Damn girl, that's a lot of fattitude

I’d been watching the weather report all week and praying to the sweet lord that the rain would hold off. No. Apparently my new thing is racing in the rain.

I did the triathlon with my bestie, Alicia. The hotel we stay at is a short bike ride from the course, so no one drives (parking is nearly non existent there too) which is awesome when the weather is nice. We woke up at 5am to the sound of thunder, the crack of lightening and the pouring of rain. I opened our hotel balcony door and just stood there trying to accept my fate of shitty weather. It did not come easily. Alicia tried to convince me that we shouldn’t race and we should just go back to bed. I refused. She acknowledged how shitty of a friend she would be if she chose to go back to bed and I went and raced. We put our trisuits on and quickly made our way to the hotel lobby with our bikes, set up, etc. There were several other triathletes sitting there too. Everyone was waiting to see if they’d cancel the tri since the weather was so bad. Some woman conned her husband into running over to the tri site and finding out. He came back shortly and said yes, it was still on. We all sat there listening to the thunder boom and deciding if we’re crazy enough to actually go.

No worries – we are all crazy. Off we go, ride our bikes over in the rain and trying to convince ourselves it’s a good idea as the thunder/lightening continues.

We get to the site and get in line for body marking. They cancel the swim portion so we skip the body marking. It’s too risky to swim in the thunder/lightening, but apparently it’s safe enough to bike. Our transition set up in minimal. It consists of me flipping my bucket over my shoes in attempt to keep them a little dry. It didn’t matter – I had standing water in my cleats and could wring my socks out before I even clipped in for the bike. We stood there waiting for the delayed race to begin and as we’re waiting a huge boom of thunder shakes the ground and a bolt of lightening strikes the width of the lake. For the first time I think about bailing…but not for long. Two by two we clip in and take off. Rain, rain and more rain. Thunder here and there. Enough storming to be incentive to move faster. The rain stopped just long enough to take these two pictures and then it picked back up again. I certainly didn’t set any PRs, but I had a good time and was glad I did it. I lapped Alicia in the bike, but she caught up to me on the run and we finished together. I had the WORST cramp in my stomach/side which made running a nightmare. Like I said, no PRs, but we had fun.

Wrung my socks out and poured my cleats out after, took a hot shower and then dug into some Mexican food. All in all – a success!

Oh and for laughs…look at this picture. The left is this race 5/18/13 and the right is this race 5/19/12. The left is me smiling and looking like I love life. The right is me barely breathing, on the verge of tears and close to suicide. The difference is incredible to me. Short story – the left is an athlete. The right is a fat girl on a bike ride trying to survive.