There is a first for everything.

Thanksgiving is the best meal.  I wait all year for it. It's the greatest holiday - the festivities, family and  food but none of the pressure of the ever dreaded Christmas.  When I found out the Pumpkinman Triathlon offered a post race meal of Thanksgiving - I was IN!  To be honest the real reason for racing was that they were hosting this year's AquaBike NorthEast Regional Championship.  My beloved Non-Lesbian Life Partner, Kevin, works very hard with USAT on their AquaBike Task Force (yes, that is actually a thing and I make fun of him often for it but he's still on the task force).  Because of the work he does with this group we try hard to support AquaBike events in order to bring attention to them as a "real" & growing sport.  After we registered for the race, THEN I found out about the Thanksgiving meal and was not at all upset about the 6 hour drive to Maine.

GREATEST post race meal EVER, EVER EVER!

I was registered for the sprint race on Saturday.  The drive up wasn't pretty - turns out Romney and my other boyfriend, I mean Obama, were both in New Hampshire making the drive there difficult.  I say this as if it really afftected me - I was sound asleep for 90% of this drive but Kevin told me the traffic was awful.  Packet pick up was easy it was at the race location and the volunteers were kind and helpful.  This race is in a very small town in Maine and the whole town is behind this race - the location was beautiful, the lake was the PERFECT location for a triathlon.  The swag was really nice, even the stickers were nice!  Back to the hotel, bag packed ready for the morning.

Saturday morning I woke up with the worst headache of perhaps my entire life.  I get headaches but not terrible and not debilitating but this one was unlike any I've had before.  I had to turn off the lights, Kevin got me Tylenol, it hurt to brush my hair, move my head and even breath.  I just needed 10 minutes to close my eyes and I thought I could rally.  I was not willing to not race.  Told Kevin to wake me up in 10 minutes.  I woke up 4 hours later and did DNS the race.  For the first time since my very first triathlon 3 years ago, I've never DNS, DNF or DFL - I've come in very close to DFL but still managed to never be last.  The rest of the day I didn't move much bc I was still in a lot of pain but it got better - my ego however was very, very bruised.  Until I got some very wise words, "CRYING?  You are crying over a triathlon? Go have a beer".  Thank you Laura Cozik  for putting things into perspective!


Sunday was much better - no headache, tornadoes had moved out and it was Kevin's turn to race.  And race he did - he killed it!  Came in 2nd place male and crushed his expectations.  The weather was unreal - the perfect day to race: overcast, no sun, cool air - perfection!  Once Kevin finished (did I mention he was 2nd?) and we were all so excited it was on to the Thanksgiving meal - it was AMAZING!  The whole atmosphere of the race is exciting - I just wish it was closer or we'd go every year.

Second Place!

Moving past my first (and I hope last) DNS and now that the triathlon season is pretty much over - I'm moving back to the Year of the Run and am going to work my butt off getting my run times faster and faster - bring it!