This past weekend there was a triathlon here in La Paz. It was a regional championship race, an ITU- distance sprint 750m swim, 20km bike and 5km run. The swim was a pool swim in a really nice 50 meter pool at an an altitude of about 3450m/11,300ft. That's over 400 meters lower than where I live and mostly train, and I could feel the difference. The bike was 8 laps and run was 2 laps on a course with plenty of curves, and a u-turn at both ends. The first half of the lap was very easy and mostly downhill, and then the second half was hard going up. People watching the competition could see the racers two times each lap, which was nice too.
My race was supposed to start at about 12.15, and I think it was about 1pm when it finally started. Not bad for Bolivia. I was glad we didn't race at 8am when it's cold outside. There were three others on my lane and they were younger and two of them quite slow. I don't think I was able to push as hard in the swim as I wanted, and while getting out of the pool I was told there were three people ahead of me. It was warm and sunny outside, and I didn't notice any wind that day. The leader during the first lap was really far ahead, maybe 1.5 minutes. He was an Argentinian. I don't even remember passing the two others because I was focused on going really hard and chasing the leader. After 4.5 laps I reached him, and for two minutes we took it easy and chatted. He was visiting from the city of Salta which is at moderate altitude, but really not much compared to La Paz. Some people were cheering for me, and as the race progressed, more and more people learned my name from them and the support was really good! Apparently they wanted me to beat the Argentinian. Also, just before the race when there is the speech (I can't remember how it's called) I was officially "welcomed back to Bolivia" hehe.
I accelerated two times in an uphill and dropped my competitor (it was a draft legal race). During the last three laps I kept going pretty hard, and had a pretty good lead when the run started. It was around 1 minute, or close at least.
The run went really well too, a lot better than I expected, just like cycling. Nice cruising. The Argentinian didn't run very fast, and I couldn't keep track of others because there were so many people on different laps.I was given a 15 second penalty for having left something on the ground in the first transition, so I had to stop 50 meters before the finish line. This was my second triathlon ever in Bolivia, second win, and both times were a first triathlon after about 1.5 years of not competing. There is a good triathlete in La Paz who has won several national championships, but didn't compete now. There have been no results available though, which is a real problem here. After the race I rode 42 minutes uphill to get home. Then in the evening I went back in a car to participate in the awards ceremony.
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