Post Mortem

I'll keep this short and add some more thoughts once I get home.

The day started well - I did a PR in the swim of 1:28:39 - interesting starting the swim when it was semi-dark, I didn't see any marker buoys until I had gone around 500m. Swimmers were all over the place and I got my goggles knocked off 5 or 6 times but once we got to the turn around the sun was with us and it was an easy ride all the way back to transition.

T1 was an absolute zoo - no space at all in the change tent.

Got out onto the bike and tried to settle down into my planned pace of 16 mph - which would have got me home in 7 hours. My heart rate was a little too high and I averaged 17.4 mph so I came in around 2:11 for the first lap. I backed it off a little on lap 2 - probably a bit too much - and slowed down too much. By lap 3 my HR was dropping too low and I found it hard to keep the speed up ... it got a bit lonely on that final lap.

Came into T2 at 4:23 and got some massage on my shoulder before heading out on the run. Running and walking for the first 4 miles but after that I found I was slowing down. I calculated that I wouldn't be able to finish the run by midnight so I pulled out at mile 7 where Jack was waiting at the aid station with Gerry & Sue. They all tried to convince me to carry on but enough was enough and I decided that discretion was the better part of valour!

We had a great time in Tempe and got to hang out with loads of friends - Dan qualified for Kona which really was the icing on the cake. BJ and Sarah both posted PR's.

I'll post pictures and more stuff once we are home.

Thanks to everyone for your support and good wishes, it really is great to know that you are all out there!