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 Swim
Comments: I didn't feel great for the first few hundred yards after the horn sounded. Doubt crept in once again. I managed to find a nice grove and started to feel better though and felt like I was swimming a good effort. I had to navigate around the first wave of M35 and under wave which started 3min bfore my wave of M35-45. A few collisions but in general folks were spread out enough to make it manageable. Swim was uneventful and I hit the stairs in 23 and change.  Transition 1
Comments: Had a fast wet suit strip and ran into a long transition area. My bike was racked near the Bike Out but the mount line was about 100 feet up a slight incline on a sidewalk. So I had my shoes clipped in the pedals and all I had to do was put on my helmet and GO. I ran hard up out and up and then easily got into the shoes and was off. It was a very smooth transition.  Bike
Comments: So now it's time to put those absurd 114 mile, 8000 feet of climbing rides to the test. I haven't been doing a lot of bike interval work and when i have, holding Olympic effort has been challenging to say the least. Knowing that and the cummulative training fatigue, I allowed that my HR would likey be a bit below what I am accustomed to seeing. I worked on staying low and aero and working a high cadence. And I was FLYING. I flet great, strong, powerful. My loegs were just pumping like pistons in an engine and I was rocketing by backmarkers from the Half race as well as the few remaining men in my race, at least I thought. I had one bottle with me between the bars with two gels mixed in and I worked through that as I hummed up the BeeLine. HR was in the mid to low 150's, about what I was expecting, but my confidance was building with every turn of the cranks. My bike was BACK for 2012. The long stretch of highway 87 really allowed me to get into a grove more often then not denied by the more typical Tempe olympic course with tons of turns. I was loving it and....I was having fun. What a relief. I had a few thoughts that I might still struggle on the run, but it was out here on the Sith Interceptor and all was good in the world. :) Transition 2
Comments: Did a good ITU dismount and hustled into transition to be greeted by one of the best sights in triathlon, empty racks. At least I though, turns out I missed one bike already in. I took a moment to put on socks as i was running in new TT 5.0's to get them a little broken in before IMSG and didn't want to chance a blister with so few weeks remianing of training. Scooped up my visor, race belt, and sun glasses and i ran towrds the Run Out as i got myself sorted.  Run
Comments: As I left T2, my coach Nick was right there waiting for me. "You're 1:00 down on Peter ney, run fast!" he encouraged. Peter Ney? Huh, he's a local guy in my AG who is a terrific swimmer but I usually catch him while still on the bike. he clearly had a great ride and for the first time was leading me out on the run course. Crap. He also looked very steady as he ran behind a lead MTB rider. My legs felt a little resistant to running at first but I tried to settle in and find my pace. Less then a mile in I made the turn up on to the bridge at Priest when i was suddenly overtaken by a 20 year old kid from Northern Arizona University! WTF, where did he come from! Then I recall passing him on the bike just a few miles from T2. He was motoring and went straight on by. So at this point I was thinking I was racing for 3rd and that this kid would catch Peter in short order. I was so fixated on the race developing in front of me that i could see I totally forgot that this kid started 3min before me. In fact it was until the finish my dumbass figured it out. Sure enough speedy boy caught peter on the north side rec path before Mill Ave. i was actuall feeling pretty good at this point, taking occasional glances at my HR but not concerning myself too much with effort or pace data, I was just running to feel and I fdelt SOLID. As we went through mile near the marina, I looked up and suddenly peter was RIGHT THERE in front of me. He was fading and I was only 20-30 feet behind. I gathered myself together and kept the pace steady knwoing when I caught him I would want to make it decisive. Just before the 4 mile aid station I pulled along side. I was beginning to struggle and we exchanged mutual support and compliments and I picked up the pace as I crossed over the bridge at Scottsdale Rd. to make the pass stick. Once down on the south shore rec path the leader, or who I assumed was the leader, turns out I was the leader, hadn't gaped me by much and the distance between us was about 150 feet holding steady. As we ran towrds the finish, he looked back a few times to check on me. I couldn't catch him and was settling in for a solid second place finsish. Crossed the line so pleased, satisfied, confident, and that was when I thought I was second. It was even better after when it turned out that I had won. :) What would you do differently?: I think this was a PR for me on the run split. Post race
Event comments: So at the end of the day, as usual my wife was correct and I went home that afternoon feeling great, feeling confidant in my training and fitness. Jamie and I sat outsdie as I enjoyed the first of more then a few Kona Brewing Company Cocunut brown Ale's and tunred to her and said,"Now i am ready to go get my Kona slot." Last updated: 2012-04-15 12:00 AM
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United States
Red Rock Co.
70F / 21C
Sunny
Overall Rank = 1/331
Age Group = M40-44
Age Group Rank = 1/49
"I think I want to switch and do the Sprint," I said to Jamie the on the drive down to packet pick-up on Saturday. She looked at me with no small degree of suprise. "Why? You've never even done a Sprint, why now?" she asked. Why now, indeed. No one wants to have a bad race, especially when it's just a tune up for their true "A" race. Having a bad day a few weeks out from IMSG had be anxious, to be perfectly honest. I had planned on Oceanside 70.3 to be a test of my fitness but having skipped the race, I had no context beyond my training to qualify where I was in terms of my preperation. My training for IMSG has been very different from my other Ironman builds. My long bikes have all been incorporating a ton of climbing wheich prevents me from settling into the kind of effort and paces I am so accustomed to. A lot fo my run training has been done on trails, where again pace and effort are so variable and make it difficult for me to gauge where my fitness is. This training has been all about building strength which my coach feels is key to doing well at St. George. Despite some good recent training sessions, I still felt a bit uneasy.
So here I was thinking about ducking the Olympic for the shorter Sprint out of that uncertainty. I was concerned all the cummulative fatigue of IM training would come crashing down on me in a longer race and I would end the day feeling, well like shit. Doing the Sprint, I reasoned, I could hide a little from having to do well. Yes, it's true, despite my years of consistently good results in my racing, I never take it for granted and usuually pre-race assume I won't do that well. So here I was having my little crisis and my wife providing me with all the perfectly reasonable arguments why I was being a baby. We arrived at packet pick-up and I walked out of the tent Jamie was standing there. "Well?" she asked. "Olympic," I replied sheepishly. "Good, suck it up," she replied. :)
So race morning dawned and I felt good. Jamie was stying home with the dogs and I was going o the race with our friend Joan as her husband was out of town and she was flying solo. The Olympic started at 8am, so we had plenty of time for a leaisurly morning. We arrived about 15min before the half IM started and set up transition. I looked over at the Sprint racks and still wondered if I had made a mistake, but I was comitted now, time to do this and get my triathlon season underway.