We are now into our fifth month of competition for the year and in the four events that I have gone head-to-head with Sister Mary Aggressive (wife Carol), she has beat me in all three running events and was getting of cocky!
But I had my day in the St. Anthony’s Olympic Distance Triathlon in St. Petersburg, Fla., on April 27th, when I finished ahead of her, not by much, but enough! It wasn’t as close as three years ago, when my margin of victory was 4 seconds. Since we start in different waves, we had no idea how close we were until we got home!
If you have never done St. Anthony’s, I'll tell you that it is very well run, and I believe the second largest in the U.S. at 4,000 participants, second only to Chicago’s Accenture which is the largest at around 8,000! If you are interested, you need to go online to their website, www.satriathlon.com, and find out when registration opens, it usually fills up in a matter of hours.
As for the start, they changed the sequence of when the older male age groups had started in the past. Those of us 60 and older started in the last male wave. Carol was in the first female wave, which started several minutes behind us. This was pleasant for me, since I wasn’t getting run over by the younger males on the bike. Also didn’t mind getting passed by the women, who started after us, some very nice scenery, and they were very encouraging in their comments as they went by!
As we got ready to start, I noticed Charlie Futrell, a resident of The Villages, and the oldest competitor there at age 88. He first started doing this event when he was 70, and this was his 18th consecutive start. I hope I’m still going when I’m that age, what an inspiration. The oldest female competitor Sister Madonna Buder, age 78, from Spokane, Wash., of Ironman fame. She blew by me on the run like I was standing still!
The water was cold enough to permit wetsuits, so I opted to wear one. I normally don’t but the buoyancy does give you an advantage, and at my age every little bit helps. Tampa Bay is sometimes hard to judge, and as the morning went along, the swells appeared to get larger. Well on the first leg, I got tossed around a lot, swallowed some water, but made it to the turn to the second leg. This was smoother than the first, so I was really looking toward the third and last leg to bring it home. Well, then it was the swells pushing you off course and down the beach, so one found themselves having to adjust direction every few minutes to stay on course!
The bike and run were uneventful, and I was pleased with my performance, considering what little training I had put in on the bike and run. You all know that feeling; gee if I had only trained more!
Our next event was on May 4 at Disney World for Disney’s “Women Run the World 15K”. Carol ran well, and it was neat to be a spectator and watch 3,000 very fit women complete this event!
Future events include a one-mile open water swim May 31 in Fort Meyers, Fla. We’ll see where we stand in our head-to-head competition. As an aside, I am working on my running.
Tags: Triathlon Competition
