A way long overdue post, well one at least. I thought I wanted to share upon my adventure of the milton super sprint duathalon. It was something I never thought I would do. I decided that this past summer after completeing the Whitby 10km that I wanted to challenge myself even more. Try something so grueling that it is a challenge to train for all on its own. I began flipping through websites, and multiple brochures until I came to the Milton Triathalon. I like this one alot, since it only consisted of women I wouldn't feel so juged if I did awful. There would be women there of all ages, one's as young as me and others older then my own mother. This run was to take place the last weekend in August, so I had plenty of time to train. I figured since they offered a duathlon so doing only two of the events I would do that instead. Since I am not the worlds fastest swimmer, I wasn't going to drown in the process I decided to only choose running then biking then again to switch back to running. It was 2.5 km of running, 10km of biking then 2.5km of running once again to then come into the finish line.
Once I had signed up for the race, I started to consider trainging. I figured that I would not really need to train for biking and that, that was going to be the easiest part. I was used to riding my bike. I had done it everyday for the entire summer to and home from camp. That I thought would have been good enough. My running I continued to train running around 10km a day for 5 or 6 days a week.
When it came to the actual day of the race I was sooo excited. I still didn't know what to expect but I felt ready to go. They had a specific transition area where we kept our bikes, based on age category. The youngest furthest away from the exit line (just my luck). We then went and all members of the super sprint duathalon lined up at the start line. The gun went off, and we began running. A quick and easy 2.5km, it was nothing, an easy run, since i was used to running so much more it didn't feel challengeing at all. There was 65 members in our race, after crossing the chip line after the first run I was in 12th place with a time of running those 2.5km at 12 minutes. We then hopped on our bikes and took off. I felt good, I was in a wicked position and I wasnt tired, now for the grueling task which at the time I thought was going to be the easiest. The biking was deadly. It was 10km up hill and down hills, out and back around Milton. I was getting passed by tones of women, women of all ages, and with better bikes then myself. They all had those racing bikes, the ones with the super small tires. I'm riding along with my monogoose street mountain bike, getting passed going downhill. The biking was the complete opposite of what I had thought. It was defintly the hardest part. I felt myself peddaling so hard, and found support in another women along the race who passed me cheering me on to keep going and not to give up yet. I knew I couldn't stop. I had to keep going. I got back to the transition area to drop off my bike and head back out on the last 2.5km. I ended up 41 on the biking, with a time of 30:34 to complete that 10km. Heading back out running, was the weirdest feeling ever in my legs. I placed 13th on the final running with a time of 13:32. Everyone who passed me on the biking I found myself passing past them again and I began to feel even greater about myself. I knew running was my strength in that race and was able to climb to a great finish. I came 25 overall out of 65 women. It was nuts!!!!! I place 2nd in my age category and got a wicked technical shirt, and I had an overall finishing time of 57:18, and everyone got a finishers medal which was pretty cool too. Still to this day I still can't believe I finished it. I now know of the hardcoreness (yes thats a word!) of the biking and to train more for that, or maybe train a little more then a light bike ride to work. All in all August 31st was a great day for a duathalon!
