Today is the second day after coming back from Taidong’s triathlon. It was awesome: nice home stay, the weather was pretty good, fresh air, good challenge from the game, and of course the most importantly, good running and biking and swimming mates from Zhi-Le (智樂) swimming pool without whom, I might never have come up with the idea of going for triathlon. Even if I went alone, I believe I would feel as lonely during the game as when I bike-rode alone from central Tainan to the mountain in rain several years back! It was just awesome, till now still feels like a dream.
Put back to what happened back then: there were actually three different levels of triathlon during the weekend. The hardest one was done on Friday, and the game was 3.8km swimming, 180km bike riding and 42.2km running, 226km in total; the intermediate and Saturday one (also the one I went for) was 123km (which was 2.2km swimming, 100km bike riding and 21km running); and Sunday was 51.5km ( 1.5km swimming, 40km bike riding and 10km running). Before the game I myself didn’t feel quite much when heard of 226km this astronomical number, not until when we got there and saw the runners or cyclists did I feel stunned by the atmosphere and…the facial expressions on runners. By the time we got there the runners had done 12 hours, and the game was 18 hours, runners had to hit the final point by 12am. It was truly a challenge, it was hard, and our coaches Jovi, 小杜 and two others managed to finish it well in time! I think among all of us, they are truly iron men!
We had more folks going for the 123km than others, and we did it as well. It was quite fun, because when I was on my bike finishing the 97th km my rear tire got pierced AGAIN! There was no way for me to run back with my bike held up high, I just kept pedaling and telling myself to keep doing it, even die trying! Finally I managed to get back and was prepared to start running, but unsurprisingly found I could just walk instead of run. My both legs had serious muscle cramp, it hurt even walking. The first 5km was really slow, and all what I could do was keep feeding myself lemon piece, water with salt, energy drinks and some ointment to ease the cramp, then kept running. Thanks to our supply team, they had been all the way supporting us with energy drinks and muscle treatment. Sometimes they also drove and passed by us with encouraging shout. It feels really good with partners and that make me feel that I am not alone. That is the feeling I love.
The third day was 51.5km game, all folks (A Da, Nancy, Fang Yi and Zhi Xiang) had done very well, especially A Da who had practiced bike-riding with his cheap, heavy and poorly equipped bike and on the day of game he started out really really fast, overtook many others against wind, even when the road was going up!
Some of us including me, A Da, Jack, Nancy planned to buy ourselves a new road bike, the idea of which has been going around on my brain! ^^ Jovi said bike frame is the first and the most important thing to consider. Today I had secretly spent sometime surfing on the internet looking for information on bicycle forums and blogs. I think I probably will go for sloping frame, made by Giant maybe. Next to consider will be front and rear hubs and bearing..... hoo! Really looking forward to getting a new bike and the practices!!! Excited!!
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