The Big Race

I nearly scared myself out of our Big Triathlon before we even started it last weekend. First, on the plane ride to Mississippi (the race we chose is associated with a county fair my family's been going to for 25 years) I made the mistake of reading an article about the dangers of running in extreme heat. It had been more than 100 degrees for several weeks in Mississippi.

"Is my pee straw-colored?" I asked Tiffany.

She sighed, regretting her own mistake, I'm sure, of telling me about the article in the first place.

"No, seriously," I said. "It has to be straw-colored. If it's yellower, I haven't been drinking enough. If it's clearer, I've been drinking too much. Also, I need to eat something salty."

I handed us each one of the bags of peanuts I'd stashed from our first flight.

I didn't feel any better when we got to our pre-race meeting. Every car in the lot had an Ironman or half-Ironman sticker on it. All the men had shaved legs like women and all the women had muscles like men. Also, some of the women were wearing full make-up, which was intimidating in its own way. I began to feel weak and unattractive, all at once.

Then, the race director opened the pre-race meeting with a prayer. This was definitely a regional twist.

"Dear Lord, please be with our triathletes; help them to stay strong and please make sure none of them go down."

Far from reassuring me, the prayer just reminded me I probably had something to pray about.

But, you know what, maybe some of that prayer rubbed off. On Saturday, it was a cool 85 degrees. I didn't bother checking the color of my pee, and Tiffany and I didn't drown, crash or go down. In fact, we did better than we expected. Even without mascara.