Just over a week ago, I competed my first triathlon. It’s been on my list of life goals somewhere between “sleep in a hammock” and “see a firefly” since I’ve had a list of life goals, and that’s been awhile.
I only decided about three weeks ago that a triathlon sounded fun, so I found one online and signed up with my friend Linsey. I paid the $90 registration fee, looked at the calendar, and thought to myself, ‘I should probably, like, train or something.’ That seems to be what people do for these things.
Well, about one visit to the pool and two bike rides later, I was done training. I think most people probably actually prepare for these things like you’re supposed to, but I was taking a creative twist to this philosophy.
On the day of the race, we drove through a couple Podunk logging towns until we got to Elma, Washington. We jumped out of the car in our shorts and T-shirts only to find it was 50 degrees outside and steam coming off the lake in which we were about to swim. Suddenly, I was having second thoughts.
I went to pick up my registration packet at the check-in tent. I found a lady in bleach-blonde hair, “What’s your name, hon?” She handed me a white bag which I opened, excited to find what goodies awaited inside. There was an ugly T-shirt and a number. That’s it.
“There you go, and the push pins are over there,” the lady told me.
Push pins? Is that how they attach numbers these days? Thankfully it was just an unfortunate slip of the tongue, so I fastened my number with the safety pins provided.
Having just talked to my brother who recently competed a triathlon in Portland, (and did very well, by the way) I had high expectations of what exactly a triathlon consisted. I was looking for the stern-faced race officials, the guarded transition corral, the hundreds of intimidating athletes that looked more like transformers than people, and the tables overflowing with Cliff bars and bananas.
Instead I saw moms in stretchy pants, flimsy bike racks made of metal pipe and 2x4’s and a couple clueless teenagers passing out hand-drawn maps. I was prepared for the big speech about where we were supposed to go and how we must have our numbers visible at all times, and the threats that if we let others help us in the transition stations, we’d probably be disqualified, or shot, or something.
The speech never came.
Turns out there weren’t any rules. Go ahead, listen to your headphones, wear a jacket over your number, Heck! Let your husband peel your banana for you while you change your shoes. Go crazy!
As I pulled on my wetsuit, I looked at Linsey with a face that said, “Well, here we are. Don’t really know what we paid 90 bucks for, but let’s do this!”
We jumped into the cold water that was just a little bit shocking while we waited with dozens of other racers for the starting gun. A guy in a blue sweatshirt got on a megaphone and told us to swim around the boat twice, and then said Go! So much for a starting gun.
The swim wasn’t so bad. I felt like I was moving pretty fast, but when I got out, I was shocked to find only about 10 people behind me.
‘Gosh, I’m already in last!’ I thought to myself.
I chased after Linsey, hopped on my bike and took off. The rest of the race went well. It was challenging, but fun. We rode 26 miles through pretty farmlands on back roads, and by the time I got to the run, I was suddenly by myself. There was not another soul in sight.
I passed a “water station” where I found a small table with a few paper cups of Gatorade and water. I approached the pickup truck parked there to ask where I was supposed to turn around, only to find a kid asleep in the front seat with his feet hanging out the window. ‘Okay,’ I thought, ‘I guess I’ll just keep running.’
Eventually I came to the home stretch. I turned into the parking lot of the park, crossed a little foot bridge, and could see the end in sight. I watched the clock in the tent as I ran closer and closer, feet hurting with blisters and legs ready to burst. Finally, I neared the tent, passed the group of about ten cheering people, and crossed…
Nothing.
There was no finish line. Just a tent. Talk about an anticlimactic ending.
A lady came up behind me and ripped off the bottom section of my number. “Congratulations!” she said. “You finished 7th!”
Maybe I should stop my story here. That would make me sound pretty cool, but sadly the truth is, I’m just not. Turns out, there were actually two different races going on at the same time. One was a sprint triathlon, and mine was the mid distance. All those people I was racing with, yeah they were in the sprint.
So it sounds cool so say I got first in my age group, and it sounds cool to say I finished 7th; I just won’t tell you there was only one other person in my age group, and I think only about 15 in my race.
When I approached the awards table, a guy looked at me, then reached into a box and said, “Here, you can have one of these!” I looked at the plaque he handed me and read “Elma Labor Day Triathlon, Overall Winner.”
“Um, but I didn’t win,” I said.
He shrugged his shoulders, “Yeah, well there are only about five of you, so you can all have one. Don’t ask questions. Just take it.”
I was then invited to partake in the treats behind him. They had a few packages of vanilla wafers and Oreos that weren’t actually Oreos, but Wal-Mart brand chocolate sandwich cookies. They told me to help myself, so after realizing these were the most expensive $90 Wal-Mart cookies I’d ever buy, help myself I did.
And so, while it may have been a little hillbilly, and I’m still not really sure what I paid for, here’s to the Elma Labor Day triathlon from your sort-of 7th place, yet seemingly last, yet somehow overall winner.
Life goal: check.
Look, push pins!
The "ultra guarded" transition area
We're Tuff.
Making the final stretch with my support team, a.k.a Mom. Notice the heavy competition.
And we even survived.
