Soma Triathlon

Its Friday afternoon and I just go back from work. Suddenly my phone rings and it's T-Ride. "Hey Adam, do you want to go to Phoenix?" I thought for a minute and about the 4 weeks of laundry I needed to do and if I had enough cloths for 2 more days. Then I said, "Mmmm...Okay!" Four hours later we were on the road to Arizona blasting and rocking out to old classic rock hits and 80's rap.

T-ride is one of those guys that knows everybody. As we entered Tuscon we found and met up with Chris Green and his brother Cameron. They were both triathletes and raced for the University of Arizona. Chris and Cameron (but mostly Chris) were big party guys and being Friday night we had somewhere to go. I was pretty tired and hungry during the party so I was pretty lame but I did get in a nice game of darts with Cameron. After the party we spent the night at the Green's in our sleeping bags on the floor.

The next morning, Saturday, was a brick workout with the University of Arizona Triathlon team. Tuscon, actually, was recently named the best place to live if you are a triathlete. You could ride down any busy street and see other bikers everywhere. The cars were very respectful and patient too. The weather is fantastic basically all year and there is an infinite number of routs, trails and pools. The brick workout we did was very quick and easy. Maybe a ten mile ride and a three mile run through the university campus. It was pretty slick throwing in monster attacks on my Pinarello while racing through traffic and flying around corners. That kind of riding really helps your handling skills, something I lack. After the ride we stopped at the famous TriSports.com shop. Pretty much amazing. If you need anything at all for the swim, bike or run this is the place. Me, I got some hand paddles. I guess I will have to start swimming again.

So now we're in Phoenix and its 90 plus degrees. Weather in the desert southwest during fall is picture perfect. We dropped T-Rides bike off at transition 2 and then worked on where to stay for the night. We had a couple of options but nothing seemed that good. We were running out of ideas and ready to pitch the tent in a park or the back of the truck when T-Ride remembered the website couchsurfing.com. If you don't know about this site (like me) it is a site where you sign up and when you need a place to stay in a new town just call a person on the list and see if its cool to sleep on their couch for the night. We scrolled down the list and saw a dude with a guitar named Ari. He lived really close to the race start too. We gave him a call and he agreed to meet us when he got off of work at 9:00.

Ari was so amazing and his house was pretty sweet as well. He and his 3 other room mates were musicians and artists. Lots of talent in that house. We talked for a little bit and then hit the sack. It would have been nice to stay up a little longer and learn more but I was exhausted. We left at around 4:15 in the morning to get to the race with about 2 hours before race start so we never saw Ari again.

The Soma half ironman triathlon was much bigger than I thought. There were over a thousand entrants including several professionals. The course was pretty dang flat and the run looped around the reservoir. T-Ride kept trying to get me to race it but I am pretty sure I would die if I did. I could race an olympic on pure bike training but running a half marathon on no run training might be kind of painful. Instead I just offered to take pictures as T-Ride zipped around Tempe, Arizona for the rest of the morning.

I was so excited watching the race. I was running around like a madman with my camera trying to get as many pictures as I could. I mean what else am I going to do for 5 hours. T-ride had a pretty good race despite bonking on the run. That's okay man, it happens to everyone, you'll figure it out next time. After the race we had our meal, said our goodbyes, and got back in the car for the long ride back to Las Cruces. It was yet another fantastic weekend. I am so glad I found this sport and the people in it. It makes life so much brighter.