Delavan Olympic

Wow....what a weekend...

Just got back from the Delavan lake Olympic race, and I placed first overall! It's funny to think that I almost dropped out before it even started.

The race is part of Lake Geneva Extreme Sport's summer series, and their reputation is less than stellar. My family drove me up the night before so we could all drive the course, and look at the course set-up. That might have been a terrible mistake.

After seeing the aweful, almost dangerous course I was in for, my nerves welled up. I did not sleep a wink all night, and my nerves were in overdrive. I got up in the morning sweating and with shaky knees. There was nothing in the world I wanted to do less then that race. If it weren't for my family, I very well may have never left my hotel room.

The Swim: The lake temperature was pretty mild, somewhere around 60, or 65. It felt great in my wetsuit. And the water was clear, unfortunately. If anyone saw the pictures or footage building up to the Beijing games of the city workers clearing algae from the water, that was the very first thing that came to mind. On race morning they had not even bothered to clear the goose crap or beer cans from the shore.

The Bike: Right out of transition, after running over the timing mat for the bike leg, cyclists were required to run their bikes down a quarter mile "construction road" of chopped up concrete and gravel, before mounting on highway 50! At least we had the shoulder... The bike was actually fun; it rode by a big sign that read S.M.I.L.E. (I'm not sure what the acronym was), and an ostrich farm. There were very few straight-aways, and lots of 90 and 120 degree turns into hills. The bike ended with the same run that it started with (although evidently some riders became ballsy, and braved the first ten feet of chopped concrete to get to some foot long grass to ride through, which supposedly shaved about two minutes off of their time).

The Run: "Beautiful cross country run through the grounds of Lake Lawn Lodge!" Ha! It was six laps of Terrible. The cross country parts ran through dirt fields, and sideways across hills that were barely cut. It was not that nice, packed, even grass. It was a grassy construction area. "This run is Bull S***" was a common phrase. My legs were hurting from the bike, and I was in no way used to that sort of terrain, so I just ran the pace my legs would move, and didn't shoot for anything faster.

All in all, it went far better than I hoped. I bit the bullet and just raced, not expecting anything, and I won #1 overall! Shows how much I know...