if it is Mayo it must be Tres Rios!

In May i went back to my very first triathlon - the Hacienda Tres Rios.  I've done the 1st, the 2nd and now the 4th edition and i think it is my favorite. 

Lovely beach start and great spot to hang out before the race.  this was the day before and it was lovely








the weather was a little different by the next day and by the time the old ladies started...

walking to the start the morning of the event, some people came quite prepared.  there must have been 10-15 people under the tarp...

again, the day before the event, the is the "sandbar run" part and start of the swim upstream..

it looks like such a nice, quiet river, no?

the swim is always a challenge as the last 500 meters or so are against either a weak or a very strong current, up river.  oh, and that is after swimming out to sea and then running over a sandbar.  it's a fun one.  the trick is to keep out of the manglar roots in the river while trying to hug the sides (where the current isn't quite as strong).   Once again, none of the kids wanted to come (honestly WHO would want to get up at o'dark thirty to watch an old lady race and, as it turned out, freeze to death in a decidedly non-tropical rain?) so jamie and i headed up solitos. 

the day before we'd done bike dropoff and as FMTRI has recently changed the rules for aerobars I had to move the bars even with the brakes (in an imaginary line) so i wouldn't get a 30 second penalty.  that's not so bad but if i do another race with this rule in place the next infraction is 2 minutes and then I think you get a DQ your 3rd.  So i didn't want to start the penalty cascade.  unfortunately at bike dropoff they said that while the bars didn't exceed, I needed a solid bar going between the two aerobars or I'd still get the penalty.  Not to be deterred, she took my information and then Jamie and I fashioned a "bar" by affixing a tire lever across with bars with black electrical tape.  So now it sure LOOKED like I had a bar there and that was all FMTRI needed not to penalize me.

The day of the event started out with grey skies and by the time we old ladies finally started the sky was dumping cats, dogs, lizards, sharks, fish, Everything was coming down.  It was raining hard enough to make it difficult to see once in the water but they bouys were nice and bright.  however, that didn't stop teh entire wave in front of us from cutting 2 of the bouys.  once i realized we were following them in cutting the course i headed back to the bouys and went around.  i'm no longer looking to podium in my age category but looking to where i am overall and it was a little disappointing to see all those women in the first wave cutting a good portion of the swim course. 

by the time we got on the bike the rain had leveled out to a tropical downpour and i just concentrated on staying rubber side down and not getting passed.  i think i came off the bike in 7th place or so.  unfortunately i was pretty discouraged wtih all the course cutting in the swim and took the run not quite as hard as i could have.  i was really pleased, however, to find a 27+ minute 5K split as that means teh Isla Mujeres run was likely not short as I'd thought.  AND my run is getting faster.  Jamie and I hung around for the premiacion as he really wanted me to get my plaque.  so we hung around, had hamburgulars and danced a bit, watched the crazy after party and won $1000 in a dental certificate prize, essentially paying me to race.  So that was SWEET.  i decided not to do Bacalar (5K swim) in June and have been eyeing a 1/2 marathon in Guatemala, so we'll see about that.  I might just decide to not spend money in June also and do nothing. 

Doesn't this look like the most fun ever?