Dualthlonning in Fredericksburg

After traffic died down a little bit on Friday night, we left Arlington and headed south on 95, sat in crazy amounts of traffic despite our efforts, and arrived in Fredericksburg just in time to grab some dinner with friends, have a drink or two, and get to bed.  We stayed with a friend from college and his girlfriend at their adorable, cozy townhouse.

Just before 7am on Saturday morning, the alarms went off and we were up and moving slowly.  While the guys went over to the race to start warming up, the ladies went over to Eileen's Bakery to catch a little more coffee and some breakfast.

The duathlon was held at the site of a place called the Virginia Outdoor Center, which has a bunch of fun stuff, like canoes, kayaks, hiking/biking trails, and tubing trips.  They even have some other obstacle-type activities that I once did as part of a team-building exercise with my college Field Hockey team. 

It was a super low-key event with about 50 participants.  The distances were approximate and the timing involved a watch, note pad and pen, but it was a blast to watch!  We ran into some local people we knew from living in Fredericksburg and made a few new friends while watching the race.  

The mountain biking looked hard, and several participants came through the finish line walking their broken bike -- one guy definitely had a few parts dangling off the side.

The guys both seemed to have fun, and I think they would do it again.  They even won a thermos or something like that ;)