le Tour de Femme

Earlier this month I participated in le Tour de Femme. This is a great ride that has really grown over the years. The weekend kicks off with festivities at Cycling Spoken Here on Friday. On Saturday morning, there is the ride followed by a catered lunch. All of the riders are given pink carnations as they finish. Good stuff!

The presentation just before the ride

Sandra, all lined up and ready to go

I had a really good time on this ride. After 7 miles or so, I took my first pull and it was lloonngg -- like 12 miles. I was just going my own pace and having fun and stuff. We stopped a the second rest stop to get water and took picked up some other riders (we were down to two at this point). I continued with them.

The group dropped someone on Big Woods and two riders took off while the rest of us slowed up. I don't want to drop someone right after they took a pull. That's just rude! We continued on and one person wanted to stop at the third stop. We all held up for her and the volunteers said there were two riders in front of us. Yikes! I had no idea that I was in the second group. Kinda fun ;-) Yeah, I know the Tour de Femme doesn't exactly draw the racer types but still.

Me and the ladies that I rode with!

Wilmington YMCA Sprint photos

Sign from Two Wheeler Dealer, a local bike shop in
Wilmington that hosted packet pickup

Photo of the swim course. I took this picture from
Sea Path, the swim finish. The swim started at
Blockade Runner. Note the arrow pointing to the start.

My awesome support team!

Catching up -- way past due

Janyne before the start at
Lake Logan

I know that I've been slack in posting here. I've been busy but nothing seemed interesting enough to report here. I completed my second triathlon in August -- Lake Logan International. That one took place in western North Carolina.

The course was fun and I'd go it again. In September I road in Bike MS for the sixth time.

Also in September I completed my third triathlon -- Wilmington YMCA Sprint. That one was really fun! I had a blast! I really wanted to do the event because the swim is similar to the one that I'll be doing for B2B. There were 1500 people registered for the event -- huge compared to my first two triathlons that had 200-250 athletes each. We went down on Friday afternoon and I went to packet pickup at Two Wheeler Dealer. There was one person in line in front of me so check in was super easy. Then we headed over to Wrightsville and checked out the site a bit and then checked into the hotel. We dropped off the dogs and went to the pre-race meeting. I'd guess 50+ people were at the meeting. Then we walked over to Sea Path which was the swim finish and checked that out along with the 300m run to transition. I found my rack in transition and we went to dinner (pre race pizza!). So, the check in process and pre-race day logistics were simple.

Janyne with teammate
David L. before the start of Bike MS

On Saturday, the usual get up at 5:00. I ate while DH took care of the dogs. We got to the site at 5:30. Parked, set up transition, talk, potty, talk, shuttle bus to swim start at 6:30. Hang out at Blockade Runner (the swim started on the Blockade Runner water access), watch first waves of athletes start their swim (waves started at 7:00), talk to people about siting and current. My wave went at 7:55. The bike course was congested and there were no passing zones over the draw bridge. That was the only on course issue. After the race, I had a hard time finding my parents and keeping Kevin, the Girls and my parents under control :-)

The race was good, well run, etc. I would definitely go back. This was the first triathlon that I felt like a triathlete. I hope that makes sense. The others went well enough but I guess I wasn't really in my comfort zone or whatever. I was more nervous excited that nervous what have I got myself into.

Since then, I have mostly been busy training for Beach2Battleship where I am will be doing my first half iron distance triathlon -- 1.2 mile swim, then 56 mile bike and finally a half marathon run. I've been working to improve my swimming and trying to keep the other pieces together as well and diligently logging my workouts.