeing green caps. Lots of caps. ! Drove right through them. Liz It Up was a wet suit stripper. ! Wanted to keep it in the club so the rest of them were out of luck.

One of our jerseys was just a bit ahead of me when ! Mounted the bike. They were moving fast. Turns out it was Heidi down from her altitude training camp. ! Passed her when she went off the side of the road. It looked to me like she had drifted while drinking and tried to ride it out in the dirt one-handed. Her handlebars slipped on her. ! Was really moving on the ride. Turning around on the bonus segment ! Hit the wind hard. No wonder ! Was going so fast. The first bike to pass me was a Blue. Blue bikes are really fast. We want to keep Blue as a sponsor. If ! Had a Blue !'d be faster too. Ride Blue. (! am available for product development) Quincy was fast until the turn-around. It's that damn wind again. It was a long way back.! Did the really cool barefoot dismount right before the line.

Into T2. Todd came in while ! Was putting my first shoe on. That's a problem. No more time to relax. Big Red Paul who flipped me off last time ! Saw him was observing from the run exit. He was much nicer this time. It was starting to warm up. ! Can do a 10k. ! know ! Can. ! Was uncomfortable. By the 2^nd aid station ! Had remembered to squeeze the tops to the cups before drinking. Todd had gotten by. Then Ed came by. He's too fast to be a teacher. Michael was looking unhappy when he passed on his way back. He always looks unhappy as he passes everyone in sight.

Turn-around finally. Heading back. Patrick, Nina, Dara, Heidi, Casey. All behind me. Patrick was the big concern. He hasn't trained all year kind of like last year when he was worried about doing Xterra for his first tri ever on a crappy old bike. He crushed that day. ! Kept pushing. ½ mile to go, ! Could see someone way back. Probably Patrick. ! Had to keep pushing. The course was so convoluted ! Couldn't tell if he was gaining on me or how big the gap was. ! Kept pushing. There's the turn onto the final bit. ! Had him for sure now. Afterburners lit. ! Have a vague recollection of cheerleaders lining the final yards. More power. Over the line. A volunteer looked up and dove for cover before ! Ran him down. ! Was just coasting in now. Coasting way too fast. Darin dispatched the 2 fastest finish line volunteers to try to stop me before ! Crashed into the lake. They found me on the other side of the pavilion trying to remember how to breathe. They were very concerned. They always are.

Sunday Sprint

3:30 again? It's cold out. !'ve waited so long !'ve forgotten the whole race. ! Recall that it hurt a lot, Charley is a freak of nature (1:05) and ! PRed the 5k by over 2 minutes. It's now down to, don't laugh, 22:42. 1:10:58

Dip N Dash

Good golly !'ve got nothing left. RMTC killed those other teams. Who were they again?