4th Street Clinic Tri

This last Saturday was the Fourth Street Clinic Triathlon. It was held up at the U of U.

This triathlon is probably the triathlon I was MOST nervous about. It was a mountain biking triathlon. I've never mountain biked before in my life! What was I thinking.

All I had was a $70 mountain bike from Wal-Mart. I just had a gut feeling that bike wasn't gonna cut it for this race. I put a plea out on Facebook and my dear friend Monica had a mountain bike I could borrow. It was a NICE mountain bike. I was right...my $70 bike from Wal-Mart wouldn't have cut it.

It was a swim/bike/run triathlon. The swim went ok. I could've done better, but I didn't have a good suction on my goggles for the first few laps so after every lap I had to stop & adjust my goggles. Finally after the third time stopping to adjust my goggles I got a good enough suction and I was able to finish the swim without having to stop.

Then it was off to the bike. Dear God, what had I gotten myself in to? Lol. I ended up walking probably 1/2 of the bike distance, but that's ok. I'm still proud of myself. During part of the bike, I thought to myself, I wish I would've brought my camera on the bike portion so I could take pictures so that you guys could see the trail. It took me almost 1 hour to do the bike portion.

I finally got back to transition and went off on the run. The run just took you 3.1 miles around the U of U campus. Holy crap, I knew the campus was big, but I didn't realize how big it was. I saw parts of the campus I never knew existed. Lol. The run wasn't too hard. I thought I was running a little faster than I was, but eh, it wasn't too big a deal.

My final time on the race was 1:35:46.6. It obviously wasn't my best time, but I'm ok with that. This was a race I'd never done before and it was a mountain biking race.

I would love to do this race again next year. Within the next year hopefully I'll be able to purchase a mountain bike and get better at mountain biking before this race next year.

Here are a couple of pictures for your enjoyment (P.S. The bathrooms really weren't barred off, but from this angle, it looked like it, so we decided to have fun with it! Lol.):

4th Street Clinic Tri

Not my next triathlon, but the triathlon after that is the 4th Street Clinic Triathlon. This triathlon goes to benefit the 4th Street Clinic in Salt Lake City. The clinic is for the homeless people and the peopl at The Road Home Shelter.

I signed up for this triathlon because it was one I hadn't done before and it was right in town.

Today I decided to look up the triathlon to look at the route and everything and come to find out, this is a mountain biking triathlon!!! HOLY CRAP!!! I don't know how to mountain bike! The mountain bike I have is a $70 mountain bike from Wal-Mart! I swear when I signed up for this triathlon, it said NOTHING about it being a mountain biking one.

Thankfully, my boss at work is in to serious mountain biking. She's biked the trail that we have to bike on and she said it's not too bad. Hopefully my bike will be able to handle it.

This isn't even a Sprint triathlon. We are swimming 350 meters, bike 5.28 miles and run 3.1 miles. I'm kind of bummed. If I knew this was a mountain biking triathlon and it wasn't a full sprint triathlon, I probably wouldn't have signed up for the race.

I've always wanted to get in to mountain biking though. I guess here's my chance. :)