Pressure and Performance

It's amazing what can happen when the pressure is off. I went into the Buffalo triathlon on June 4 not sure how my injured (left shoulder rotator cuff and left knee patella femoral tendonitis) joints would feel. I just focused on having fun and letting it roll. The swim went very well and all of the rehab exercises I've been doing really paid off. My swimming was not very smooth but it was a very short swim and all worked out just fine. On the bike I could feel my lack of fitness but my position on the new bike is very effecient (good power output as well as very aero) so I was able to fly along. Every two minutes on the run I checked in with my knee to see how it felt and if at any point it wasn't happy I was just going to stop and walk back. It held up throughout and I ran a pretty good time. OK, it was an amazing time considering that my running workouts the last two months have consisted of nothing more than 15 minutes alternating between 45 seconds running and 45 seconds walking.

As several friends at the race said I can no longer play the "I'm injured" card in lowering pre-race predictions. The trick is to just take the pressure off.

Race results can be found here.

And for the effort I came away with a pretty cool prize.