BEast of the Southeast Super Sprint

It was my very first time competing triathlons that I toed the start line with the professionals, the very best off-road triathletes of the world. I wasn't as scared as it sounds, in fact I was rather excited to see how I fare against them. I was rather afraid of the course itself and how my recent muscle strain will affect my race. I happened to fall during pre-riding the course just hours before the race and pulled my neck muscle bad enough to give me discomfort while turning my head or bending over. The water was very shallow so we had to line up quite far from the shore. The swim was fast and short. At around 200yards it ended before I could have picked up the pace. I am not sure if I wasn't the last out of the watet but I sure wasn't the last leaving T1. I quickly passed another athlete then another who happened to get stuck on a tree that went through his spokes. I rode in no man's land and got of the bike about 1000m behind the leaders. Ohh well.. I knew I wasn't going to be in contest with the best but I sure didn't want to take last either. I missed going through the finish line just before the T2 instead had to back track an go through tapes to find my way into the transition. I sprinted out and sprinted almost the entire 1.3 miles through the technical forest and caught Damien Gonzalez only about 500m to go. He hrld off good going downhill so I had to find some long-time-used gears to go past him. The race was rather quick for me and had hard time finding the rhythm (all- out speeds). When I am typing this I had to forfeit the pro race at noon on Saturday because I woke with the worst neck and shoulder pain I have ever had. I will have to call it a day and just watch the pros and amateurs doing the short course mtb race and hope that I will get better by tomorrow morning where I can compete in the amateur off-road tri at 9am. I am excited to race and see how I'll do on this quick but technical course. We shall see.