My stream of consciousness this past Sunday:

And we’re off!  Go, go, go!  Oof!  Keep pushing!  It’ll settle in a couple minutes.  Come on!  Ow!  That’s gonna leave a mark!  Go, go, go!  Where’s Tim?  That’s an orange cap [they give some pros different colored caps so that they can be easily identified by the cameramen] - Am I on Hillary’s feet?  No way!  What the?!  What are you doing?! At this point the guy in front of me (who, to my disappointment, turned out not to be Hillary Biscay, a great swimmer!) turned over and started backstroking.  Right there in the middle of the first loop!  No!  The lead group is gone!  No, no, no!  (bad words)  Ok, just swim.  Lose as little time as possible. My fat lip and I swam the rest of the swim so-lo!  55 minutes…  Yeesh!  Ok, move on!  It’s only a couple minutes.  Don’t make it worse by focusing on it! I was out of my wetsuit in no time, and just about to haul ass down to T1 when my toe caught a piece of the carpeting.  I then executed an oh-so-graceful somersault right there in front of an enormous crowd.  Nice one, Cait!  Get up!  Go, go, go!

I proceeded to run through T1, grab what I thought was my swim-to-bike bag, and hit the change tent.  What the?!  Why are my run shoes – “I grabbed the wrong bag!  Oh, no!  I’m sorry!”  Now I was running back to the bag rack, watching 3 women run into the tent.  Wow!  Get it together, Cait! As I ran back to the tent one of the volunteers was running my bike-to-run bag back to the rack for me.  Those people are amazing!

I calibrated my power-meter and hit the road.  Goal: average 178 watts and 90 rmp.  Keep the cadence up.  Watch the power.  Let the others [athletes] go.  It’s a long, hilly ride – be patient!  178 watts, 90 rpm, 178 watts, 90 rpm… I crested the first set of hills and began the 6-mile descending section.  Here we go!  Stay in the aerobars.  Good… Good… Tuck in…  Stay low…  Holy Crap!  50.9 mph!  Wooo hooo!!  And we’re down.  Phew!  That.  Was.  AWESOME!  Ok, settle in.  178 watts, 90 rpm…

The rest of the ride was nice and steady.  I came through the first loop in 12th place, but came off of the bike in 8th place.  Average power: 178 watts.  Average cadence: 89 rpm.  Nice!

35 minutes off of first, 14 minutes to second.  Let’s see what we can do! Goal: go out at 6:40 and hold it as long as possible.  Here we go!  Oh, wow! The crowd was so loud! I love these people!  I feel great!  Check the pace.  Oh, (explitive)!  6:10?!  Slow it down woman! I hit the first mile in 6:30.  Oh, no!  I hope I don’t pay for that later!  Come on, now!  Settle down!  Keep it to 6:40 – it’s a marathon for crying out loud! “12 minutes to 2nd!”  Nice and steady… “9:30 to 2nd!”  ”Good job, Cait!”  ”Run ‘em down, girl!  Just like last year!”  ”You look great!”  I love these people! Half-way through: 7.5 minutes to 2nd.  Ok, this hurts.  (Tim’s voice in my head) “It’s a race of attrition.”  You can handle this.  Just hold 6:40 as long as possible. “2 minutes to McGlone!”  Lean forward, turn the feet over, shoulders up.  Ignore the pain.  You can handle this!  No excuses!  Let’s go! “1:30 to McGlone!  She’s fading!”  I’m fading!  No!  Ignore that!  Push!  Just a few more miles!  How badly do you want this?  Are you willing to fail? “1:30 to McGlone!”  Still?!  Oh, man!  Is that 6:30 going to kick me in the ass?  Let’s go! “1:20 to McGlone!”  Come on!  ” She’s right there!  Go get her!”  You can do this!  There she is.  Nice and steady…  Here we go…  Ok, steady now…  Don’t let her pass you back!  Here comes the last hill.  Holy mother!  Don’t look at your Garmin – you don’t want to know!  Is this even considered running?!  Keep pushing or she’ll get you!  She’s right there!  Oh, wow!  I can’t see straight…  Keep taking sports drink…  Take some sponges…  Final turn-around!  My hands are really tingly…  Ignore it!  Almost there!  Am I going to make it around the oval??  If you don’t, you don’t.  Just keep pushing!  There it is!  Get across the line!  Aaaand I’m spent.

Thank you to Guru (bike), Oval Concepts (aerobars & stem), and American Classic (wheels) for the sweet ride, to Saucony for the kicks, to Oakley for the shades,to CompuTrainer for the Real Course Video to train on, to PowerBar for the fuel, to FuelBelt for the fuel transportation devices, and Trakkers for the fun website!

Thank you, Brian Hughes, for taking care of every mechanical issue I encounter (and for being a great friend!)!

Thank you, Jesse, for remembering my goals and remaining patient in the face of my periodic psychoses!

Thank you, Tim, Mikaela, Mom, Mr & Mrs Snow, and the rest of my family, for all of your support and patience.  I love you guys!

On to Kona!