I made a lot of angry sounds when I realized that my temperamental phone (which I use as an alarm clock) had decided to turn itself off overnight despite indicating a full battery the previous evening.
I decided to give it a shot anyway. Threw on the stupendously revealing Tri-Suit, some shorts and a t-shirt and headed out. Grabbed the only liquid available, about 32 ounces of raspberry ice tea crystal light and drove off gambling that 1) I could make it in time and 2) that I hadn't forgotten anything.
Drove like a man posessed. watching the clock like a hawk, estimated my arrival time at the race to be somewhere between 5:46 and 5:51. Arrived on site at 5:47.
Hopped out, put on my running shoes, swim stuff in one pocket, helmet on head, bike shoes on aero bars and hopped on the bike hoping that I had enough air in the tires.
Rode right up to the registration desk, asked if they'd accept a really, really late entry at about 5:53... the swim brief was going on by the beach.
Leaned my bike over by the fence, threw my helmet on the handlebars, realized I forgot my shades in the car, undressed down to the tri-suit, grabbed my goggles (no time for anti-fog), grabbed my swim cap from the Half Ironman (so they'd know I was fo realz...unnnnh!) ran to the chip table, grabbed my own chip, ran to the timing table, made sure they had my name, and ran out to the beach.
Got there as everyone was filing into the water and the starter was yelling "60 seconds" whew. time to catch my breath a little... oh wait... I had to poop... not gonna happen!
The horn went off and the standard battle began... I swam OK, pushed really hard for the first couple of minutes and stuck to the left edge of the line, it was a short swim over some nice coral reefs, saw two turtles.
Never really had time to settle into a rhythm on such a short swim (400 M), and came up running in about 7:15. T1 was about 200 yards away, we had to run across about 120 yds of deep, heavy sand. There was no hard-packed sand because the water breaks right on coral. This sucked in a royal fashion and I crossed the swim finish in 8:42, about the top quarter of the field.
(note- all the pictures in this post are from last weekend's race, they're the professional photos that were taken. Since I'm not inclined to pay 79.00 for some photos, I just copied out the small versions and posted them in here. They still look like how I looked this morning)The transition area was on grass/dirt, that wispy black sand/dirt mixture that is very light but hides sticks and pokey things well, this is probably the least ideal material for a transition area, when wet feet are trying to fit into dry bike shoes. I threw on my helmet, grabbed the two wheeled terror and set off, hopped on the bike and started in.
After I got my shoes on and started into my rythm I quickly realized that my seat was about 2 1/2 inches too low- another thing that probably would have revealed itself had I some pre-race prep. I had taken it for a check ride after bringing it home from the shop friday, but didnt notice as I was mostly concerned with the shifters, brakes and pretty blue aero bar tape. This poor positioning was burning my legs a little more than usual as I couldn't extend my legs quite as much as I am used to.. I get a little power from my butt, back and hips, which I could not utilize in this position. Nevertheless, I settled into a pretty good rythm and had a couple of faster riders around me to give motivation. We passed a ton of people and traded the lead among the three of us to the turnaround point at about 5 miles where there is about 400 yards of slight climb. I came out of the saddle which felt great on my unextended legs and didn't lose a bit of speed on the climb, and settled into a good rythm and speed down the hill and back to T2. I took a moment to drink the mysterious substance that was in my water bottle, I believe it was half a bottle of Gu20 left over from thursday's ride. Made it back to transition in 27 minutes total, didn't measure (forgot to reset computer) but guess it was about 10.5-11 miles total. This was good enough for the 9th fastest bike split in a field of 240 people- not bad for feeling like I was only going at 85% of top speed the whole time.
Came back into T2, took some time to try to brush as much sand off my feet as I could, threw on my brand new Zoot sockless shoes (these ones) and headed out on the run. The run course was a straight out and back along dillingham airfield, and was precisely 3'1 miles (5K). I had wanted to have a really good run, and started off at a 7-minute mile clip and felt pretty good for the first mile. Mile two the residual sand in the shoes started to bug me, and by the time I hit the turnaround at about 10:30 and I could tell my feet were not going to be happy. I was going at what I felt was top speed and looking at my watch trying to figure out if I was going to make it in an hour or not... I had started the run at about 38 minutes into the race, so knew it would be right around there.
I got passed by a guy I was pretty sure was in my age group (turns out he was) and I knew I had to catch him, and figured I'd see where my limit was. I threw it into sixth gear and tried like hell to maintain his pace and see where I was... this lasted about two minutes and I had to slow down or I knew I was going to puke. I throttled back to about an 8 min/mile pace with less than a mile to go and was just trying to make it in but felt that I had maybe upset something deep down... as I approached the finish, about 200 yards out, I knew something was wrong and felt the first *urp* of my gastrointestinal mutiny beginning. At about 150 yards from the finish, and well in view of the 60-70 spectators, the fireworks began and I began launching what was left of the raspberry iced tea (now scarlet red- from the gasps of the crowd some of them thought it was blood) all over the road to my left while trying to maintain some small amount of forward momentum. two guys passed me in that last few yards, and when i could see the finish line clock ticking 59:40...41...42 i lurched forward in a crouched run and made it across the line in 59:53, under an hour and kept my 3rd place finish in the age group by about 15 seconds.
I felt kinda embarrassed for shocking the crowd, some of them had shouted some encouragement, I mostly felt stupid because I knew it was my own fault... at least I know where my top end is.
(results here) So I finished 23rd out of 249 people, 3rd of the 30 25-29 year old guys, and once again had a top 10 bike. It really is apparent that the way to get faster is to fix the run... I need to put in a lot more miles and get my frame used to going at 100% for 20-30 minutes like I can on the bike. Still, having a top 10% showing while being absolutely unprepared has to count for something, so I can take that as a positive.
Next race: Hickam Criterium (maybe) June 22nd.
Next Triathlon: Firecracker Sprint- Barber's point, June 28th.
Other races this year: Lifetime Fitness Triathlon, Minneapolis, July 12th
Tinman Triathlon, Honolulu, July 20th
For those of you who were wondering, I pooped later in the day( thanks for your concern.) Turns out I hadn't had to go too bad.
No comments:
Post a Comment