On Saturday 26th of July there was a triathlon over the olympic distance at Mürzer Oberland at Neuberg an der Mürz in and around the Urani pond. Before there were a aquathlon competition and a hobby triathlon.
Exactly at 14:00 the start signal was given for the 1500 meters swim separated into three laps in the larger but still small pond and another shorter lap in the smaller pond which were connected to each other over a channel. First half of the first lap was very tough – in my opinion there were too many athletes at the same time for the size of the pond so I was just able to swim like a water polo player. After the turn at the first buoy it happened that I got pushed towards the shore and all of a sudden it was digging in the ground of the pond. As i was startled I looked out of the water to see where I exactly was and I noticed a nother athlete who was standing in the water and jumping into it with a header. After the second turn the field got separated more and more and it was possible for me to concentrate more on my own swimming skills than on other athletes although I still got some hits on my feet.

After coming out of the water there were still a few meters of running to the transition area

During the 40k biking course it rained several times which had a very pleasant cooling effect but also made the road a bit slippery so you had to take care and not risk too much.

All in all I had no trouble on the road and after an hour I returned into the transition area and back on the running track.
There was a course of about 5k on a path over grass and brash that has to be run twice by every athlete. Due to the rain the meadow was sometimes a little deep, therefore, it was not easy to accelerate all the time. But this could also had its reason because the sun and the before fallen rain made hazy conditions on the track – felt like in the jungle!

In the end I finished my second triathlon over the olympic distance in 2:09:13 on the 50th overall rank, and the 15th place in my class (M-MA24) .