OK, I have to be honest with you. It is now Monday the 8th and I am trying to update and wrap up my blog almost a week after it ended, so hopefully my memory is still clear.
Saturday morning Alison and I went for a short run. We ran around the wharf and spent some time looking around the transition area and the swim start, which is about a mile from the swim finish. After the run, we ate breakfast and went to the room to rest.
At noon we went to a downtown restaurant to meet her family (Tricia, Randy, Andrea and Mark) for lunch and as we are standing outside of the restaurant out walks my parents! I couldn’t believe it. They had driven all through the night to get there and surprised me. Of course everyone, except me was in on it. Apparently they worked it out weeks ago and were going to surprise me that night at dinner, but got into town early so there they were. I was shocked and extremely happy! What an energy boost to have them there. It was amazing.
So obviously we had a great lunch and afterwards I needed to turn in my gear. We walked down to the transition area to drop everything off and as I was racking my bike, my back tire popped and went flat. I couldn’t believe it, but I actually handled it really well and as I kept telling myself, better now than tomorrow. I had to take my bike to the bike tech area and I had them put on a new tube. I didn’t want to use the 2 I had so I just bought a new one. As I’m standing there Heather Gollnick comes up next to me. Heather was the top female finisher last year and she wanted the bike tech to look over her bike one last time. She told me to enjoy the race and that I would always remember my first.
After a quick ride to test out the bike, I finally racked it and headed back to the room. Unfortunately I did not have any time to rest before we had to get ready for dinner. That made me a bit uneasy, but overall I was very relaxed all day.
Alison found this great Italian restaurant online and we all met up for dinner. It was great, the food, the service and more importantly, the company. We didn’t even talk about the race, so I was even more relaxed. After dinner it was time to go back to the hotel to rest, but Alison had more surprises for me.
Weeks before the race she had been asking friends and family to send her well-wishes to pass along to me, and Saturday night she gave them to me. There were cards, pictures, e-mails, letters and a whole bunch of things from people who wanted to wish me well. It put me in such a good mood and helped me realize how much this all meant to me. I told Alison that I was going to enjoy this and not worry about anything because I had already won with all of this support.
And that’s exactly how I woke up…
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