Tina Coleman's First Triathlon!

Tina is part of our "Raise the Hope" squad and Cascades Edge was her first triathlon. She is a fighter. :) Congratulations to you, Tina!! Here's her story:

I felt like I got a good nights sleep, don’t remember being restless in the middle of night or anything like that, and I definitely didn’t have any more nightmares of coming out of the lake during the race naked. Yes, naked. After Patty worked my butt off in Lake Morton Thursday night, I had these nightmares that I was in the swim leg of a tri, and I was coming out of the lake naked and had to go back in the water to find my wetsuit and the race went on without me and I never got to finish. Is that weird or what? Anyway, had a good nights sleep, got up at 5:30am, my husband loaded the truck for me, I made a slice of pb&j toast which I gagged down; it’s really hard to eat when your nervous. By 6:15am we were headed on our way to Nolte, in the rain. The rain didn’t really bother or worry me; I knew I was doing this no matter what, rain or shine. I did have butterflies the entire way there though, and tried to keep drinking my water. Got to Nolte and found Teresa right away. I had my bike, my gym bag, a backpack and a Fred Meyer bag with my vitamin water and bananas in it. I was really loaded down with stuff and was driving Brooks (my husband) crazy because I wouldn’t let him help me carry anything. I figured it was my race and I should carry all of my stuff, I didn’t want any help, I need to do this myself. He just hated it because he thought it made him look un-chivalrous; so I let him hold my water that I was drinking. So I got my packet, had the bike people inflate my tires for me and got “marked”. Found our transition area, and happily also found Cathy, Patti, Elizabeth and Ruth. Once all my stuff was laid out, we decided to go look at the water and find our buoys. There they were, big and orange and daring me to come out and play. Went back to the transition area to suit up in my neoprene armor and prepare for battle. When we headed back out to shore we found Kristin Anderson and Teresa’s husband Ron. I was sick to my stomach and scared to tears, literally. I think Kristin was the only one who saw my eyes watering and it quickly passed as I had to pay attention to the announcer’s instructions. Before I knew it we were lining up to the start and stepping into the water. Water wasn’t too bad, not as cold as I remembered the week before and then I hear “45 seconds”, I’m in the water jogging in place to get the blood flowing, the “trickle” isn’t so bad either, I’m thinking I can do this, I’ve been training, this is equivalent to 18 lengths of the pool, I can do this! Then I hear “5, 4,3,2,1 GO”! I take off into the water and I’m feeling strong, 1 2 3 take a breathe, 123 take a breathe, 123 take a breathe and then I realize that the breathes aren’t going in. I am literally gasping for air, my chest is locked up and I can’t breath. So I stop. I am no longer swimming and I am bobbing around in the water trying to catch my breathe. I can hear Patty’s voice telling me not to stop, keep going, so I take off again and it’s no good, still can’t breathe. So I begin to doggy paddle, I think to myself that I have to finish this no matter what, and humility has gone out the window on this one. I begin to hear the announcer preparing the Olympic Men to start, I’m doggy paddling, I hear the Men take off and I’m doggy paddling, I hear them behind me like a tsunami approaching and I’m freakin’ DOGGY PADDLING! I don’t want to turn around, because if I do, I’m done for. So I make it to the first buoy just as the Men are jetting past me. I’m safe. The Kids in the canoe look pretty worried and I let them know that I’m ok. I look back to the shore and think wow, that’s pretty far, but that next buoy isn’t, so I take off swimming. I am feeling good and make it to the second buoy. I rest a bit and take off again for about 20 strokes and stop again, I look to shore I see Teresa getting out of the water. GO TERESA I yell and scare the canoe Kids who aren’t too far away. I go for it again and I am really disappointed at how fatigued I am. I stop again and try to pee because that 20oz vitamin water that I downed before the race is throbbing in my bladder. Can’t pee, relax Tina, you can do this you have to pee you have 11 miles ahead of you and you can’t stop at the buckets right now. Can’t pee, so I try to keep swimming and end up doggy paddling until I can touch the ground. I get out expecting to see my team totally disgusted at me for my weak attempt at pretending to be a triathlete and I all see are smiles and voracious cheers. I see Patty standing there in here bike helmet, yelling GO TINA GO!!! I walk the entire way to transition trying to shake off the shame of my swimming disaster. Then I see 2 RTB team members/spectators outside the transition area cheering me on as I am rolling out with my bike and helmet telling me I am doing great, clearly they didn’t see me swim. I yell back, “when do the nerves calm down?” and the gal says to me “right now, on the bike”. Good, I thought. So I head out on my bike and the first mile is a struggle, my legs are burning and I’m trying to open my power bar that I stuffed in my sports bra without crashing. Don’t really remember when the burning stopped but I do remember all our amazing RTB teammates cheering me on. I would see our colors flying by and I would hear “RAISE THE BAR” “you’re doing great”, “keep going”, “looking good”, “nice work”. Whether riders were coming or going, I heard shouts from both directions. I felt great and I’m pretty sure I was smiling. I was doing ok with my gears and I made it through all the hills. There were 3 times where I wanted to get off and walk but I kept hearing Patty “DON”T STOP TINA”! I made it over the hills and I kept thinking as soon as I see that little store, I’m golden. Now I still haven’t gone to the bathroom and tried to go while I was on my bike; gross, I know but by this time I was in serious turmoil. I can see the lights of the patrol car in front of the park and I know I’m there, I’ve finished the bike leg. I easily roll through the parking lot and I see my dear sweet husband at the end of the lot looking worried and proud and cheering me on. I dismount my bike and roll to the transition area, dump off my bike and head to the bathrooms, finally. Of course I lost at least 5-6 minutes in order to do this, but I didn’t care at this point. So I head back to the runner’s start, take a cup of water and start my walk. It was muddy, slippery and treacherous. It was at this point where I had lots of time to think, time to think about how insane this was and why would anyone in their right mind choose to do this. I was mad. I thought to myself, instead of calling this a Tri It, they should call it a Hate It. I can’t wait to be done, this sucks and I can’t believe I’m here doing this of my own free will. Then they started in on my again, “RAISE THE BAR” “you’re doing great”, “keep going”, “looking good”, “nice work”. This was also about the time that Luis Diaz passed me up and gave me a high five and told me to keep it up and said he passed Teresa up too and that she’s doing great. So I decided to run a little and it felt good. Not too long after that I was coming through park and really had my arms pumping doing kind of a speed walking thing. My legs were burning but I had to show my husband that I was ok and it felt great once again to see everyone, Brooks, Melissa, Patti, Patty, Kristin, Ruth, Elizabeth, Cathy and others. The second lap around the park was much faster and I did a lot more running than my first time around. There was this one RTB gal who had on red under armor, who was my run angel. She was so sweet and every time she passed me she gave me a big smile and would have great words for me. If anyone knows who she was please tell her she’s wonderful for me. She finished her Olympic just after my Tri it and I walked up and thanked her, but I wish I knew who she was.

Finishing was the best part of the day, finishing with at RTB jersey was a close second. Thank you all for your encouragement and support. I am so proud to be a RTB team member.

I will never forget my first outdoor triathlon. It was humiliating, painful, dirty, wet, exhausting, exhilarating, uplifting, empowering and wonderful. I ran across the finish line that day, and it was great.

What I learned:
Never give up. Even though triathlon is an individual sport, it’s good to be on a team, because you are never alone.

3 things I must do before Danskin:

1) warm up before my swim, so I can get my breathing worked out; both Patty and Kristin advised this and I didn’t listen
2) learn to pee in my wetsuit
3) work on my running endurance, I didn’t fall asleep after the race like I usually do so I think I had more to give than I actually gave. I wasn’t even that sore today, except for my bum.