Amica 19.7 at Ocean Beah - Triathlon

So I'm standing on beach waiting for start and I begin to have those WTF am I doing here thoughts. I haven't been able to swim in 4+ weeks as a result of the car accident I was in back in mid June. Start swimming and try to remind myself to just stay comfortable, stay in my own box and if things start falling apart just slow down. Get halfway into the first leg, feeling some of the rolling waves, swallowing a little salt water and for the first time ever (races, OWS training) started to wonder if this was such a good idea to. Reminded myself that I've done this a lot in the past and just stay long, smooth, don't panic and just get to the 2nd turn when I would have the incoming tide to bring me home. What went really well was my sighting was spot on and I seemed to be swimming straight. Swim time includes a very slow run (better described as a fast walk up the beach to the boardwalk with transition was). I just couldn't run in the sand and was concerned about tweaking my tender calf. Today's swim was clearly one of those that I got through primarily by relying on all my past experiences and what little fitness I had left.

Swim waves were very reasonable size. Opportunity to draft if/when I could and wanted to but little to no contact (which was a big change as my last 2 races were big IM full contact wrestling events). In the week leading up to race there was word that jellyfish were here. While in water before start I saw a few but had no issues during race.

Be able to swim prior to race. As a result of a car accident 4 1/2 weeks prior I was unable to pull, roll, lay flat in water at that time so I decided to give myself lots of time to heal/recover before this race. Worked but swim fitness wasn't where it had been before taking over a month off from swimming. Top it off today was my 2nd OWS of the year. Run more from water to transition.

Too much of this time was spent getting wetsuit over my heels. Had taken goggles and cap off on run up to T1, pulled wetsuit top off and bundled everything into a ball. Had bibjohn straps down but the thing just fought me to come off my legs and over my heels. Otherwise glasses, helmet and shoes went on very quick and I was gone

More practice yanking wetsuit off by myself. Racing long (IM and HIM) the last couple of years I've gotten spoiled by wetsuit strippers. Also need to drop some weight and get back down to racing weight. Extra weight I'm sure didn't help with getting wetsuit off

Anticipated a strong bike. While I am racing well over my ideal race weight I anticipated that being a flat course my bike FT would yield me a decent ride. Was flying with what seemed like a hard but not unreasonable effort. Took the first 1-2 miles to get my stomach settled as I swallowed a little salt water during swim. Was cruising along a gradual decline when hit a bump and off goes my Powertap computer. No way I'm losing that sucker so I slow turn around go back to get it. Volunteer saw if fall off, picked it up and handed it to me. Estimate ~45sec lost with turnaround not including loss of momentum. Get back into a rhythm and going well until about 14.3 miles. Another bump and there goes the PT computer again. Crap. Turn around and need to wait for cyclists to pass before I can turn back, and slowly retrace and look for it. No luck this time. Estimate I lost about 2 minutes searching for it before giving up. Pushed the last 1.8 miles trying to make up for lost time. Came into beach parking lot where loop around toward transition. Feet out of shoes and rode with feet on top last little stretch. Was off bike in a flash and into transition very quickly and at a much faster pace then if I have bike shoes on. Nutrition was good. Drank 1 bottle of Infinit, had a gel about 1h into race and some water to wash it down.

Note: Post race I went back to the area with my daughter to walk and look for the computer. She spotted it in a storm drain about 3 1/2 feet down. After some McGiver like building of a contraption to scoop it up I managed to reclaim it. At the time I lost the computer the 2nd time I was averaging 20.5 mph (including the time spent recovering it the first time). I have no doubt I would've knocked out a 21.X bike split as I was consistently riding in the 21+ area (except for the one slight hill) when I wasn't going backwards on the course and/or looking for the PT (PT computer actually said 20.9 avg through ~14 miles where I lost it in storm drain)

Not have the PT computer fall off twice. Really disrupted to ride not only with time lost to circling around but loss of momentum in these sections. Go back to my Speedfill. I have been riding with a standard bottle cage between my aerobars for the last month. While I like having a real bottle there and being able to monitor my intake better the position just contributed to the PT being knocked out of its holder.

Bike rack was opposite end of transition from where we entered so ran distance with bike. No biggy as not that big. Was right at run exit so quick out. Hard to imagine doing this much better as time included putting socks on before running shoes.

Only way I could've been faster is running without socks which probably isn't worth it for maybe 10-20 seconds.

This was the leg i was most concerned about after pulling up gimp on my run Friday. Had some bad calf cramping that had me unable to walk that day, better but still sore yesterday and just a little sore today. Right out of transition grabbed cup of cold water and over my head. Felt awesome but shoes now soaked. Not a problem as first race in K-Ona's. They drained the water and while feet were damp they felt cool and comfortable. First mile felt awesome and in retrospect perhaps ran a bit too fast. About 1.5 miles in started to feel calf a little tight. Stopped for about 15 secs to walk/stretch it. Resumed running, backed off the pace a little and other than it being hot out and no breeze was doing ok. Hit the 2 mile at 16:30'ish and figured I was running ok taking into account the 15 sec stoppage. Continued on and about .25 miles later had to do a 30sec walk/stretch of the calf again. Seemed to hold off any further issues and got me to the finish line.

Race lighter. Currently probably 10+ pounds over race weight which certainly is taking its toll on my running. Not only running slower but having a harder time staying cool. Need to get this calf thing resolved. Been an off and on issue all summer and seems to be an issue at the worst times.

Crossed the line and was given an ice cold bottle of water, had a volunteer take my chip off and was given finisher's medal. Drank half and poured rest over head. Walked around for a few minutes, grabbed and gobbled down a slice of watermellon and a banana and then went back to water to soak in nice cool LI sound to cool down


Lack of swimming the last 4 weeks. Losing the PT computer 2x. Racing too heavy and needing to drop some pounds. Back still not being 100% right. Overall though I can't complain and had a heck of a lot of fun doing this race. Given the nature of the car accident I was in I'm happy that I'm here and able to actually race today.


First year race but I'm not sure you would know that by the way it ran. Packet pickup on Saturday and day of race. Picked up packet day before (at Niantic Bay Bicycles) as I'm local and the drive to Niantic not a big deal but I think I could've just as easily picked up morning of as they seemed to move folks through quickly. Vibe when I arrived on race day was cool. Music playing and a big race setup / feel despite being a sprint. Transition area seemed to have plenty of room between racks. Bike wheel sat in a tray (rather than some racks where hang bike from seat). More rest rooms than accustomed to seeing at races as we had access to the rest room facility there at Ocean Beach. Water temp in LI sound was nice. I opted for full wetsuit but there were people in sleeveless and some without wetsuits. Bike course could/should be very fast and it's somewhat scenic in parts along the water. Recall seeing lots of volunteers on bike and run course at just about every intersection and side street. Police at major intersections/turns. No water handups or aid stations on bike course which is fine. Only 16 miles. Roads not closed to traffic but that time of day on a Sunday morning I don't think I saw a single car on the race route. Run: each mile marked. water at about 1 mile and then at about 2.5 miles. Not sure what else they had at stations (I think I heard gel at 1 mile). Finish has you come into Ocean Beach over by mini golf and then run onto and down boardwalk to finish arch. Finisher's medal was pretty cool design.

Will definitely put this one on the race calendar for 2011. Nice to have more options to race local.