Nautica Malibu

In his own version of the midlife crisis, my brother decided he wanted to jump on the triathlon bandwagon, and asked me if I had any interest in doing the Nautica Malibu triathlon with him. The idea immersed in May. I said sure and sent him all kinds of tips for training. I spoke with him periodically throughout the summer and the key thing I was trying to drill into his head was how important practicing in the open water would be. But you know what they say about leading a horse to water...you can't make them swim in it.

Despite the fact that I've officially retired from TNT, I managed to train somewhat regularly over the summer. I even did a great swim in Aquatic Park the week before the race with Rebecca and Nate. It was during the 4-day heat wave we had in early September known as "summer" and actually quite nice conditions for Aquatic Park. But I digress.

The Nautica Malibu triathlon now ranks as one of my favorite tri's to date. While each race that I've done has it's positives and negatives, Malibu is really quite approachable, like the Merlot of triathlons. I flew down Thursday night, Andy I went to register on Friday. Pretty good shwag, including female-specific race shirts which in my book, already makes the race a winner. The San Francisco crew, starring Rebecca, Nate, Geoff, Tiffiny and Shaun were all driving down and arriving later on Friday. Most of us didn't meet up until we found each other in the transition area Saturday morning.

Historically, the race has been a celebrity triathlon offering a sprint distance only. The race directors must have looked at their financial spreadsheet and realized how much money they could make if they extended the race and added an olympic distance. Sure enough, they got 1,000 people to sign up for the Oly on Saturday and another 2,000 for the sprint (including J LO, Matthew McConaughey and Andy Baldwin) on Sunday.

The swim was probably the most challenging part of the race; the first leg was through the breakers, totally new for me and not so easy getting pounded by waves during that first stretch in the water. Getting to that first buoy felt like it took forever, but once out there, it was a straight line to the 6th buoy, turn, and then body surfing into the finish. I came out of the water at 30 minutes, but the walk through the sand to the timing chip sensors put me at 31 minutes.

The bike was an out-and-back, all along a gorgeous stretch of the PCH. There were a couple of rollers but mostly flat and the race organizers managed to get one lane of traffic closed to cars. On the way back, we rode past miles of cars backed up waiting for the intersections to open up. I must confess, it brought me some happiness (the fleeting base kind) to see all the fancy Malibu cars and their self-absorbed drivers (with yappy dogs wearing clothing) standing there looking ticked off. I saw Andy on the bike and was happy to see that he had made it through the swim. Time on bike: 1:30

The run was also along the PCH and completely flat. The ocean was in site the whole time and during one stretch, I saw dolphins swimming in the water right offshore. When I saw Andy on the run and told him the end was in sight, he responded "I f'ing hate this" which made me laugh. I don't know of any triathlete who thinks the run is a fun experience. At mile 4, I looked at my watch and realized that if I pushed myself, I was within reach of getting a sub-3-hour overall time. I picked up my speed a bit, but unfortunately, my knees were not on board with the plan and I had to slow down to my standard sluggish triathlon run pace. Still, I finished with my best run time at 1 hour and overall time, 3:09.

My brother rolled in about a half hour later and as we congratulated him, the confession came out: he swam about 1/3 of the swim then come to shore. He then snuck into the transition area and got on his bike, then he did the run. He actually had a better time on the bike than me (by 3.5 minutes), which we later calculated about 1 minute of that could be attributed to the better bike and the rest was just sheer determination to beat his little sis. Still, ya gotta love the father/child finish, which I captured on video as Abby ran out to meet him on the finish chute.

Sunday's celebrity race made headlines all across the rags and it was interesting to see the special treatment the stars got. J Lo had an entourage escort her from the swim to the bike and Matthew had a chair setup for him in the transition area. But the stars did something that the rest of us couldn't; they raised a couple hundred thousand dollars for the Children's Hospital. For that, I will grant them leeway.

Not sure what's next on the triathlon circuit. Marin is coming up in October...