First Place in Age Group

This last weekend, yesterday to be exact, I raced in the Cyman triathlon and I had a great race. I finished 1st in my age group!!!! I was 9th overall women out of 99. I was very happy with my day. It was a little chilly in the morning, but was lucky the race didnt start until 9am. It was a sunny day with very little wind. The water was disgusting. Green algae everywhere. I was in the 3rd wave. Athena/clysdale in the first, 24 and under male and female 2nd. The swim was only 500 yds so I just went out as fast as I could. I was able to keep up with the front group until about at 300 yds when my goggles filled with water. I decided at this time the goggles were going in the garbage. I have had problems with them all year. Well when i was leaning to one side to dumb the water out, I came across a person with a snorkel. Yes, that is correct, a snorkel. Now to me this seems pointless, because the point of a snorkel is to look at things underwater and not have to pick your head up to breathe, am I correct? So what can you see in this dingy water and why would you not want to look up and SEE where you are going? well that gave me a good laugh to start out the day. Into transition, I felt slow but was no different from my other times. Out on the bike. Flat course so I blew by everyone. This course was basically a big loop so you never got to see people behind you. So I had no idea how close anyone was to me or who was in front of me. I got off the bike and out on the run. There were a few people around me that I was really surprised to see around me, but I never looked at their age so I just assumed they were in the under 24 group. I took off running my usual pace, which is slow about a 9 min mile. But some how, I felt like I could run faster so I did. I never got tired on the run like I usually do. One woman was behind me I could see but she was moving way to fast for me to even think about keeping up with her. She wasnt in my age group so I really didnt care either way. We can to the turnaround and I looked back and saw another woman coming up behind me. She looked like she was in my age group. she came up to me with about a half mile to go. I just wanted her to pass me because today I was really not in the mood to sprint out the finish. She passed me and also a bonus was she wasnt in my age group. I just tried to keep up with her to the end, but she was moving right along. I gave a little hard finish to the end so I could look good finishing, lol. Crossed the finish line at 1:19:46. Awesome time for me. Improvement of 5 min from 2 weeks ago. I contribute that to the flat bike course. It feels so great to have done that well especially that being the last triathlon of the season. I secretly really wanted to finish first in my age group this year, but realistically didnt think I could for atleast another year. I was over 11 min faster than 2nd place in my group. I got a medal and it is cool :) Well as that soaks in, I came home and cleaned up my stuff and began to plan my training for this week. Last race of the year is this sunday. it is a duathlon. It is going to be hard for me since I am not a strong runner, but I am just doing it to see how fast I can do it. Today I am going to swim and lift for the first time in about 3 years. Mostly arms since I wont really be needing them on sunday. After sunday, I am bascially taking 3 weeks off to study for my licensing exam I have in October and preparing my training schedule. I am kind of getting sad now that I have worked so hard this year to improve and now I have to go through 8 months of snow and cold weather before I can get out there and race again, so it will definatly be a mental thing for me to hold on to my endurance I have built this year and apply that to my Ironman training which will start in October after my exam. I need someone keep myself motivated through these upcoming winter months. 3 hours on the trainer is going to be hard for me. But until then, I am going to wear my first place finish medal around for atleast a week!