Average Joe

I had some friends participate in last weekends Average Joe Triathlon in Perham. They tried to get me to do it and I am now kind of regretting that I didn't as it looked like a lot of fun. The swim, which a lot of people fear the most, was short and the water wasn't very deep so if you needed to push off the bottom you could. I don't have a fancy road bike, well, it was fancy when it was new in the early 80's, but I don't think that would have mattered much as I saw people there using mountain bikes with big knobby tires. Maybe I'll update my bike with a carbon fiber seat and I'll be ready to go. No matter what, it looked like my kind of event. Laid back and friendly. Yes there were the hardcore triathletes there and all of the competitors worked their butts off, but you could sense that the event was more about coming together than putting someone behind you. Lot's of laughing, lot's of fun but still a true test for everyone. There were a lot of first time triathletes. You gotta start somewhere. I'll do this event next year on my bike that is older than most of the competitors. Then maybe I'll update to some carbon fiber front forks.

Friday night I will be off to the Twin Cities to participate in the Afton Trail Run which is a hilly 50k ultra marathon. This was the place of my first ultra just 3 years ago and still one of my favorites. They offer a 25k event as well and between the 25k and 50k they have a capacity of 500 runners and usually fills up.

As an added bonus, 4 of us will be traveling together. Tim and Jarod will be doing the 50k and Jon the 25k. With my recovery being slow since the Kettle Moraine event, I really don't know how my body is going to respond to the 6,600 feet of elevation loss/gain and the warm July temps. As always, I'll start out slow, take what the trail will give me and hopefully stay injury free.