Paul Bunyan Long Course - TriathlonOlympic

We started in ankle deep water with all the long course racers together. I started in the front for a change. When they said go I walked until thigh deep water and then swam while most folks around me were still walking.

Felt calm, focused on my stroke, paid attention to sighting as they only had 3 buoys each way. Way out the buoys were not aligned straight so at first I was sighting on a buoy on the way back...but adjusted. I normally swim to the right but did better on this race swimming straight. Some contact on first 200 yards and turn buoys....one person grabbed my butt.

The short course folks started 20' after we started so I had an idea where I was time wise on the second loop. Faster short course folks were passing me. I swam until my hands touched the sand while others were walking out of the water.

Large crowd of folks at swim exit but no cheering..it was odd.

Pleased with the swim. I figured I'd be in the low to mid 40s...they put far turn buoy out first and said they used GPS but who knows. In longer race I placed higher than I normally do...had considered wearing my 310xt but struggle getting off my wetsuit off leaving it on my wrist so didn't wear it

6th fastest T1 and I had the 5th slowest run time so I was super efficient as transitions as time is a combination of running and swapping out gear

I felt my transition was slower than normal with wetsuit removal issue

Getting there as transition opened at 6:15 helped as I had primo spot

Be faster? run faster?

Goal was to keep power at .9 of current FTP and keep VI low. Stayed in aero almost whole bike. Passed few folks at the 8-12 mile part in course. Had guys pass me then slow way down twice. Second time the guy was riding almost exactly my speed other than hammering up hills. I tried to back off and do some legal drafting. I couldn't recall what the rules on drafting were on this race since it wasn't a USAT race. I was to close at times to this guy. I'd pass him and he'd pass me back again. In the end I passed him for good with about a mile left.

It takes concentration to keep power level at this effort..kept thinking if there is not some discomfort I'm not riding hard enough.

VI 1.02

A few days before the race, I rode the course but turned around early so about a mile shorter in 1:16 so racing in 1:07 with avg 28 watts and about 3+ mph faster was pretty surprising. Confirms wind effects pace. 28 watts may be 1.5 mph normally. I'd love to do this course when my FTP is normal with my Zipps and my normal Oly NP which is about another 25-30 watts could I improve 1-2 mph with similar wind conditions. I'd love to have a 21+ mph oly bike

3rd women on the bike and only 28" out of second and I was oldest women racing..small race though

Struggled a bit with my socks..forgot my handheld fuelbelt flask so hoped they'd have not run out of water on the course

Only started running again after 6 weeks off 4 weeks before race. Plan was do to .4 mile run/40" walk as I have been doing in training. I wasn't sure how fast I could run as I have been doing all easy zone 2 runs based on how things felt.

Knee felt normal off the bike and I was surprised how fast I was running 10:30 pace as I haven't seen that pace since my April HIM. I debated if I should drop the walk breaks but opted to still do walk breaks but only 20". I saw Kevin about .3 mile from finish line as he was doing the sprint..high fived him; then I saw Emily and yelled some encouragement.

Great course along the lake in the shade on sidewalks then multi use flat path. At short course turn around they had water.

At the statue of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox, there were three tour buses of teenagers who cheered for each of us. Middle 3 miles my knee was feeling more typical of how it has post surgery just awareness of it not being quite normal.

At the turn around, I had slowed down some and was okay with it. Some of those I passed on the bike were catching me. I had a look out for the women I was pretty sure was in my AG and passed her and she was about 2 miles behind..sweet I thought I had a chance at my first AG hardware as there were 4 of us registered in my AG.

With 1.5 miles to go my knee had some discomfort and once felt like it might give out. Pushed on got near the finish line and picked it up as much as I could and ran 9:10 pace...glad to be done and again surprised at my run split.

I was breathing heavy the whole run.

Crossed the line knowing I did well for what I had that day and that is the true measure of how I did before I look at numbers and my thinking goes through my filters and judgements. I know I could have focused better a few places on the bike but other than that executed well.

Executed run well given my training..still rather negative than positive split

I looked back at my Oly run pace and this was only about 30-40" slower than I typically do given my training...pleased

First time in a long while I've surprised myself on how well I did. I figured I would be maybe 42/1:14/62 so I was a good 15 minutes faster than I expected. My fitness is coming back faster or I lost less than I thought. I hope this bodes well for IMFL. I still have a lot of work to build up my run volume and durability and work hard to get my FTP back up to where it was before and then make some gains.

First time I have won AG hardware..yes only 3 of us were in the 45-49 AG and we were the largest women AG..lol! It was small local race with only 8 women racing.

I learned something with this race...what really counts to me is how I know how I did...hardware, last place all those things are good or bad but in the end I race against myself and that bar is the one that really matters.


Lymes and Knee scope 6/1

Given my training and fitness very content with how I did. I plugged my paces and transitions into a tri calculator for standard Oly race to see what my time would have been 3:02:30. Long term goal has to been to go sub 3 hours in Oly with my best being 3:01:15 in '06 so this would have been close and not in top form for me..promising.


This is not a USAT sanctioned event...and pretty low key. Everything went smoothly and on time. Great little local race. Sign up in December for half price.