Just tried the Scody Tri, finished 76th out of 120

From a Facebook post to Joe:

300m/10k/3k, it's a baby triathlon. Here's the split and positions out of a pack of 120.

#51    Uysal    Cuneyt    Male    25-29 yrs        0:11:03    85    0:23:01    67    0:15:35    55    0:49:39    76 .

Keep in mind I overheated during the swim, and got bumped off my bike; managing to pop my chain off as well! I'm not whining, I had the time of my life... but it's also good to know that the second time around, I'd hit 40mins :)

40 minutes would put me at 'bout 30 / 120 off the pack. Big difference. Granted its a pack of first time triathletes for the most part, there was no shortage of career athletes. 3 IronMen were in attendance, no doubt taking their last sprint-level workout before Kona in 2 weeks time. So don't let the numbers dissuade you, there was a big spread out there. The top dawg finished in 32 minutes. But I don't kid myself, each minute in your time is exponentially more difficult to knock off than the last. So the difference between a 40 and 32 is astounding. In other words, that IronMan veteran is not 30% faster, but literally 2 to 3 times as fit as myself. Amazing.

I embrace my errors. They are my teachers and I'm forever indebted. Despite paling in comparison to a true triathlon or marathon, this is the first endurance even that I can say really pushed my bounds. I was hopeless in the water, having only swam with my swim-friendly mates a handful of times. Adrenaline-flush and green, I sprinted the first 100m with the pack and then proceed to lose my shit directly afterwards. I realized at that very moment that I had never once swam a leg of more than 50m, a single pool's length, without pause. Now, I had done twice that amount, and had to repeat this twice more. I was beside myself. Well in all fairness, I had to be, because everyone else had long since passed me, the novice. I dragged my carcass out of the water and hobbled to the transition for the bike, barely making sense of the process. I's affectionately liken it to playing Operation after after an inebriated road collision - not that I can speak from experience, of course.

Yet, after the race, I was so enthralled and invigorated that I contemplated taking a practice swim to immediately work on my technique. That's how motivating the sport of triathlon is. I've run longer  races, cranked out longer bike rides, but nothing has created that primal sense of urgency, of survival that is generated from this humbling sport. In a hopelessly romanticized sense, it's the closest thing to battle I've ever experienced; proof that even in sane, domesticated desk jockeys lurk dormant neural pathways, essences, that are waiting to be rewarded for their patience when called upon.

I love this sport.

I finish with a passage I stumbled upon from the good people at TriFuel, perhaps the only ones who could make sense of such a brutal yet zen-like endeavor that is Triathlon.