Wetsuits

With the Taylorsville Triathlon coming up in 4 weeks, I figured I better go ahead and buy a wetsuit so that I could get in a few practice swims before the race.
Here's the wetsuit guidelines set forth by USA Triathlon:

• USAT rules state that competitors may wear wetsuits if the water temperature is 78 degrees or lower.
• USAT rules also state that if the water temperature is between 78.1 - 83.9 degrees, competitors may wear wetsuits but will not be eligible for awards.
• If the water temperature is 84 degrees or above, participants may not wear wetsuits. 

The current water temperature at Taylorsville Lake is 60F...yes, I found it online. I wouldn't guess that it would warm up more than 5 or so degrees come May 15th. So it's obvious that I will need to wear a wetsuit if I plan on being in the lake for 45-50 minutes!

I went down to Swim-Bike-Run of Kentucky in Lexington to buy a wetsuit. Sure, there are lots of places around Louisville that sell them, but no one has an endless pool where you can try on various suits and actually swim in them before deciding on which one to buy. I tried on 4 different suits and ended up going with the 2XU C:2 (pictured below).

I told myself that I would not look at prices until I swam in all of them so that I could make an honest decision on which one I liked. Fortunately, the one I like was the cheapest of the full sleeve suits! It wasn't cheap, but it could have been a lot worse!

Believe me when I say that getting a wetsuit on and off is no easy task. I had to have help getting all 4 on and it took me around a minute to get each one off...I'll have to practice this or it will do some damage to my transition times. Notice to all of my neighbors...if you see me in the yard wearing a wetsuit, spraying myself with a hose, then running through the yard trying to take off the wetsuit as I run...don't be alarmed.

I may end up taking back all some of this stuff I said about wetsuits...we'll see once I actually race in one.

YESTERDAY'S WORKOUT:
Ran some ladder intervals.
1 mile warm-up run (8:10)
5 minutes of drills, then the intervals.
Intervals were run on the indoor track. Started off with 2 laps, taking a 30 second break, then adding 2 laps to each interval until I was up to 14 laps (1 mile).
2 laps - 0.14mi - 0:53 (6:18 min/mile pace)
4 laps - 0.29mi - 1:52 (6:39)
6 laps - 0.43mi - 3:02 (7:13)
8 laps - 0.57mi - 4:09 (7:16)
10 laps - 0.71mi - 5:14 (7:22)
12 laps - 0.86mi - 6:21 (7:23)
14 laps - 1 mile - 7:26
Total workout: 4.5 miles in 48:21

Swam 1.2 miles (distance of swim in Taylorsville Lake race) in 41:47
5 minutes of drills
Total workout: 2400 yards in 49:54