Jacksonville Olympic Triathon (first win of the year)

This race was the first time I've put mind over matter and pushed when I didn't think I could push anymore (or at least doing it to a higher level).  I've done this before on a smaller scale, but this time I really had to dig deep for the win.

I decided to do a couple things different before the race.  I brought my trainer and rode my bike for a bit before to warm up.  I also went for short run and my usual swim practice.

I felt fine on the swim, I thought my time would be better so maybe the currents were bad, I'm not sure.  I held a steady pace the whole time and I could only see one guy out ahead of me, but he had a really big gap. As I got out of the water, I was passed by a couple others and I thought the day was off to a pretty bad start.

When I got on the bike, only one person was in front of me, since I had passed the other guys in transition.  I didn't feel super great the first 15 minutes and I got passed by two more people, but then I finally got into a groove almost half way through and was able to push it.  I made it a goal to catch the guy in first place and I finally did right before T2.  The last few miles, I was heads down, pushing as hard as I could, thinking I would blow up my run.  I don't think I have ever worked so hard on the bike during a race.  It was not my fastest bike split ever, but it was windy...otherwise, it probably would have been.

I exited transition a little before the guy I had recently passed on the bike.  He caught up to me shortly in and we ran together for a while.  It was hard to hold the pace he was holding, but I knew if I let him get too far ahead, I was done for.  A couple times I let him get about 50 feet ahead, but both times I reeled him back in.  The final time was about half a mile before the finish line.  I passed him at close to a sprint and ended up in first, but only by 4 seconds.  The third place guy was also only 20 seconds behind.  So many times I had given up in my head, but I changed my mind, sucked it up and decided I wasn't going to let this guy beat me.  It worked, but it sure was hard!  I'm happy to have also finally broken 40 minutes in a 10k off the bike!