Got the Nerve Report Part 1

This is the first of a series of reports on the Got the Nerve Triathlon held in Mt. Gretna, PA on May 22 2010.  It was my first triathlon so its a pretty cool deal.
This post is a prequel to the actual race itself.  We used a disposable camera and still have 12 pictures to burn as of the writing of this blog.  So pictures and video are coming soon.
Friday afternoon I shot out of work to lots of well wishes and re-explanations of what I was going to be doing the next morning, which is no problem because I love talking about it.

I got home laid out all my gear to make sure I had everything  For those who know me well I have swiss cheese for brains and I tend to forget things.  Once I got everything laid out I packed it up got everything into the car and took a 15 minute cat nap Renee and Liam got home.
As we headed down the road Liam was acting a little more fussy than usual.  Those with toddlers know that long car rides are not the most fun in the world.  Liam also has a screech which leaves his mouth and goes right into your spine.  It does not stop there but spreads itself out along you neck and shoulders.  This does not provide for a relaxing or enjoyable ride, but this would only serve as a precursor for the night to come.

We stopped in Wilkes -Barre at an Applebees for dinner.  I found to best looking pasta dish on the menu to store some carbs.  It was a Three Cheese Penne with Grilled Chicken.  It was not anything to write home about, but good enough to serve its purpose.  One interesting site we saw was this, a alrge dresser sticking out of the back of a sedan...it did not look very safe.
Our original plan was to stay with some family in Lancaster but due to a lack of beds we opted to stay in a hotel.  There were a couple of reasons for this, but the primary one was I needed/wanted a good nights sleep.  Second it was only about ten minutes from the race site.  We made a half-hearted effort the night before to find the race site site but to no avail. Turns out I turned around about 500 yards from the turn-off.
We got to the hotel around 7:30 which normally is Liam's bed-time.  We did our best to rock him, give him a snack, but by 9pm he still was not going down.  Renee and I were both losing steam and I really wanted to get some rest.  So I took liam for a walk on my shoulders through the hotel.  I thought he might be fading, but by 10pm he was still going.  I got the stroller and we did laps around the Hampton Inn.  I am sure I covered over a mile and it still did not seem like he was fading.  Finally at 11:15 he passed out-and so did we.
At 3am we were awoken abruptly by some yelling and arguing.  And it wasn't like it was down the hall, it was right outside our door.  The guys was going on and on about who knows what.  Finally I hear another voice of a older woman scream "Hey big-mouth, people are trying to sleep!"  I thought she handled it well because things quieted down after that.  I found out the next morning it was a drunken wedding just back from the reception and the State Police had almost been called.

My wake-up call came at 4:45 I got up went downstairs ate a bagel with Peanut butter, a banana and some coffee.  When I got back upstairs my family was still sleeping.  I got them up (reluctantly-he's so precious when he sleeps) and we got on the road.
The parking area was already filling up when we got to the race site.  I started to feel twinges of self-inflicted intimidation as I got the bike out and my gear set.  I picked up my race packet and got my body marked with my bib number 534 and my age on my right calf.  This number would prove very useful in my own observation during the bike leg which i will save for the next post.  Thanks for reading!