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 Swim
Comments: The swim was a time trial start. We were sent off in pairs about 5 seconds apart. We stood on the timing matt, then when the starter said "go" we ran into the lake. I was up to the two in front in about 2 seconds after I hit thw water and I must have passed 10 swimmmers in the first minute. I was in te back third of our wave which had at least 50 people (40-49 age groups). Navigation was tricky due to the number of swimmers that started in front of me. I just didn't think about making my way up the front, I figured I was out of medal contention, just wanted to have a decent race. I eventually got to where I was passing members of the ladies wave that went before us. Didn't run into a single person and managed to swim between swimmers that were barely a couple feet apart. High elbow drills helped there i suppose. Because of my quad cramping up I kicked a little extra in an attempt to work it out. What would you do differently?: Nothing, it was a decent swim, given my lack of proper preparation for this race.  Transition 1
Comments: Oh this transiiion was fun. I got to my spot, sat down to peel off my wetsuit bottoms, a little trouble with the left leg where the timing chip was. I got up to put my cycling shoes on and I couldn't find the oher shoe! I was thinking "what the heck!". Then I heard my relay swimmer yell "It's on your back!". I looked back and my right cycling shoe was stuck to my tri suit. The velcro from my shoe strap stuck to my tri suit when I was leaning back removing my wetsuit. That must have looked pretty funny. Of course that frazzled me a bit, took too long putting that shoe on. Not a good T1 time at all. What would you do differently?: Lay my shoes in a way so that the velcro strap won't get stuck on me. I could learn to slide into shoes while already clipped in I suppose.  Bike
Comments: This was a pretty crowded race so I was able to get into traffic pretty easily. Combine riders from the tri and the duathlon totaled at least 600 so that many riders on a 4.5 mile loop is a lot. I rode tentatively for the first few miles as I didn't know how my quad would react. I would normally get out of the saddle going up the dam hill but I stayed down and just spun up the hill the first lap. There were lots or riders going up that hill, some were three abreast so I made sure to yell out "on your left" well in advance. I must have yelled that out at least 10 times during this ride. I got out of the saddle doing up the dam hill the second time and that went pretty well. I didn't hammer this ride the way I normally would out of fear my quad would react negatively. So given my time at that effort, I was pretty pleased with my time. I had a 50/50 water/gatorade mix in my bottle, took one drink during the ride. What would you do differently?: Nothing. I navigated well with the amount of traffice on the road. Transition 2
Comments: Typical T2 for me. I'm pretty slow, nothing too stylish. I keep my shoes on, clip out, run to my transition spot. Luckily it was only 10 yards from the dismount area. Took one more drink from my water bottle before heading out. What would you do differently?: Not much.  Run
Comments: This is where I got really conservative. I didn't want my quad to cramp up here so I went out at what felt like an 8:30 mile as I simply wanted to finish with a respectable time. Cramping up would have been disasterous from a time standpoint becuase I'd have to stop and walk. I was most concerned about running up the dam hill (that same hill you ride on the bike twice) as that would put some strain on my quads. Made it up the hill, after that is a nice dowhill stretch for which I ran conservatively as well. This whole time I was watching runners who passed me, looking for the little 40 on their calves which indicated my age group. I think I was passed by maybe 2 people on the run (one on the bike). Which made sense as the more competitive types were lined up well in front of me in the swim start area. I felt better once I passed the two mile mark so I picked up the pace a bit. I was able to finish farily strong and I ddn't cramp up, thank goodness. What would you do differently?: Nothing. Given my physical condition at the moment I didn't want to risk anything that would cause an OK race to become a terrible race. Post race
Warm down: Got my chocolate milk and talked to some of my co-workers and friends. What limited your ability to perform faster: Uh, maybe the bike crash one week prior ..... Event comments: A good race given my condition. I actually ended up 2nd in my age group. Medals go to top 3 in each 5 year age bracket. I did well enough on the swim and bike, there was too much to make up for anyone else in my AG to catch me. But looking at my time, averaging 7:52 miles, it wasn't exactly a stacked field in my age group either. I can see a few 44 year olds with some speed will be moving up to my age group next year, I will have to step up my game to stay on the podium. Our relay team got 5th place in our division. When the meet points were tallied up we finished 4th in our division out of 21 companies. It was a good day for us points wise. Profile Album Last updated: 2013-05-25 12:00 AM
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United States
Kansas City Corporate Challenge
75F / 24C
Overcast
Overall Rank = 26/327
Age Group = M45-49
Age Group Rank = 2/27
A little background before going into the pre-race routine. One week before this race I was coasting down the hill to transition for the Kansas HIM and stupid me, I had my transition bag hanging on the handlebars. You know, the plastic one they give you to put your T1 gear in a point to point race....Anyhow the bag got caught in my front spokes, I flipped head first into the asphalt. BAM, no HIM for me. Luckily I had my helmet on but it wasn't strapped. The fall caused a nice cut in my head and I spent the next 2 hours in the med. tent as my buddies enjoyed a beautiful day racing. THe docs there were great, stitched me up with 5 stitches, lucky for me no broken bones. Bruised ribs, and some pretty good bruises on my back just above the hip and also my left leg. Some minor road rash.
So I took most of the week off, did go for an easy 25 mile bike ride on Wednesday but that was it. No swimming or running between the crash and this little sprint.
This was the annual Kansas City Corporate Challenge Triathlon for which some pretty good talent show up for. Before the crash I knew I was in a good position to get my first medal in this event. Now I was certain the medal hopes were all but lost.....
Woke up at 04:00, wanted to get the primo transition spot so I wanted to get there by 05:00. Got to transition about 5:10 and there was already a half dozen bikes in there already. Put my bike right next to Jared's who won the race last year. On the other side was Scott's who this day was my pick to win our age group. He beat me by four seconds in the 3 mile time trial and was a much better runner and equal a swimmer as I. I knew I wouldn't be keeping up with him. He mentioned some really fast young guy, I don't remember his name but I think the guy he was referring to destroyed the field, beating Jared by a couple minutes.
Being the company coordinator, I had more on my mind than just my race. We had a first time duathlete, a first time triathlete, a veteran triathlete who doesn't really train, except for running, that in his words "wipes the dust off his bike" to do the occassional triathlon. Then I had a relay team with a young swimmer with huge potential who doesn't apply himself in this regard, a great runner and a young, strong girl doing her first race on a road bike. I had seen here in spin class, hammering away. A co-worked loaned here a road bike two weeks prior so she had ridden the course a few times and was OK with the hills.
So we're now 7 minutes from the relay swim start and my swimmer was NOT there yet! So I decided a nice jog was in order up the hill to see where the heck he was. There he was about 1/2 mile from the beach walking with his wife. I told him he needed to get his butt down there otherwise we don't have a team. While jogging down the hill he's fumbling around his bag looking for the swim cap. Then the timing chip, that was in his wife's bag. Anyhow he finally makes it, a few minutes late, to the swim start and lucky for us it was a stime trial start so he just jumped in at the end of the line. My cyclist and runner would have been just a little upset had he not shown up at the time he did.
Anyhow while I was running back down the hill my left quad tightened up big time. Oh great I thought, this is going to be an interesting day. Once I got my wetsuit bottoms on I did some stretching in an attempt to keep the cramp away.