Presidents Day duathlon race report

I competed in the Presidents day duathlon this last Saturday, February 13th. This was my 56th multisport race.

It was a 5K run & a 30K bike.

I did average on the run finishing in 24 minutes 39 seconds. I took off way to fast just like I do at every race. The run was a long gradual uphill on a sandy dirt road. I finished the run somewhere around the 25th place.

I'd been working a lot on my cycling this year. I put in 550 cycling miles in the month of January alone with a big portion of that being hill or speed work, so I was pretty sure I was going to have a good day on the bike.

Once on the bike I started hunting guys down like they were Saddam Hussein. No holes out here to hide in guys.

Since it was an out and back bike course I was able to count how many people were in front of me. When I hit the half way point I was in 10th place over all. I was able to keep 10th place for all of 15 feet before Mark Ballsinger passed me. I knew if I could keep up with Mark I'd have a great finish, Mark B is fast. I was able to hang with him for about 6 miles, which is a first. After that he started to pull away from me.You know what's really impressive about this story? Mark is 64 years old.

Anyway I ended up finishing in 11th place over all, 1st place 35-39 AG. The closest 35-39 to me was 5 minutes behind. This was my 2nd first place finish out of the 3 races I've competed this year. I have 28 points out of a possible 30 for the South West Challenge Series & am currently in 1st place. I'm pretty happy how my speed has been improving. I weighed in at 204 on race day. I'm hoping to get down to 182 by May. Oh me, oh my, but I'd be fast at 182!

My next race is the Sully Super Sprint in Alpine TX. I love the Sully. It's only $35 for the registration. It's a semi fast sprint in a great little town.

I'll keep you posted how my next race goes.