Saturday, March 29, 2008

UMD Tri Club Makes Its Debut

The Univ. of Maryland was nine strong in attendance Saturday at the Smithfield Sprints 2008 in Smithfield, Va. All were members of the up and coming UMD Tri Club. Members participated in relay format--three teams of three each.

My team won the relay category by 6 minutes and 3 seconds. From left to right: Me, Nick Hermes and my cousin Grace Evans.

What amazes me is that my rank for the bike portion is 22nd. That means that 21 guys biked faster than me, then proceeded to run a 5k. I can tell that this is going to be a tough sport to try to come out on top with.

The event itself was very well run. Setup Events clearly has the procedure down. It looks like there were 500 people racing, and it all went very smooth, and pretty much on time.

There were lots of very cool bikes there--and plenty of opportunity for shooting "velo-porn." My impetus for going fast was to beat anyone on an all carbon bike, or anyone with those sweet disc wheels. I didn't find any on the course when I was there--they must have started much earlier than me (staggered start).

Racing as a relay was fun, because I was able to zip by everyone in an all-out sprint while they reserved some for the run. I think an actual triathlon would be much more fulfilling, though, and I can't wait to do one.

1 comment:

aymzed13 said...

Very very sweet bike time Chris =) I wish my legs were as long as yours, haha.

The first guy that pasted me (when finishing the bike leg as I was just starting) had those paper-thin Zipp wheels on his red Cervelo. We should outfit the entire club with those... yeah that's never gonna happen.

But we can still come up with some cool team chant like JMU & VA Tech (plus get some of those nice tri-outfits).

Can't wait for the next tri!