At 6:30o´clock, everybody in Germany is still asleep. Everybody? No way, of course not, some maniacs found each other in düsseldorf, for the first triathlon there, over the sprinting distance( 0,75/20/5). There were only 101men and 36 women on the start, so the check-in was very fast and so, I still had time to take a look around and get back to my bed again, just in mind of course…
At 7:35o´clock I pulled on my wet suit and went towards the start of the swimming and to listen to the contest-briefing and after the briefing we had some time to get to know the waters( muddy harbour brew) before the start.
At 8:00o´clock was the starting signal and soon the field were apart,after 750, I escaped the waters over a ramp to the transition area after 16:37min. And 2:20min later, I sat on my bike, wet and cold, while the outside temperatures were around 14degrees and so I needed the whole first round to warm up a bit. On the bike course you had to ride over two bridges over the river Rhine towards a turning point than over 200mmof really bad cobble stone pavement ( I thought my bike get itself into its component parts), passing the parliament and back to the harbor. You had to ride three rounds and after 34:09min the fun was over for me. For the 2nd change I only needed 1:26min and were able to run with another starter on the 5km running course with two rounds thru the harbor and after 19:19min, and I crossed the finish line with the same time with the other, because no one was faster than the other in the closing sprint, our time 1:13:50h.