Skinnyman Triathlon - TriathlonSprint

3rd wave of 150. Started wide and put my recent 100 repeats work to good use. Went out harder than usual and was able to angle in, in front of the majority of my wave without ANY bumping. Good deal. Was a little worried I went too hard but slowed up a bit and regained composure pretty quickly. Stupid goggles started fogging about 20 strokes in. (urg.) Got into a good rhythm but quickly got a little crazy when we started overtaking the waves in front of us around the last bouy before the first turn. (Which came very quickly.. I was thinking "dang, I'm half way already?!?! Must be all that long yardage I've been doing) Got ALOT more chippy the closer to shore we got. Seemed that everyone liked to swim right beside one another instead of drafting. Get to one row of 10 people side by side, bust through only to come up on another row of 10, 15-30 seconds later. Was half tempted to swim under them at one point but swallowed a good bit of water getting sandwiched between two 'big guys'. Took me a good 15 strokes to stop gagging and get back into a rhythmic stroke. Nice thing here was although there were (big) people running into me, it didn't hurt nearly as much as most races. For some reason people weren't kickin and punchin as hard as usual. Whatever the reason, I'll take it. Hiked out of the water and slowly made our way up the slippery steps.

Put anti fog in my goggles. Duh. Although I used a different tactic and went pretty hard for the first 100-200 yards and I was a little worried I'd blown myself out, it actually worked out pretty well. Will continue to explore this method in future races.

I am just so darn clunky in transition. I guess if I want to get more competitive, this is something I need to practice more.

Practice

Maylay getting onto bikes. As usual, people come right out of transition and STOP ON the mount line. Wall of 10 people slamming to a stop and struggling to mount. UGH. Ran to the side and mounted but at the mercy of everyone in front of you as there was a no passing rule for the 1st mile. (kinda icky) Once they let us go though, start heading up a gradual hill and my quads start screaming! (OH CRAP. Guess I've been going pretty hard in training getting ready for Syracuse. This is going to be a long 14 miles) Headwind pretty much all the way out. Not a horrible one but enough to make you think about it. Am feeling pretty good and passing people like crazy - and not slowly either - really moving past them at a good clip and not really listening to my quads which haven't shut up since we started up the first climb. Only think I got passed by 5-6 people total the entire 14miles. (Which is like a miracle for me) Not sure of average heartrate but several times when I looked down I saw low to mid 180s. DOH! That didn't help the quads much either I'm sure. :) Pretty uneventful good ride. A little bumpy in places and slowed WAY down on the turn I went off the road on last year (good idea) but all in all, I was pleased. Last mile was no passing again and I'm right behind Christa. She is probably 100 feet off the wheel of the person in front of us but moving right with them and there is a guy behind me yelling at her to move it... doesn't she know this is a no passing zone. She starts taking her feet out of her shoes and I hear him say "oh now we are busy undressing". After a good 2 min barrage of sarcasim from behind I finally said "Dude, it is like 5-10 seconds, relax!" He proceeded to try and jut past us when we both slowed to dismount and almost went on his nose as he tried to dismount. Good lord. He was still struggling to get off his bike as I ran off into transition. Can't people just have fun at these things?

Not too much. I am disappointed that my quads were so angry the whole ride but I'm pleased that for the most part I was able to ignore them and push through it. Makes me look forward to out season training in prep for LP next year! (Bring it..)

Again. I am just so clunky. Was supposed to have my gel on the bike right before transition but was so distracted by Mr Mouthy behind me that I forgot. Didn't have one out so wasted a good 5-10 seconds rummaging through my bento bag for it. (funny part is ... I never used it either..sheesh).

Practice.

Gave it what I could. Quads wanted no part of this run. We had several arguments as we moved up the hill out of town and for the most part, I won. But this was not a pleasant run. There were several times I said to myself "oh just let her pass you. who cares?" and then I'd fight back to hold on for another minute before getting passed. Thinking that after we came off of 41 it was all flat or downhill, I put a little extra into it. WRONG. Silly little loop went down to the bottom of a neighborhood (right next to the lake) and then you had to come back up out of it to get to the main drag where it was THEN all flat or downhill. Burnt myself a little on that one and had to really fight to finish strong. There were NO smiles on my face for the last .5 and JC even said I looked like I was really gritting my teeth. I told him I was just trying to keep the vomit from exiting my mouth.

What would you do differently?:

Train for pain. :) I spent so much time in Z:1-2 this year training for LP that I'm just not acclimated to the pain associated with running fast. Running long pain I got nailed. But running fast pain is something you have to embrace in training so that on race day it is a pain you are familiar with and have the willpower to accept because you know it will soon be over. :)

Big bottle of chocolate milk - well after getting my stomach to not want to purge anything already in it. But can I say...I don't know if it was whole milk or if Byrne Dairy has some "special sauce" or somehting but that was the BEST bottle of chocolate milk that I have had. Dang. Good thing I didn't find more of it as I probably would have tried to rehydrate myself with that. Started to rain and the wind was picking up so I was shaking pretty wildly, I was so cold. Grabbed some warm clothes in transition and packed up my stuff. Waited for Dad to come in off the bike and cheered him in transition. Ran up to the loop hill to wait for him - bell in hand - obnoxiously cheering on everyone on the course. Saw Ang on the way. YOU GO GIRL! Gave dad the business all the way up the hill from the loop and down to the finish. :)


Probably training for Syracuse. Definitely not rested and my quads just were not in "prime" racing condition. But no worries. I had a great time, went faster than last year and was able to cheer on friends. Life is good.


Good race overall. Lots of spectators/volunteers and well run in general. For some reason, they decided to take down transition an hour and a half earlier than they advirtised and before people were finished racing and awards were given out. Good thing I packed my stuff up before I went out to find dad on the run as we came back to our bikes laying on the ground on top of our bags and other stuff. (mind you my father was still out on the run so he didn't have a chance to even clean up his transition area.) Odd. But other than that, it was a good race.

Heard lots of people cheering for me but having a hard time remembering who and where. Mom and Joe were in many places particularly next to transition, laughing at me as I talked to myself. :)

They are nice and say I came in 3rd in my age group. Really it was 5th. My age group went 1, 2, 4, 7, 14 in the overall standings. 5, 6, 10 and 12 went to the age group I'm moving into next year. Sheesh. I gotta lot of work to do if I wanna have a prayer of moving up anymore in the standings.