I qualified for Team USA by limping around the Daytona 500 track.
The race was the 2023 USA Triathlon Long Course Duathlon National Championship at Daytona International Speedway. The format was a 5K run, a 56-mile bike, and a 13.1-mile run.
The first 5K went to plan. The bike felt fine too. I averaged about 22 miles per hour with my heart rate around 135. I came into the second transition relaxed and ready to run the half marathon.
Then I got off the bike.
My ankle hurt so badly that I could not run. I did not know why. The only available version of the last leg was a limp, so I limped the whole thing.
I started moving anyway.
That is a long way to limp anywhere. It is especially strange when part of the route is inside the Daytona International Speedway and everybody else is racing.
The Team USA spot was priority number one. USA Triathlon used the national championship to qualify age-group athletes for the following year's World Triathlon Multisport Championships. Even with the ankle, I got what I had gone to Daytona for.
The messages after the finish were not complicated. It hurt. I could not run off the bike. I still qualified.
Daytona had a beach, a pool, and plenty more bicycles to inspect. I spent the next day stretching, looking for a bike shop, and trying to work out why my ankle had stopped cooperating.
The result said qualified.
My ankle had a different review.