Hansen Dam is about 30 minutes north of Los Angeles. I chose to not pick up my packet on Saturday and just get there especially early on Sunday morning to pick up my packet. I arrived at 5am, which was way earlier then I needed to. By the time I had picked up my packet other people had arrived to set up their transition area as this race is first come as far as transition area spots. So I decided to set up my bike and transition area. They allowed everyone to hop in the lake from 6 to 6:45 for a warm up swim and then transition would be shut down. At 7am the race started. First off the water is very warm at this event. They announced it at 78, I thought it was above 80. The race starts off in a small area between to docks and you swim straight for about 20 yards and take a left at a buoy, from there it is 3 right turns and you come in to the same small area where you started at so if you are in an earlier wave you need to pay attention when you come in. The swim was a little more aggressive then the only other tri (Strawberry) I have ever done but nothing brutal. My swim time was 12:33, not near my goal but not terrible. Transition 1 is a quick 30 yard jog on asphalt from the lake. I had a horrible time in T1 getting my shirt on as I chose to swim without it. Otherwise nothing really special here, they had people telling you where you could mount so it was overall an easy transition. My time was 2:56, we will just call that an epic fail. The bike course is pretty awesome, by far one of my favorite rides I have done since getting into tris. It has a lot of small rolling hills which are very similar to riding on PCH after trancas. I was able to pass a lot of people while only being passed by very few, one of which had the fastest bike time in the entire tri. One thing I didn’t like was there seemed to be a lot of lower level riders who would not stay to the right if they were going slow. I probably passed 25% of my people on the right because of this. The other interesting part in this race is about a 1.5 mile strip on top of the dam where there are pedestrians walking next to or on the bike course. It made it very difficult to pass people at this point because of the very little room and cones everywhere. Overall I had a great bike time of 31:24, beating my goal by 2 min. Also the bike course was only 10 miles on my garmin. Transition 2 is pretty simple, by the time you get off your bikes it’s a 20 yard run back into transition area. My time was 1:54, not terrible but nowhere near respectable. The run is also a great course, you start off running around the lake which will be the last piece of cement or asphalt you run on, the rest of the course is on dirt or grass, but mainly dirt. The course is mainly flat with a little downhill at the beginning and a small climb at the end. The first water station is about ¾ mile into the run with the other at the half way point. My running time was 26:42, beating my goal by 18 seconds. My overall time was 1:15:31, missed my goal by 31 seconds, got to blame my slow transition times. Overall this is a really fun tri and they have plenty of food for you at the end, bagels, oranges and bananas galore. If you have any questions don’t hesitate to email me. Jason Kummer jkforex@yahoo.com