Splashing and Dashing, Oh the weeknight Fun!

Last night wast he first in the summer series of three week night splash 'n dashes.  I did these events last year for the first time and LOVED them.  After work on a Thursay night, what could be more fun than a mile swim in a clean reservoir and a 5k sprint with friends?  Not much...although for 46 minutes last night I sure wasn't thinking about all of the fun I was having.  I was having Jens Voigt moments of "shut UP legs!!"

There are just two waves, one for the guys and one for the ladies. This means you always know exactly where you are once you hit the run.  I knew that there were a few STUD ladies out there, can anyone say Gina Kehr...multiple top 10 Kona finisher in the PRO field?  And the woman can swim!!  Thankfully last night, I think she only splashed and skipped the dash.  Otherwise I would have been toast.  There simply isn't enough real estate to make up that kind of deficit coming out of the swim. 

So starting the swim, I lined up next to said super star swimmer and thought, just hang on as long as you can!  We started out hard (for me) and again, I made it until about the first bouy 250 meters out.  I then continued to find feet until the second loop where I was in no mans land, swimming over guys doing backstroke and trying to see the bouy in the evening sun.  I was out of the water in 23:49, 6th but just like last weekend, I made my move in transition and was 2nd headed out onto the run.

Oh Lordy!  I had remembered the three mile run from last year and there is an incredibly steep hill on the way back that I have to walk...straight uphill and sometimes will pass the runners.  This race last year was my first run apres Ironman Texas and I sure felt it.  Thought I was going to face plant the entire time!  This time around was much better but I did feel like my heart was going to explode out of my chest the entire time.  Betting if I had my HR monitor on it still would have been squawking at me that my HR was too low.   There may have been a few "look backs" up that hill to make sure it was OK for me to stop hyperventilating.

So I finished the 5k in 23:05, but the first place OA gal (thankfully she was 40+, giving me hope that my best years are YET to come!) had beat me out of the water by a solid 2.5 minutes.  Darn!  I won the women's open category (women 20-39) and scored another clean bottle, a sweet gift certificate to Sports Basement and a mug to accompany my wine glass from last sunday's Olympic.

Total time was 46:54 vs a LY time of 50:49.  Not too shabby!  And it's only 40 seconds off my best effort there last August.  I love seeing the same course yer over year, you can actually SEE where you are at.

It was a fun night with friends, and Mark even surprised me by riding out there after he got home from work.

Now it's time to rest up and recoup for Sunday's BIG event at Escape From Alcatraz!!