Kerr Lake Int'l Distance Tri Race Report...and ugly feet.
Sunday, 4:30AM: Wake up to thunder and lightning. Fall back asleep
Sunday, 4:50AM: Wake up and put watch under my pillow thinking I'm plenty awake...and trying not to let the sound of the alarm at 5:05AM wake my wife.
Sunday, 5:22AM: Miss alarm, wake up and realize I'm going to be late if I don't get to my meeting spot in 8 minutes for the hour ride to the race. Yikes.
That's how my day began. Luckily it got better. I quickly took care of my business upon awakening since my bike was already loaded and my gear prepped. Jumped in the car and got to the meeting spot 15 minutes late. Grabbed the rest of the crew and hit the road.
Arrival at the race site was met with rain and wind. I DECIDED TO LEAVE MY HR MONITOR/WATCH IN THE CAR. This was a "C" race, after all, so this gave me a calmness regarding the effort I would exert. Registration and transition set up went fine despite the weather. I had brought plenty of plastic gear storage bags. And my non-racing friends there cheering helped me get my gear to and from the car.
OK, lets skip to the race. Swim start went smoothly. As usual it didn't take me long to end up at the back of my wave. I did stay with a handful of other blue caps the whole time, but I noticed many, many yellow caps passing me as well as a few pinks. Yes, I was getting hammered as usual by the waves behind me. I kept my weak pace and thankfully swam pretty straight. Swim exit at about 34min for the 15000m. Slow.
My wetsuit removal got challenging in T1 so I sat down and took it off somewhat casually. My bike shoes were clipped in so it was just a matter of strapping on number and helmet then running through the mud barefooted to my first shoeless bike start. Shoeless transition was a major success as my strap in went outstanding once I got up to some speed!
Passes on the bike were few and far between. I estimate that I passed about 20 bikes, including two friends, and got passed by 3 or 4 bikes. The rain only slowed us down marginally. Just rolling resistance slow down, not puddles or rain in your face. I did back off slightly during the bike but remembered my discussion with my coach - if I wanted to go hard on anything in a C race it should be the bike. So I did put out a strong effort with a likely negative split. Not the greatest result but solid. Bike finish at about 1:07 for 40K. Half a bottle of gatorade endurance and one gel consumed.
T2 smooth. Drank some more gatorade and chose to go no socks since it was so sloppy. Turned out to be a fine choice during the race but I'm paying today. See feet. Run started off marginal with a missed turn at the end of a long road. Maybe 10 seconds cost. From there, after seeing some of my friends who were obviously positioned to finish near or ahead of me, I picked it up. Hammered the last mile for a certain negative split. Run time about 1:41 for 10K. Cytomax sips all along the way on the fly.
Overall results about 2:26. Good enough for third place in the 35-39 age group. My first "medal finish"!!!!
It was a great day despite the weather. Many of my friends from the Finley YMCA had outstanding races. Congrats to all of them!
Sunday, 4:50AM: Wake up and put watch under my pillow thinking I'm plenty awake...and trying not to let the sound of the alarm at 5:05AM wake my wife.
Sunday, 5:22AM: Miss alarm, wake up and realize I'm going to be late if I don't get to my meeting spot in 8 minutes for the hour ride to the race. Yikes.
That's how my day began. Luckily it got better. I quickly took care of my business upon awakening since my bike was already loaded and my gear prepped. Jumped in the car and got to the meeting spot 15 minutes late. Grabbed the rest of the crew and hit the road.
Arrival at the race site was met with rain and wind. I DECIDED TO LEAVE MY HR MONITOR/WATCH IN THE CAR. This was a "C" race, after all, so this gave me a calmness regarding the effort I would exert. Registration and transition set up went fine despite the weather. I had brought plenty of plastic gear storage bags. And my non-racing friends there cheering helped me get my gear to and from the car.
OK, lets skip to the race. Swim start went smoothly. As usual it didn't take me long to end up at the back of my wave. I did stay with a handful of other blue caps the whole time, but I noticed many, many yellow caps passing me as well as a few pinks. Yes, I was getting hammered as usual by the waves behind me. I kept my weak pace and thankfully swam pretty straight. Swim exit at about 34min for the 15000m. Slow.
My wetsuit removal got challenging in T1 so I sat down and took it off somewhat casually. My bike shoes were clipped in so it was just a matter of strapping on number and helmet then running through the mud barefooted to my first shoeless bike start. Shoeless transition was a major success as my strap in went outstanding once I got up to some speed!
Passes on the bike were few and far between. I estimate that I passed about 20 bikes, including two friends, and got passed by 3 or 4 bikes. The rain only slowed us down marginally. Just rolling resistance slow down, not puddles or rain in your face. I did back off slightly during the bike but remembered my discussion with my coach - if I wanted to go hard on anything in a C race it should be the bike. So I did put out a strong effort with a likely negative split. Not the greatest result but solid. Bike finish at about 1:07 for 40K. Half a bottle of gatorade endurance and one gel consumed.
T2 smooth. Drank some more gatorade and chose to go no socks since it was so sloppy. Turned out to be a fine choice during the race but I'm paying today. See feet. Run started off marginal with a missed turn at the end of a long road. Maybe 10 seconds cost. From there, after seeing some of my friends who were obviously positioned to finish near or ahead of me, I picked it up. Hammered the last mile for a certain negative split. Run time about 1:41 for 10K. Cytomax sips all along the way on the fly.
Overall results about 2:26. Good enough for third place in the 35-39 age group. My first "medal finish"!!!!
It was a great day despite the weather. Many of my friends from the Finley YMCA had outstanding races. Congrats to all of them!
posted by Lucky at 10:30 AM
1 Comments:
Congrats on the podium! Thank god for the Clyde division or I'd never scare a top 3 finish. :)
That was my first Olympic race two years ago. Brings back painful memories.
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