Osoyoos Race Report

My 5th triathlon of my life had its good and bad elements. The day threatened to be rainy but seemed to hold back by the time we got on our bikes. The run was humid and a perfect temperature.

I had two goals going into this race. The first was to get my qualifying IM spot which I did by placing 1st in my age category of F45-49. The second was to experience my bike on a longer ride and in a race setting. I had only been on my new bike twice prior to the race and was a tad nervous, anxious and protective of it. However, “mini me” (that’s the new bike’s name) and I bonded and it was christened with some dirt and rain.

I had some difficulties in the swim. I had a panic attack which I have never experienced before. I almost thought I would have to call the boat over and quit the race. However, I managed to settle myself down after a couple of minutes. Once I got going, I was fine and found myself moving through a number of swimmers. I believe that my lack of a proper swim warm-up is what caused the panic attack. I just felt like I could not breathe and my chest tightening up. It was scary!

My bike was solid. The course is a 93 km course and without transitions my time was 2:50. I was slow on my transitions which is unusual for me. That added a good 8 minutes to my bike time. Part of the bike course is on Black Sage Road which I found to be very rough; so much so that I managed to lose my cartridge. Thank god I did not flat. Lots of people flatted.

I was unsure about my run. The course has many turns and traverses from gravel, pavement, and up and down stairs. I just found that I could never sustain my momentum on the run. In the end, I had the 5th fastest female run. I cannot complain about that when there were some really great runners in the field such as Lori Bowden and Linsay Pickell.

Final outcome:
11th Female
1st F45-49
Times: Swim 42:38 (Sorry Colin!); Bike with transition 2:58:25; Run 1:39:33;
Total Time: 5:20:35


I am happy with my training progression as I head into the last 12 weeks of my IM training. I feel that I am well on target for IM. My taper for this race was only a couple of days so I raced a bit tired. My view is that you cannot taper for every race and you need to choose which the key ones are. For me, those races include the Vancouver Sun Run, Duathlon World’s and IM Canada. Everything else is training.

Great races posted by Kyle who took the overall title, and Krista who had the race of her life and placing 6th women.