Here I am again with more synopsis fodder. Yippee hoo-ha.

Saturday was the long-awaited and final Try-a-Tri. I drove down to Burley alone again because Tatoo had decided to go to Seattle for the weekend with a couple of her friends. I hate when she does that. But hey, she's leaving me for the Air Force in a couple months anyway, right? Complain, complain. There I was in Burley. Doing a triathlon. It was pretty exciting. This tri featured some local high school chicks timing swim legs and handing out water in the run. I picked the cutest one to time me, and she pretty much swooned when I bulged my muscles at her. Or something. So my swim time was seventh best; I am apparently losing a little ground there. But some of that is related to who else shows up. This time there were not quite so many of the bunch of guys from Boise (with the "Triathletes from Hell" t-shirts) - only a couple. But there was a girl and her boyfriend, apparently from Boise because they talked to the other tri-geeks, that were new and interesting to observe. The girl (or woman, I should probably say, but she didn't look too much older than me) kicked everyone's ass in the swim with a time of under 16 minutes. She whomped me by a good four minutes, and was kind enough to swim in the adjacent lane and lap me numerous times. Christine (that's her name) beat Brent (that's Mr. Zipp Speed Weaponry boomerang-bike, my previous nemesis) by about two minutes, I think. Her boyfriend also outswam me, but not by much since he was only two spots ahead for the bike start.

So there we are at the bike start. Christine takes off on her fairly ordinary Specialized. Okay, probably three-tube carbon Eckstein-style, but those are a dime-a-dozen. Everybody else sits around for two minutes, then Brent goes on his boomerang. Some other guys go. The boyfriend (Darren) goes on his Kestrel 4.0 with dual neon yellow Aerospokes. The guy in front of me goes. I go. The guy behind me on a beam bike with a rear disc goes. We all pretty much go. There was even one chick with a Litespeed Tachyon, but she was part of a team and was way back. Never saw her. So we are going. Did I mention it was windy? Tailwind at the start, briefly, then cross for two miles, direct headwind for a mile, cross the other way for two miles, tailwind for a mile, your basic six mile lap. Times thee, eighteen miles, woo woo.

I am a biking maniac. I catch the guy in front of me in less than two miles, and start to work on Mr. Aerospoke Kestrel, who I pass in the strong headwind section. Then I look for the guy in front of him, that would be Mr. #4-spot. On the downwind, the guy behind me zips by on his beam and disc. I am slightly pissed, and stay fairly (though quite legally) close to the headwind, where I trimphantly pass him. He passes me right back, and we come up on #4 at the turn to the crosswind leg. The beam-n-disc guy is now in front of #4, and ingeniously drops his chain changing rings for the big 90 degree corner. What an idiot. He stops, cursing, as I blast by #4 and take that position for myself. I figure I might as well go all out on the bike because it is quite well known that I cannot run. Climbing the hill (beginning of first crosswind leg) for the last time, I spot someone ahead and get all excited about catching somebody else. As I get closer, I notice it is friendly Rita, who timed my swim last month. I lap her. I lap several other people, and on the final cross leg catch Christine, who started four minutes before me. I'm guessing she started out as either a swimmer or runner. Course I could guess that from her legs, and only an idiot would start doing triathlons from biking and swimming without being able to run.

So the bike is over. I once again get the second-best bike split, behind that boomerang-bike bastard Brent. The beam-and-disc guy comes in and smokes me on the transition. Christine comes in and runs by as I go around the first corner of the run. Now wait - how far did beam-and-disc start behind me? Hmm. I'm pretty sure the official results indicated I had the second-best bike split. Anyway, the original #4 runs by. I look back after about two miles, and see nobody. Perhaps I am safe in sixth position? Of course not, but I don't get passed until the last mile, twice. Once by the guy with the two nasty little boys that run around the health club with squirt guns, and once by the wanker with the mountain bike (just flat bars and slicks) who wanted to know if he could draft anybody he caught. He must be a damn fast runner, because I think I saw him coming in on his bike as I was almost a half-mile out on the run. Of course, I am a damn slow runner, once again posting the third-worst run split. But it felt a little better than the first run, and I even got a pair of socks as an award for "most improved run" from the first to second try-a-tri. Cotton raquet-sport socks, the kind that I sweat into and then get blisters from, like I have right now from my run Tuesday. So I got some CoolMax (TM) and polypropylene socks Friday, and they are much better. Didn't even aggravate the blister by running Saturday. Not very much. Oh, and Darren was lounging in the back of his Subaru muching a Powerbar when I wheezed up after the run. He must have despaired after I passed him, for he DNF'd.