Chicago Triathlon - Olympic Distance - TriathlonOlympic

This is all from Beth.

"I did what you told me to do, I made certain there was at least an arms length distance between me and the person in front of me. I didn't want to get a heel to the face. As we were floating in the water, a few people were commenting on how cold it was. To me, it was perfect. I was glad for the wetsuit, but the temp couldn't have been better.

The horn sounded and off we went. I stayed to the wall side of the swim, cause it helped me site better. We hit the turn buoy and I knew I was going to do just fine. I continued to stay to the inside, next to the rope, to help with siting.

Once we passed the start line and the lane opened up, I again moved closer to the wall to keep it as a reference point. At this point, I was starting to catch caps from the previous wave. I almost swam over two guys doing an elementary back stroke. 'Sorry' I would say as I basically pushed them away and kept going. (That's my girl).

I would occassionally look up and see the Harbor building. I thought, 'Oh, I'm almost there' and then swim for a little while longer and look up again and then think 'I'm not there yet!?' I finally made it to the turn into the stairs. Thank goodness for those volunteers. Getting out of the water without them would have been interesting.

Out of the Swim Out chute I went and started the long run down the carpet. I don't run so this was not fun for me. I reached the end of the carpet, and thought 'I'm not going to hurt myself' so I moved over to the grass and walked the rest of the way. I was getting passed by a lot of people but that didn't bother me. I was in this for the fun.

I finally made it to T1 and I saw David standing waiting for me with a bit smile on my face. I got up to him, he kneeled down and took the chip from my ankle. As he was standing up, he smiled and said '34 minutes'. I did it! I beat my goal! And off he went to bike. My part was done and I was tired."

"Train to run on the asphalt? Nothing really. I beat my swim time (out of the water in 31:00) and it was just the ridiculous run to Transition that slowed me down."

Took Beth's chip and sprinted to the rack where Tony was holding the bike. I grabbed it and weaved my way to the bike out. This transition is absolutely immense and we were just about as far from the Bike Out as you can be so I'll take this time. It was also 11th fastest over all and 5th fastest in our Division so I can't complain too much.

Have the bike with me when Beth came in so I didn't waste time getting it.

So running to get the bike and then running to the mount line was essentially my warm up for this. Didn't do a running jump (hadn't really practiced all that much, so I just swung the leg over, clipped in, and hit it. I mean really put the hammer down.

Starts out with a short hill/on ramp onto LSD. Up onto the bridge and this was the first feel as to how the wind was going to be. I knew immediately that I was going to have to stay tucked, even on the hills, to keep up a decent speed. The wind was moderate (about 10-12 mph) almost straight out of the North and that was the direction I was heading.

Down off the bridge and onto the first flat. I started passing people left and right. Lord knows how many "On your right" I had to holler. Once or twice I had to yell at people to move to their left. I tried not to get too angry because this concept was so different than what we are used to with normal races. I tried to keep it forceful but without anger.

Interesting thing about down town is that the buildings sometimes change the direction the wind is blowing. For short distances I would get a cross breeze and once I swear I had a slight tail wind while going North.

Anyway, I continued to keep an eye on my bike computer. My goal was 1:10 or faster for the bike portion. And I knew that to do that I would have to keep as close to 20 on the head wind portion as I could. I hit the turn around, looked at the time, did some quick math in the head and I knew I was on target.

So now it was make up time. With the wind at my back I took every opportunity I could to push it. Even harder. Per my Garmin, I averaged about 26mph on this return trip. I was still passing people all over the place. I think, in the first loop I was only passed by 2-3 bikes over all. It wasn't till we got the results did I find out just how few bikes passed me over all.

Hit the turn around for the second loop and the wind felt stronger than the first loop. Whether it really was or not I don't know, but it certainly felt stronger. I continued to keep a good tuck to stay as small as possible.

Right around the Lincoln Park Ped Bridge, I was passing two guys, one was passing the other. Unfortunately, the inside bike hit the seam between the two lanes and jumped to his right, which pushed the next bike into me. I was in aero and hitting about 22 when this happened. "Whoa, whoa, whoa" I holler out. "Sorry" I hear from behind me. The second bike caught up and told me what happened and apologized. I said no problem and continued to hammer. I have no doubt that my HR probably spiked for a second or two there. And I think this is when I lost a little concentration too.

From Lincoln Park Zoo to just North of Belmont, I think I zoned out a bit. Lost concentration. Sure I was tucked in nice and tight. But my cadence started to drop and therefore so did my speed. I looked down and I was only doing about 17+ on a straight away. WTF?!?!? Dude you are in a race and this is your ONLY leg!!!! Immediately I upped the cadence, changed a gear or two and I was back up to 19+mph into the wind.

Hit the Foster Turn Around again and WEEEEE!!!! tailwind time! Again, I dropped the hammer. This time, I dropped the bike into the hardest gear I had (I really need to see what my cassette is) and kept it there for the remainder of the trip. Looked at my bike computer and it showed that I had about 18 minutes to go almost 7 miles. Oh dear. Goal time might be in jeopardy.

Yeah. Not so much. With that tail wind, I started sucking up the time. First, it helped that the course had thinned out. Less bikes to avoid. Second, I stayed focused on the way back. I knew I only had a little time left on the bike and I needed to keep hammering away.

I hit the big S curve, and knew I was going to be close on the 1:10. Kept the mph above 21 going up the hill to the bridge, made the big 180 turn to go down into T2, crossed the dismount line with a nice flying dismount and heard Tony yelling "Crowny!". Over the timing mat and straight to him. He grabbed the chip, slapped it on himself and he was a blur out of site before I knew it.

Not lose concentration on the second loop and maybe get out of the saddle for some of the shorter hills to maintain speed. Otherwise I'm relatively happy with the ride. I would have preferred 1:08, but I'll take it.

Tony took the chip and was gone in a flash. Still had a long way to go from the bike in to the run out, but he did it quickly. we were 10th over all and 4th in our division so made up still more time on the competition.

Nothing.

I'll get Tony's comments later and upload them or let him comment below.

Beth told me he came flying by them outside of T2 and my Mum got a photo of him. He really was moving. I'll upload it when she sends it to me.

He was shooting for as close to 40:00 as he could get, but with a recently diagnosed PF injury, it was going to be tough. He told us the wind was tough too, coming back from the turn around.

Beth and I got into the back of the finishers pen and I got to see Tony cross. The announcer said "And here comes Team 'Cause She Doesn't Run. What a great name. Kind of roles off the tongue". I saw Tony pump his fists in the air and I hit the Garmin.

He found us and we got our finishers medals and walked around.

Not get PF.

Mum and Dan took our picture together with our finishers medal and the finishers towel. Grabbed some water and then started the walk back to transition to get our stuff to go hom


Other than what was outlined above, Beth not being able to run from Swim out, me spacing out on the bike and Tony with PF. In all honesty, each of us had a PR on our individual events.
Beth swam 4 minutes faster than her previous 1500 OWS.
I was 3:30 faster on the bike, same course, almost same conditions as last year.
Tony beat his stand alone 10k time by 2 minutes.

So I would say not much limited us.


This race is just so friggin huge. For its size it is incredibly well run. 9300 participants, or something crazy like that. Almost 5 hours of waves. And all on time. I know I said it last year, but I think this year I mean it. I doubt I'm going to do this one again for a few years. Great experience, but lots of hassle too, with the early check in, etc.

Over all, though, we had a blast. Lots of fun doing a relay. I would definitely do a relay again. Just on something a bit smaller.