Toyota U.S. Open Triathlon - Sprint Course - TriathlonSprint

First in my AG for the swim portion. Although, my swim time is misleading. I was completely stupid and took off my wetsuit BEFORE the timing mat. Ugh. So I wasn't this slow.

Overall the swim was easy and smooth. No one got in my way. I even turned on the buoy (aka, my left arm was hitting it as I turned), and no one beat me up. Shocking. I caught the wave ahead of ours, and the one before theirs. I usually catch some people from two waves ahead. Always nice.

I have to say that there were A LOT OF NEWBIES at this race. I was sighting off a river of red caps (previous wave), whose heads never went under water as they were all doing breast stroke. Weird.

Getting out of the lake was painful and miserable. The mud was like deep quick sand, with rocks in it. I have tender feet. There was a lot of cuss word coming out of my mouth. Yeah.

Then I screwed up by taking off my wetsuit before the timing mat. DUH. Even then, the closest person to me in my age group was still a minute behind.



Take off my wetsuit AFTER the timing mat. But it all worked out, since I still got 1st in my AG on the swim.

This was a VERY LONG, UPHILL run to my bike. Very long. All uphill. The fact I pulled off 4 minutes is freaking amazing. Once I made it to my bike, I had to run a LONG WAY, DOWNHILL in my BIKE SHOES. Yeah, hard.

Even with this long time, only the 1st and 2nd place winners beat my transition time. Yes, it was a brutal transition.

This is a HARD course. I'm not sure why so many newbies do this race. It's brutal.

First, out of transition, you start up a steep hill. Which a lot of people have trouble even pedaling up. I was able to get on my bike and pedal, but had to avoid people who couldn't.

Then you turn and keep going uphill. Brutal. And keep going uphill.

Other than the hills and sadistically laid out course... this is what I would call a "white knuckle" ride. There were so many cracks, and potholes. I was trying to avoid those, while having guys pass me within inches of me on my left. There were a few times, I was terrified of going into a crack. If I wasn't dodging potholes, and cracks, I was being beaten up by chipseal. BRUTAL COURSE.

I worked hard on this course and when I felt like resting, I reminded myself that it was ONLY 14 miles and I needed to suck it up and keep riding.

Average HR 171
Max HR 181

For most of the 5 miles segments I logged on my Garmin I kept this HR. Looking at my HR zones for the bike, I paced this perfectly- working in interval HR zone the whole time.

HR Zones for Bike:
Warm up / Recovery - 110- 141
Steady State / Endurance - 142-158
Tempo - 159-170
Interval - 171-178
Anaerobic Capacity - 179+

The end is nice because you can cruise downhill for the last couple of miles. Of course, people are also complete idiots and refuse to use their brakes when they should. I heard there was a spectacular crash that occurred before I got to transition. Idiots. Really, slowing down for 100 yards isn't going to ruin your race... but a wreck will.

I can't believe my T2 was THIS fast. Seriously. I had to run a long way in my bike shoes, with my bike, uphill. So the face I got this time is shocking.

Coming out of transition we had to go up this steep hill (seeing a theme here?). I walked up it. Even walking up it, my HR was around 175. So yeah, I was walking it.

I wanted to run hard, and try to keep my HR in tempo zone, and then move into interval zone the last mile. The first half of this run is mostly uphill. It was pretty brutal (seeing a theme here?). A lot people starting running and ended up walking. I kept a slow jog, making sure my HR didn't go above 180. I knew if it went above 180 before a mile or two, I would probably die before the end (aka: get a horrible side cramp).

When I was going downhill, I was able to run a lot faster with a lower HR. Which was nice. Uphill I had around a 11 mm pace. Downhill I had around a 8:00-8:30 mm pace. I'm going to enter all my paces for each 0.50 mile so you can see how varied my pace was.

Overall a solid run. Not sure I had much else left in me. I'm happy I did as good as I did.

0.50 - 10:49 mm 171/178
0.50 - 8:19 mm 175/179
0.50 - 9:05 mm 175/178
0.50 - 9:04 mm 177/180
0.50 - 8:30 mm 180/183
0.50 - 7:26 mm 183/191 (WOW! That was fast!)

Avg HR 176
Max HR 191

HR Zones for Run:
Warm up / Recovery - 123 - 155
Steady State / Endurance- 156 - 172
Tempo - 173 - 184
Interval - 185 - 189
Anaerobic Capacity- 190+

Finished. Found my Triple Threat Tough teammates and chilled. Went to eat after the race. Fun times!


Overall this was a good race. Much better since they moved it to Rockwall. It's a long drive, but otherwise a good location.

I'm not sure why so many newbies do this race. I guess ignorance is bliss? It's a brutal course. The swim is long for a sprint, and bike is super hilly and so is the run.

I would do this race again.