Dairy Queen kicked my Ass

Triathlon #2 in the bag!

"How did it go?", you ask. Let me see . . .

The swim? Well, there was that really great moment right before the swim start when I had to squint in order to be able to barely make out the buoys that I was required to swim around. I had to squint you see because the freaking things were TOO FAR AWAY from the shore for human eyes to see.

And, there was that first five minutes of the swim when all that I was aware of was churning water, and bodies and body parts everywhere, and that I was pretty sure that I was going to drown. The truth is that the swim SERIOUSLY SUCKED. There were people everywhere. However, I worked really hard to stay calm, didn't let myself completely freak out, and I finished. Yeah me!

The bike? Well, that's actually my strongest part of the tri. Though there was that whole "S#$%, I can't get my right foot unclipped!!" fiasco that left me standing in front of the timing mat at T2, looking like an idiot, for oh about 10 minutes. Well, okay it felt like 10 minutes.

The run? Well, it did kinda bite that my feet were numb for the first half of the run. And that I couldn't initially figure out what the problem was. All I knew was that something was off. Finally it hit me, "Hey, I can't feel my feet!"

And it was kinda embarrasing when I realized that the zipper on my tri suit, the front of the suit, had come unzipped. ALL THE WAY TO MY WAIST. Now before you start thinking "Tri Girls Gone Wild," there is a built in bra in the thing, so the show remained PG. But still, jeez, you'd think somebody could have said something. Aren't there some clothing courtesy rules among triathletes?

And then there was that moment about half way through the run when I started thinking, "You know, there's something about me that's different than all the other runners. Hmm, what could it be?" Well, what it was was that I forgot to put my race belt on and so I had no number. This lead me to be all freaked out for the rest of the run thinking that I was going to be disqualified.

Race results? Well, I had some fun when the initial results were posted and I was NOT ON IT! Come on! I did alot of work here people! I NEED to see my name in print. I then had to wait five minutes for Results Posting Guy to do posting guy stuff before he would talk to me. And my head almost exploded when I gave Results Posting Guy my bib number and he said "We don't have anybody logged in with that chip number." Fortunately, Results Posting Guy was very nice and helpful and managed to calm me down. We figured out that the unknown racer who had raced with the unassigned chip number of 112 was, in fact, me. This actually was a great lesson. It didn't occur to me before this race to check my chip number against my bib number. Yes, probably tri lesson 101 but I've never claimed to be a rocket scientist.

And, there was that cool 20 seconds when I got to go up on the podium and got a plaque for winning my age group. Hey, never ask a woman of a certain age her age. The point is NOT the actual numerical grouping that one is in. The point is that one showed up in order to get grouped.

And then I went to Dairy Queen.

Now you should understand that I operate on the principle that I should be rewarded for even marginal accomplishments. So, in my mind finishing tri #2, with or without a plaque, was definitely grounds for ice creamy goodness. However, yesterday my mind apparently forgot to consult with my gut.

Within 90 minutes of me drinking my milkshake, everything I had eaten for the past two days had run through me. I spent the next four hours fighting abdominal cramping, nausea, and really, really, really bad gas. Yes, gross x 10.

Dairy Queen managed to do what the lake, the hills, the bike, and the run could not do. Dairy Queen kicked my ass.