Umpqua Ultimate

So Labor Day Weekend, I decided to race in the Umpqua Ultimate Sprint Triathlon. There are a lot of races out there to choose from on that holiday weekend. I always have a hard time deciding what to participate in. Last year, I raced in the Sunrise to Summit Duathlon in Bend. Ouch, talk about a painful race, but that is old news and I won't go into those details. This year I decided on the Umpqua race because I needed to go back and redeem myself. Two years prior, It was going to be my first triathlon. I ended up not racing. It was the only time in my life I have gone to a race that I was signed up for and didn't participate. It was a combination of poor race preparation, unusually cold weather and extreme fear about the lake swim. I had to go back and prove to myself how far I have come since then. Especially with swimming in open water. So I definitely floated (it was a deep water start) at the start line with something to prove. It ended up being one of my best triathlon races I have had to this date. The swim was by far my best in any of the races I have done. I found a good rhythm and just kept moving. I was 7th out of the water and felt good getting on the bike. On the bike, I had one strategy, to go as hard as I possibly could for the entire ride. However, to take a my mind off the pain a little bit, I thought about how fun it was going to be to head to the Duck's football game after the race. I jumped off the bike with the 3rd best split and hit the run hard. I felt like I was up near the front, but it was hard to say because we had the Olympic Triathletes and Duathletes out on the course. I was about 2 miles into the 5K run when I passed two guys who appeared to be in my race. One of them told me that he heard there were only two or three ahead of us. That's all I needed to hear, I went full throttle from there to try and catch these mysterious leaders. I figured if I made a move then, I might make it into the top three and get a plaque. Little did I know, I had just accelerated away from the true leaders of the race. I pushed hard to the finish line and had the 2nd best run split. A couple of people at the finish told me they thought I was first in the Sprint but I didn't really believe them. I figured the mythical front runners had already finished and I was somewhere in the top 5. I was shocked when I saw the results were posted and I was at the top of the list. In fact, my wife looked first and didn't see my name because she didn't look at the top. She figured I would be lower down where I usually am. It felt really good to come back to this race that two years earlier, I didn't have the guts to start. This time I started it, finished it and in an unexpected outcome, I won it!