I arrived to the race early to take care of all the setups and have a good warm up without having to panic to make it to the start line like last year.  Everything went smoothly and the body was feeling great.  I knew the water was going to be cold (not as cold as last year) but I was mentally ready for the shock factor.  The swim started exactly like I expected and I thought I handled the shock correctly and got into a good rhythm, around the 2nd turn buoy though I felt like I wasn't moving and struggling to find my rhythm; my mind was relaxed but the body felt off and I told myself to just focus on swimming and not to worry about the time as I can't control it.  The further we went into the course the more people kept on passing me and I had a hunch that this was going to be a dismal swim... I got out of the water at a time of 41:48, almost 6 minutes slower than what I expected!  It was still roughly ~5 minutes faster than last years debacle but it was a disappointing outcome considering how I've performed at other races this year.

Instead of getting dejected I just didn't let it get to me and focused on whats ahead, I went through transition as fast as I could and I was off on to the bike.  I felt so good and at the start and I was just zipping through the crowds, I possibly passed around 100 people in the first 5 minutes or so and was only passed by 2 or 3 riders.  That got me excited and I was telling myself that its a long ride and I should focus on nutrition, hydration and not burning all my matches early on.  Riding into the race track at around mile 40 was probably the highlight of this race, it was so much fun to have such a smooth surface and such a wide lane to let it rip on the TT bike; it was quite technical but a lot of fun.  The rest of the ride was uneventful, the last 2-3 miles things got really congested and riders weren't really allowing a lot of passing and I didn't want to do anything stupid as I was having a great ride.  I probably lost a minute in the traffic but I had one of my fastest 70.3 rides with a time of 2:39:13.

The run started with some heavy legs as they always do but I got my legs back around the 1 mile mark and I felt like I can put up a great time this time around as I was expecting the rolling hills on the golf course.  The first lap around the golf course was going pretty smoothly, taking my fluids at aid stations and managing to keep a good pace without feeling any loss of pace.  The 2nd time around the golf course was a different story, I started to feel the toll of the rolling hills on my quads and I started to walk through aid stations to get my hydration and "nutrition" and to regain some freshness; I obviously dropped my pace due to walking through the stations but when I was running it was the same pace as mile 1 (this is post race analysis).  I finished strong with a sprint at the last .25 mile and I finished the run in 1:47:28 giving me a new 70.3 PB at 5:16:44 which is over 2 minutes faster than my previous time and 18 minutes faster than last year.  

I should be happy with the result but the swim left a bitter taste in my mouth as I didn't feel like I did the best I can do in that discipline unlike my bike & run which I felt like I did the best my body could do on the day.  As I wrap the year and look back I couldn't be happier with the improvements I've made since I joined PPF 16 months ago... I'm making all these small incremental improvements that I don't see everyday but then I go race and I see a huge leap that I didn't think was possible; I love the resilience and mental toughness that I've developed that made the whole racing and training experience much more enjoyable.