Shawnee Mission Triathlon - Short Course - Triathlon

This was the first year for a time trial start at this race (29th year). You line up in random order, for which I made sure I was in front, and they start you in groups of two about 3 seconds apart. It's a short run to the water from the beach so off we went. The guy paired with me was right there at my pace for the first 100-125 yards or so then I started to pull away. I was on his left and I was sort of sightning off him for the first 100 yards or so but then realized he was drifting left away from the bouys. So I started moving to the right and he got the picture as you could see we were a ways away from the bouy line.

Finally I was in front of the group and started to hit the group ahead of us. After the turn there were a lot of white caps (group ahead of us) that I had to weave through. I was able to swim wide left of the bouys which wasn't a bad idea since that was a good line to the swim exit.

I was pretty sure I wasn't passed by anyone in our wave which was men 40-49.

Pay better attention to the bouy line earlier in the swim. I doubt that added much time to my swim, 3-4 seconds maybe.

I already have slow transitions, so when other things happens it seems like I spend an eternity here. My bike has a stack height of nearly 600mm so it doesn't just roll under the bike rack. I've got to tit my bike almost 45 degrees to pull it out. So this time while doing so, my pedal slipped under the strap of my transition bag and when is started to run out with my bike, I saw the bag dragging! D'oh, so I had to spend some time to get it off the pedal, and given I was in a hurry, it took much longer than it should have.

I need to rack my bike differently or make sure my transition bag straps are underneath the bag so they can't get caught by anyting. What is it with me and transitions bags!!

Once on the bike I did not feel as loose as I usually do. I thought, OK first mile or so I'll loosen up. Nope, still tight. I went hard the whole way, just didn't feel fast. I was passed by two guys on the 2nd lap, wasn't sure if they were short course or long. I had space on the left side of the road for most of the ride, had to yell out "on your left" a couple of times. As I was approaching the sharp left turn just before the straighaway to the dam hill there was a gal in front of me and I wanted to to go wide so I yelled out a nice load "on your left" as we approached and she veered right to give me some space so I thanked her for that.

Did I feel tight because my only warmup was 5-10 minutes of swimming? Should I have jogged a mile or so before? I think I rode 40 miles two days before with some 3-5 minute high intensity intervals.

Ahhh, the pitfalls of the random trainer who doesn't follow a plan.

I still averaged 22 mph so it's not as if it were a terrible ride. I just think I can go faster on this course.

Typical longish transition. A lot of people were under 1 minute. I haven't learned to get the feet out of the shoes while riding. I'm still a little clumbsy while rolling and don't want a muppet moment (that's a saying the great Chrissie Wellington uses with her moments of clumbsiness).

At this time nothing until I learn to dismount without unclipping.

Felt OK coming out of transition. The usual post bike tightness until the run legs show up. Out of the shute I was putting on the race belt and two guys cruise past me, both 30's age groupers. Once the belt was secure and I got that first drink of water I settled into what felt like a good strong pace. Passed those two back about 1/4 mile out of transition. Next up was the dam hill and it played true to its name. Talk about slower down to a near walk.

Finally made it up and did the little loop around the parking lot and across the main road. The next section was 1/2 mile or so downhill. The first guy that passed me had a 35 on his calf so no big deal. Then another guy passed me with what I thought was a 45 on his calf, my age group, but I didn't know if he was short course or long. I couldn't see his race number by that time. Oh well, just run your race I thought.

After that I was all alone for the last 1.5 miles and I finally looked back and nobody was behind me for quite a distance. Then I started the uphill climb where you come out of the wooded area parallel to the main road. I didn't look back in this section, I just knew I needed to use all I had left and get to the finish. As I finally got near the finish line this guy passed me right as we crossed. I think that was Scott but wasn't sure. He did the long course so it didn't matter.

That last mile was tough, my lack of running lately showed. I didn't have gadgets for pacing but that last mile was probably 8:30 or worse.

Not much given my current level of fitness.

Got my "after", chocolate milk of course, had two in fact. Chit-chatted with the guys who all had great races. We waited for Mark to come in, I think he was in the very last wave. Eventually I went over to the results board and it looked like I was third in AG as I could swear that was a 48 and a 49 year old ahead of me. I was 12th overall at that point.


Minor injuries from bike crash 5 weeks which resulted in a major lack of running.


They had a pancake breakfast post race so Patrick, Pete and I went over there for a while. I had about 5 as I was pretty hungry. We then waited around for the awards which took awhile. The awards announcer guy was a hoot! He announced things in random order and noted finish times for some people but not for all. Depending on the size of the age group, the awards could go five deep. So one female age group went four or five deep and he announced the finish time of the 4th or 5th place girl but not the others. He then skipped from men 35-39 age group to men 45-49. Sometimes he would announced 3rd to 1st place and other times 1st to 3rd place.

So Pete got 5th OA in the short course which give you an OA award and you are supposed to be removed from AG awards. They didn't even announce overall for the short course so Pete got first in AG, which he was anyhow. I was expecting 3rd place but ended up first in AG because those ages on the results printout were wrong I guess.

This was actually a wire to wire victory for me. I took the lead at the swim and never lost it. Even with the slow T2 and run noone in AG was able to catch up. I only won by about 22 seconds but the Raging Bull got Bullied!

So upon completion of the award ceremony, Pete, Patrick, Mark and myself had some nice hardware. A couple other BT'ers also got hardware so at least 6 BT'ers got awards this day, most of them AG victories.

Pete's jokingly called himself a short course bully, Actually I sort of feel a little bullyish, given so many beginners do the short course. I could have done the long course and would have finished easily had I paced myself accorindingly. But I wanted to RACE this day without causing further delays on my healing etc. so there! call me what you want. Those 11 guys that finished ahead of me don't think I'm a bully ;)

One other cool thing about this race was the Parks and Recs partnered with the local United Cerebral Palsy group and had a challenged athlete division. the local UCP director has a daughter with CP so she put together a relay team, herself being the swimmer. She pulled her daughter in a raft, another person pulled her on the bike and a third pushed her during the run. She was inspired by Team Hoyt and she actually called Dick Hoyt for some pointers and he was very helpful during their phone conversation. If you don't know who Team Hoyt is, just search Youtube for Hoyt Triathlon/Ironman etc. and you'll see some very inspiring footage of a "real" ironman will do with his son.

Peace out friends.