Run, Bike, Run, Puke..

It's officially the crap season in North America. It's cold, dark at like 3:00pm and cold and wet and dark. For solar powered lovers of outdoor exercise and related Tom-foolery that poses a bit of difficulty to our lifestyle. Given that and my need to punish myself physically and have fun, I accepted my sister's invitation to enter the Double Trouble Duathlon at Bays Mountain in Kingsport, TN yesterday. After signing an affidavit that I would not have to run any, that I was merely going to be a hired gun on the mountain bike leg, Megan entered us and it was on.

The format was a 5k run, 15k bike and 5k run. The bike portion was hilly but skipped some of the nasty climbs at Bays Mtn and I was looking forward to getting out there and playing some. Megan warmed up while I played on my bike.

And took time for some candid shots with my peeps.....

Soon it was time to get serious and race. Megan lined up with 40something other competitors and they were off. She would be out for about 30 minutes and then it was my turn to unleash the devastating power of the Pato.

She had a decent run considering she hasn't been running much lately (the Archer kids rarely overtrain...... :p) and she came in with a respectable (and injury free) time.

Now it was my turn to do what I do best. I took off and immediately caught  several riders that had the nerve to get out of the transition ahead of us. On the first climb I caught 7 more and over the next few miles, I caught more. Fifteen total. I was having a load of fun. Granted, many of the people I was passing weren't strong in cycling and could assuredly whip my butt if we were running. But we weren't running and that is the difference. I had some strong friends of mine out there with about a 9 minute head start and my goal was to catch them but it wasn't happening. I got off the mountain and back to the valley road and just cruised into the transition.

Megan took off on the second run leg and she pretty much left it all out on the trails. I am proud of how she can dig down deep and deliver the goods when it counts. She did great! We ended up 15th overall and 2nd in Co-Ed and had a load of fun in the process. I can't wait for the next one!

Thanks Megan for inviting me and many thanks to Varinka for the pics and the cowbell ringing that could be heard all over the valley. It definitely helped! I'm glad you were there.