I signed up for the Life is Good Duathlon awhile ago because I wanted to try a multi sport event without the pressure of swimming.  For a duathlon you run/bike/run a certain amount of miles whereas a triathlon is swim/bike/run.  Both a du and a tri have an area in-between called transition where you set things up ahead of time for the next part of the race.  You place everything on a folded towel next to your bike.  For example, if doing a tri, you have things set up so that when you run in from the swim, everything you need for your biking portion is ready to go.  Then when you finish the bike portion everything else is set up for your run.  There are many different lengths of races to choose from so I started looking for a short course aimed for beginners.  I stumbled upon the Life is Good Duathlon at Peace Valley Park – there were 2 lengths to choose from – short (2 mile run, 5.5 mile bike, 2 mile run) and long (3 mile run, 11 mile bike, 3 mile run).  I decided to go for the short course as I had never even attempted anything like this before and didn’t know what to expect or how my body would handle jumping from one activity to the other back to back.  I did a little research and it seemed like it would be a good beginner course to try.  I assumed both the run and bike would be fairly flat as it stated on their website that there was a  hill that was too much for most people so they rerouted the course this year to take that hill out.  Well you know what they say about assuming right?  🙂

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