Doylestown Duathlon - Duathlon

Only 195 people finished this thing and I just noticed I was 196th on the first run! My plan was to take it easy on the first run...mission accomplished there, I guess! The pace never actually felt too bad or too fast, but it was definitely faster than I originally planned for. If I'd run the pace I'd planned, I probably would've been DFL on the first run. I went in the last wave, which wasn't a big one, maybe 20 of us, if that, and most took off at a pretty quick pace. I let them go but I was still moving faster than I wanted to. But when it didn't seem so bad I kept it up. I had a couple of people I could hear behind me to the turnaround and for a little bit afterward. But at some point, before we got back to the water station, I did a couple of "pick-up" intervals, reduced my pace to about 9:30 for a little bit, and I guess that dropped them pretty good. I didn't hear them the rest of the way.

Not too much. I'd planned to go slower, but at a 10:00 pace overall I didn't feel too bad when I finished.

Went slow through transition. With the rain and all, I'd left my bike shoes in the bag to keep them somewhat dry and wanted to put my running shoes in there too for the same reason. Also took a quick drink from the water bottle.

Not too much; trying to gun it through transition wasn't in the plan.

This was my first time outside on the tri bike this year, so I was treating this leg as the season-opening shakedown for the bike and my comfort on it. I also wanted to really work the hills, see how my spinervals training and longer rides (for me) had helped, if any. I never did quite understand why, but they lengthened the course by 2-3 miles the day of the race, something to do with park officials. With the rain I scaled back expectations but I was both disappointed and somewhat satisfied with this leg. Disappointed because I didn't do better...I wanted to at least reach middle of the pack, which would've required a little over 18mph average, which I really expected to be able to do. I still think I probably could've, or at least gotten close, if it hadn't been raining so hard; for most of the ride I couldn't see because my glasses were smeared up with rain and fog, which got worse on the climbs. I was satisfied because the hills didn't bother me near as much as I'd feared they would; I actually felt fairly strong on them. In fact, most of the riders I passed, I passed on the uphills.

Probably not too much, given the conditions. Maybe pushed it harder on the flats.

Took another easy transition. We came back to transition down the same very steep hill we left on, so I wasn't real comfortable trying to negotiate that and get out of my shoes. My feet were soaked too, felt like a couple of blocks of ice, so I just didn't feel much like messing with the shoes.

Nothing, on this day.

178 on this run compared to 196 on the first tells me I was better equipped to handle this than some of the others out there, making up 18 spots on the second run. I'm still shocked at my time, even as slow as it was, because it felt like I was barely able to coordinate putting one foot in front of another. Couldn't feel my feet, my legs and hips were hurting, and I felt like I was barely moving. I only passed one other racer, about 100 yards from the finish, and two or three picked me off. One lady went past, maybe about halfway through, and told me "Good job" as she went by. I'm thinking she told me that to encourage me to keep going because I must've looked like crap. I'm not sure if the way I felt was because I went too hard on the bike, or because of the cumulative effect of a previous run and the bike, or because of the conditions, or a combination of all of those. But I've never felt that bad on a run after one of my tris. I was basically just hanging on. But this was only my second multisport workout this year, my first "real" brick, which was the main reason for doing the race.

Second run was much tougher than expected, but I'd done only one brick prior to this, so hadn't really built up to this effort level yet.

Did a little stretching, drained my transition water bottle, did a little more stretching. Then went under the tent to get something to eat.


Conditions were probably the biggest factor, but they impacted everybody the same way, although I doubt most of the others were "blind" on the bike with the glasses issue. More brick work to get used to that second run.


This was the first time for this race and I thought they did a pretty good job considering the challenges of the weather. I think they were short on volunteers but they managed (I think) mostly by drafting the majority of the spectators to help out, and the ones that helped did a heck of a job. I don't like the hill right out of transition (and back into it) and the road conditions on the extra distance they tacked on were horrendous, with serious, teeth-rattling, seatpost busting, gaps in the asphalt every 20-30 yards. But I think this can be a great event going forward.