Boulder Peak Triathlon - TriathlonOlympic


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Boulder, Colorado
United States
5430 Sports Corp.
70F / 21C
Sunny
Total Time = 2h 35m 38s
Overall Rank = 264/1363
Age Group = M25-29
Age Group Rank = 40/90
Pre-race routine:

Had a cup of coffee on the way to the reservoir. Got my transition area set up. When I picked up my packet the number I was originally assigned has been removed from use (there was an athlete killed during a previous years race and they retired the number out of respect). So I was reassigned a new number, which put me away from my AG in the transition area since the racks were by bib number. This turned out to be pretty nice since my transition rack was clear because everyone on that rack was part of an AG that started before me.
Event warmup:

It was pretty warm, so I just stood in the water with the wet suit and hung around. No actual warm up besides some simple stretching.
Swim
  • 30m 25s
  • 1500 meters
  • 02m 02s / 100 meters
Comments:

I started towards the back 1/3rd of the wave on the far left side. This was perfect because like normal everyone took off and I tend to start slow and speed up over time. Being out the outside allowed me to swing around people as they slowed down to catch their breadth from going out too hard and keep looking to my right as I took a breadth instead of having to look straight ahead all the time and lift my head to spot. I still spotted on occasion, but I was able to use the group to my advantage. I also notice that being on that side let me have a semi draft on people as I passed them, especially with the group as a whole making a wake in a way.

Now the bad part.... The "corners" at the end were marked with a yellow buoy as opposed to the red ones that meant to go straight ahead. The announcer said that the first yellow buoy is not 90 degrees and more like 45 degrees. So with that, that's what I did when I got to that buoy. I looked up at 45 degrees and saw a red buoy and swam towards it (I should also mention that you are swimming into the sun on the way out, so spotting is extremely hard with the glare on the water), figured it was going to be like the sprint tri last month. Turns out it was NOT the buoy I should have swam towards. As I got towards it I realized that there were people with my color swim cap swimming at it perpendicular to me... I had to turn 90 degrees left, saw the OTHER yellow buoy and swam towards it... it was FARTHER away from the start than the first yellow buoy. When I got to it and turned, it was close to a 160degree turn for me. I probably swam an extra 100+ meters because of that incident. I didn't let it phase me, kept my stroke strong, and started passing people from the wave in front of me finally.

On the way back in, I started kicking a little more to get those muscles firing in the legs and wake them up. I think that really helped because after nearly 30 minutes of swimming, I got out of the water and was able to stand and run without much disorientation at all. Passed a number of people going up to T1 in that process as well.

Overall, my swim was strong... even with the 200m run up to the T1 area included in the swim time and my detour in order to make it a little longer, I was still near 2minutes/100m pace... so I was definitely swimming faster than what that shows, but lack of knowledge of the course did me in.
What would you do differently?:

Know the course layout better and don't just assume what the far end of the course would be set up like.
Transition 1
  • 01m 55s
Comments:

My AG racks were closer to the swim in/bike out side of the transition area than where I had to set up. So my T1 time looks slower than what the rest of the AG has, so I ranked 59th out of 90 for T1 time. (But T2 made up for it). I made the mistake of trying to buckle the helmet this time as I was taking off my wet suit. Normally I buckle it right before taking the bike off the rack after putting my shoes on. I think this cost me a second or two because of the fumbling it caused with both the wet suit and my hands on the buckle.
What would you do differently?:

Go back to my normal buckle the helmet before grabbing the bike way of doing it.
Bike
  • 1h 16m 5s
  • 26.1 miles
  • 20.58 mile/hr
Comments:

The bike portion went well for me. Stayed in aero anytime I was above 12mph, including uphill (which is how I train). The climb was not bad at all, but I constantly had to yell at people to stay right because they were swerving erratically because of how slow they were going. Saw a number of people walking towards the top as well. Even on the flat sections I had to have told about 10 people to stay right. There's one portion in the last 10 miles on a busy highway that has a HUGE 8ft shoulder to ride on, people were STILL riding 2 feet from the white line on the left with no one in front of them at all. I never passed anyone on the right, but I'd yell at them because they were making me go much closer to the white line than is needed because they wouldn't react to "on your left" very fast. There was another guy... this REALLY annoys me because he beat me in my AG by 17 seconds... he passed me on the bike, I dropped back and then saw him come up behind the next guy and sit behind him. I was now gaining on them and ended up passing them. As I passed him I looked over and he was about 6 inches off the guys wheel, I had dropped back for this @$$hole and waited nearly 10 seconds watching him draft before I decided to go around both of them. As I passed him I simply looked over and said: "Nice draft". The guy in front of him must have had no idea, because he looked over at me, then behind him and had this look of shock that there was a guy that close to his rear wheel. Looking at the results, coming out of T2, I had nearly a 6 1/2 minute lead on him, but he ran 6:20/miles and I ran 7:31s. It's not like it's a podium spot he took from me, but still... when you see that kind of thing happening and it's in your AG and then you see him pass you in the last mile of the run you have to wonder if he could have caught you had he not been running on fresher legs.
What would you do differently?:

Carry a stick to throw in the guys wheels. j/k :)

As far as my performance, I think I did pretty well. Still managed to average 20.5mph with that climb in the beginning and felt my run was still strong after.
Transition 2
  • 00m 40s
Comments:

I think I did pretty bad on this transition for a couple reasons. I tried some new techniques out and they didn't really work well. I ranked 1st in my AG with speed in T2, but that's because of the location of my stuff... same reason I was slower in T1 than a lot of my AG.

But I tried something new. I always feel like I waste time unclipping the ratchet on my shoes (normal road bike shoes, not tri shoes) when I'm at my transition area. So this time, about 1/4mile out, I un-did them while going down the last downhill. I was still able to pedal efficiently, but I did not take my feet out of the shoes. I figured I could still run in them when I dismounted. Turns out, loose cycling shoes are REALLY hard to run in. I still go to my area, racked the bike, shoes came off quick, running shoes went on quick, hat on... D@MN IT! forgot to take my Garmin off my bike... so I had to reach awkwardly and remove it from the bike mount.
What would you do differently?:

Take my feet OUT of the shoes instead of just loosening them. Remember to put the Garmin wrist band on before coming into T2 and transfer the Garmin to my wrist before T2 as well. I think those blunders likely cost me 10seconds of more. Oh well, that's what these races have been for... practicing new things and seeing what works.

Oh, when you combine T1 and T2, I ranked 31st out of 90.
Run
  • 46m 35s
  • 6.21 miles
  • 07m 30s  min/mile
Comments:

I think my run was strong. I kept a pace I think I could handle, turned out I could have gone a little faster, maybe another 15s/mile or so. The knee held out well and only started bothering me in the last 1/2 mile, at which point I said screw it and figured if I get it over with quicker it'll be easier on the knee. I'm happy with the 7:31 pace overall. I'd never done this distance before so I didn't know how to judge things. But in the end I had enough left over for a solid sprint finish and felt like I could have still continued to run that pace for another 6 miles.
What would you do differently?:

run faster.
Post race
Warm down:

beer and pizza.

What limited your ability to perform faster:

I'm more endurance than I am speed... I need to get faster if I want to do better in these shorter races.

Event comments:

Most people hate that climb in the beginning of the bike, but I LOVE it! It really made for an interesting sight seeing people struggle up it as you just spin yourself past them.




Last updated: 2009-12-15 12:00 AM
Swimming
00:30:25 | 1500 meters | 02m 02s / 100meters
Age Group: 50/90
Overall: 543/1363
Performance:
Suit: Xterra Vortex 3 Sleeveless
Course: Out and back... kind of, more like a rectangle, but no 90 degree turns at the end.... I'll get to this in a minute :(
Start type: Wade Plus: Waves
Water temp: 0F / 0C Current: Low
200M Perf. Good Remainder: Average
Breathing: Good Drafting: Average
Waves: Average Navigation: Below average
Rounding: Good
T1
Time: 01:55
Performance: Average
Cap removal: Average Helmet on/
Suit off:
Yes
Wetsuit stuck? Yes Run with bike: Yes
Jump on bike: No
Getting up to speed: Good
Biking
01:16:05 | 26.1 miles | 20.58 mile/hr
Age Group: 33/90
Overall: 266/1363
Performance: Good
Average HR: 165, Max 177. The 177 came during the 15% grade portion of the climb. I allowed that to happen though since there was a nice downhill coming up after that I'd be able to recover on (and there was a 35mph speed limit being enforced on that downhill, so I knew I'd be riding my brakes to not get DQ'd)
Wind: None
Course: A giant rectangle kind of. The first 6 miles are uphill, starting off around 5250ft and reaching about 5500ft after 4 miles, mile 5 you're at 5680ft, then comes the REAL climb... at mile 6.2 you reach 6200ft, it flattens for 0.3 mile, and then at 7.2 you're at 6400ft. It's basically downhill until mile 16 at that point where only a few small climbs of perhaps 100ft over 1/2 mile. It's then slightly up hill over some small rolling kind of terrain until the end.
Road: Smooth Dry Cadence: 87
Turns: Good Cornering: Good
Gear changes: Good Hills: Good
Race pace: Comfortable Drinks: Too much
T2
Time: 00:40
Overall: Below average
Riding w/ feet on shoes
Jumping off bike Good
Running with bike Bad
Racking bike Below average
Shoe and helmet removal Bad
Running
00:46:35 | 06.21 miles | 07m 30s  min/mile
Age Group: 39/90
Overall: 244/1363
Performance: Good
Average HR: 168, max HR 179 (right at the end). My pace was pretty even overall, first mile was 7:51 and I slowly pushed faster and faster as I went, feeling better and better as I went too.
Course: Out and back, first half mile and last half is pavement, the rest is a gravel road, couple small hills, but nothing major.
Keeping cool Good Drinking Just right
Post race
Weight change: %
Overall: Good
Mental exertion [1-5] 3
Physical exertion [1-5] 3
Good race? Ok
Evaluation
Course challenge Just right
Organized? Yes
Events on-time? Yes
Lots of volunteers? Yes
Plenty of drinks? Yes
Post race activities: Good
Race evaluation [1-5] 3