Strawberry Fields Triathlon - Olympic - TriathlonOlympic

For some reason, I was a little nervous when we were walking over to the start. No idea why. Warmup swim settled my nerves a lot.

Waves were 3 minutes apart + a lot of guys struggling with the surf = I caught the previous wave by the first buoy. I was in a wave with all the 50+ men plus the Clydes and Athenas. It was a little weird that they'd put all the non-Athena women AFTER us...I was bantering with a couple of the young women about how they'd be swimming over me. In reality, I didn't see more than a couple of the orange caps from that wave pass me.

Very minimal contact, fun swim. Fairly choppy (buoy line was right on the edge of the outer break) and I enjoyed powering through the waves. Whole swim was about winding my way through the white-capped guys from the big wave ahead of ours.

Toughest parts were at the end. We were all struggling getting in to the beach...really felt like I lost time there. I'd end up on top of a big wave with a good view of the swim exit, then be back down in a trough and feel some pretty good undertow pushing back. Then came a really long run through the sand (which was fine...I'd rather have that and grass than the usual concrete or rocks.).

Liz said I was one of the first out of the water in my wave, but it looks like I was 10th of 52 (5th of 17 in AG)...which I'd expect given that I was one of the youngest non-Clydes in the wave.

Nothing other than maybe hold a tighter line to the exit after the turn in to the beach. My goal was to be out of the water in 28-29 minutes and I only missed that by seconds (followed by almost 3 minutes of running through sand and grass).

This was okay. No real issues, other than combination of grass and sand on my feet to deal with. Wore socks. Decided to put on race number belt here rather than T2.

Nothing. I suck at T1, because I have feet that are irritated by anything in my shoes, so I have to spend a little time brushing them off and putting on socks. At least I've stopped wearing gloves for sprints and Olys. I was was slower than most of the guys ahead of me in my AG, but--interestingly--about the same here as the eventual AG winner.

I had designs on topping 21 mph for this ride, but the northbound segment (on Harbor) was into a pissy little ocean breeze and that (plus some poor road surface) held me down to 18.5-19 mph for that piece of each loop. On the rest of the loop (other than the very short uphill in the weird little out-and-back on 5th), I was consistently staying between 20 and 23.5 mph. The slower section on Harbor was enough to knock down my aspirations for 21+.

Uneventful ride. Passed a lot more people than I was passed by. Stayed in aero for virtually the entire ride. Felt strong on the one climb over the bridge over the marina...spun up it where everyone around me (both times) was laboring out of the saddle.

Kept an eye on my quads and my glutes as a check on effort. Tried to hold my output to right at the edge of overworking my legs and that seemed to work...felt solid, but by no means rested for the run.

Might have had a bit more in me...esp. if the ride was only 21.6 miles--as it appears--instead of the 24 (!!!) it was advertised as.

Also wished I'd taken a gel in my pocket. I knew I had enough calories from breakfast to get through the race, but it wouldn't have hurt me to top off the tank (esp. with a few more electrolytes, since the temps were climbing pretty fast).

As much as I suck at T1, I'm getting to where I about make it up in T2. Only thing that put this over a minute was deciding to put on my Garmin (and to do that at my rack rather than as I was heading out...I was just too close to the timing mat where I was racked and didn't want to be fumbling with it while on the run course).

Nothing really. I've got my T2s dialled in pretty well now...if I don't put my Garmin on, they are now consistently about a minute or less.

Felt good heading out. Had a plan of holding first half mile to 7:25/mile pace, but that went out the window. Around the one mile mark, encountered my elite duathlete buddy Gerard and he asked if I wanted some pacing. I think I tried to beg off, but he fell in alongside me anyhow. Told him where things stood...I was on track for a possible 2:24, but had taken the first mile a bit faster than I'd planned and needed to dial things back to over 7:00/mile. He ran with me for the rest of the first loop, then dropped off, telling me to push the second lap.

Second go-round started fine, but right around 3.4 miles, my left calf and Achilles spasmed up and never really let go at all. Between that and the payback from the sub-7:00 pace for the beginning of the run, I was having to work to hold sub-7:30, where I'd hoped to be around 7:12-7:15. Judging by my final time vs. my goal, the Achilles problem did cost me about :15 sec/mile for the last (nearly) three miles.

Passed the usual constant parade of people, but actually got passed by a handful...more than usual...even though I still had an okay run (4th of 52 in my wave, behind just the 1st & 2nd place guys in my AG plus one much younger Clyde). Missed 3rd place in AG by quite a bit (about 5 min.), but the reality is that the #3 guy started the run almost 10 min. ahead of me and I crushed him by 5 min. on the run...him crushing me by a lot more on the bike was all the difference.

Did spot one guy in my AG ahead with less than 0.5 mile to go and decided that was the cue for my kick...wanted to blow past him and not give him any ability to react (in case he happened to be in 3rd). Saw Liz and then Gerard cheering me in and I finished at a dead sprint in spite of the stabbing pain in my lower calf.

Stick to the plan. I tried to rein things in, but the early pace probably did cost me a little. But really the issue was the calf. I'd been tight in both calves after running on Wednesday in different shoes than I normally wear...hadn't been bothered by it the last two days, but it obviously wasn't healed up. Only cost me :30, though, as near as I can tell...just hurt.

Got a post race massage for the first time ever. Needed to try to get the calf/Achilles opened up at least a little. Massage barely touched it. Liz looked for my results while I was on the table and came back to announce I finished 4th in my AG by 5 minutes. Woman on the next table said, "That's better than 5 seconds." Which is true...I laughed and mentioned that at my last Oly, last summer, I'd missed qualifying for AG Nationals by all of 2.8 seconds, so, yeah, five minutes takes any disappointment off missing the podium by one spot: There was nothing that would have bought me 5 minutes.

All in all, I was happy with the day...goal was sub-2:30 and prediction was 2:28 and I beat that...though I might not have if the bike course had been measured accurately. Since I've been fretting about lost speed over the winter, it was nice to at least threaten for an AG podium spot in my first Oly in over a year.

Oh, and my buddy Gerard won the du (as I'd predicted...and he knew he would).


I think I was a little low on fluids and electrolytes. My tri shorts were more white with salt than I've ever seen them after a race (which is saying something). Otherwise, the only thing that seriously cost me time was the calf injury the last three miles of the run.


Generally a nice event. Decent expo. Flat course. Only things I'd like to see change: More post race food options (they had only strawberries and cookies), along with water and cocoanut water. And a bit more accuracy with regard to the bike course distance. Bad enough to call an event an "Olympic" with a course that is shorter than the Olympic standard (call it an "international" then), but to have the course come up more than two miles short of what is announced is unacceptable, IMO.