The Triathlon: A Play By Play

Last Friday we traveled to Las Vegas to attend Wayne's olympic distance triathlon and spend a few days relaxing. It's hard to put such a eventful day into words, so let me just give you the details chronologically.

Lets start with the night before:

10PM We arrive at the hotel, get unloaded, and go to bed. We notice that Peneope's whole body feels like a furnace.

11PM and every hour until 6AM Penelope wakes up moaning and crying and her skin is hot to the touch. I put a cool cloth on her head and blow on her until she falls asleep again. I consider finding a 24 hour pharmacy, use Google to research the worst case scenario diseases she could have contracted, and consider zipping my head inside of the suitcase for not packing Tylenol.

6AM We are all up after very little sleep. Wayne gets ready and I hold a sick and shaky Penelope. Wayne leaves with our friends, Todd & Dini, who we are staying with. I tell them I will try to come later when the race actually starts.

745AM Penelope vomits, I clean up and then she soon falls asleep. I decide we will come to the race for the end.

930AM Penelope wakes up, and I decide it's now or never for trying to go support our dear daddy. Penelope seems able to breathe without either acting like she is going to vomit or pass out.

950AM After carrying Penelope and the Karate Kid around the parking garages for 20 minutes, I cannot seem to locate our car. I decide that Wayne would be done by the time we got there anyway, and head back to the room.

Meanwhile....at the race

Around 930AM All is going well until after Wayne's second flat tire, he has to push the bike for the final two miles of the race. Todd also has bad luck, break's his chain, and has to push his bike nearly 6 miles.

Around 11AM (They were expecting to be done with the entire race at 1030) Wayne and Todd start the running part of the race, and the temperature has risen to over 90 degrees. They have been training all winter in 30-50 degree weather. The six mile run takes them almost twice as long to complete due to the hot desert heat.

I expected them back at the hotel any time after 11, but finally Penelope and I took a long nap and they got back after 1PM. Surprisingly, neither of the guys dropped out of the race. I keep laughing picturing Todd pushing his bike for six miles. It's really not that funny, but because the chain was broken, Todd could push the bike on the flat and up the hills, and jump on and coast down the hills. The funny part is that when he would coast down a hill and jump off to push, people thought he was an amateur and just couldn't make it up the hill so he had to jump off and push. So they would encourage him and cheer, "You're doing great! You can bike up the hill!" etc.

On the down side I have no pictures and wasn't there to support my husband while he tried to run and push his bike through the hot desert. On the bright side, I didn't drag a sick kid along to wait for HOURS in the shadeless Lake Meade gravel.

Penelope has been improving, I bought some medicine, and we are all happily relaxing and enjoying swimming.