Less of a man, more of a triathlete

From the Too Much Information Department:

I am finally a real triathlete; I shaved my legs. I can't fully explain why I did it, it was just something I was curious about because all the Cool Kids do it and it was pretty much now or never. I figured that If I shaved my legs my tri-friends wouldn't care, but at some point my non-tri-peeps would notice and it would be hard to explain. I figure that Wildflower is a shave-worthy event, so I can just make up some story about it being a Wildflower Tradition or something like that.

I do have some advice for newbies who are thinking about shaving for the first time:

1. You are hairier than you think. You might believe that your legs aren't really that hairy; they are. You might think that the large plastic bag on the floor will surely catch all the hair you shave off; you're wrong.

2. Sharp new razor blades will cut your skin very cleanly. So cleanly that the nicks won't start bleeding for several minutes. The trick is to shave slowly enough to be careful, but quickly enough so that by the time the first blood appears you're already finished. Once you see blood you won't want to continue, so you just wait and see where else you start leaking.

3. If you are built like a 14-year old, after shaving you will look like a 12-year old.

4. How high up your legs you go is up to you; the weird part is how far DOWN you have to go. If you shave your legs, you have to shave your feet or you'll look like a Hobbit. (Somebody else first made that analogy, but I can now confirm it.)

For more advice, check out Stewie:

How not to shave (900k Quicktime Movie)

I saw a lot of shaved legs at Ironman Arizona but the funny thing is my legs don't look like that. Maybe if I wax...