The Swim...

I line up near the front with my newfound swim confidence and a couple of team mates and get adjusted to the water. Gun goes off, start my watch and begin my swim. Things start off much as expected; a lot of positioning and a lot of me getting passed by some of the faster swimmers. As I am getting through the fray of the start, something begins to not feel right. I can't breathe. What's going on?

My wetsuit is attacking me.

The neck of my suit has creeped up and is pressing on my throat. So much so that it begins to consume my thoughts and I start to panic. I swim off to the side and call over one of the kayaks and ask the girl if she'll unzip my suit a bit. She did, I caught my breath again and started swimming. But just as soon as I start to get back into it, it begins again. WTF????? Why is this happening? Then my mind starts going NUTS!! OMG, I'm not going to finish. I can't breathe. I'm can't do this. But I've done two IM's, why is this happening? I'm not going to be able to do IM AZ next month. All these negative thoughts started to consume my every thought. Finally, some sense came about me and I knew I HAD to finish: my family and team mates were expecting it. I was expecting it.

So what I did next was out of pure determination to finish. I called over a guy and girl on a jet ski and told the guy, "I gotta get out of this suit". He didn't bat an eye, just said, "Ok". Somehow, I managed to get my suit unzipped and down over my hips all while still being in the water. Then I grabbed onto the side of the jet ski and flung my legs up and over the side and the guy took my suit and yanked it off. I said thanks and went about swimming again.

FREEDOM!! Freedom from the strangling suit. I had never felt better in the water than I did at that moment. A renewed sense of confidence got me swimming strong again. My mind settled back into a positive state and the rest of the swim was uneventful.

(turns out my suit has become a bit big for me, I guess losing 14 pounds will do that!)

On to the BIKE!!