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 Swim
Comments: Sheesh. What would happen if I had entered the time Dave told me? I put in a 5:10, but Dave though I should have entered closer to 4:30. I had planned to go easy until I I got caught and just ride some fast feet the rest of the way. Never happened. The guy in front of me went out faster than I did and I couldn't get around enough people to catch him. The guy behind me was sandbagging his time the wrong way. The people I did pass were way too slow to draft off of. So I pretty much swam on my own. Not that I'm not happy with this swim. It's my best race swim yet. I felt very comfortable. No panic, no wishing I was somewhere else. Just nice and easy. What would you do differently?: Seed myself higher. I was seeded 139, my swim time was 57th. I could have been way faster with some fast feet to pull me.  Transition 1
Comments: The shock of getting out of the warm pool into the sub-freezing temp was nuts. "These pretzels are making me COLD!" OK, got the prerequisite Seinfeld quote out of the way early in this race. Grabbed my towel to dry my legs. Done. OK, leg warmers on. Good. That's better. Socks and shoes next. OK. Jacket. Ah, that's better. Gloves. Ahhh. That's nice. Then things fell apart. Those of you who know me know how dainty my hands are. When I tried to fasten my helmet, I couldn't grip it with my gloved hands. The gloves are smalls and still have a bunch of hangover in the fingers. Dang it. OK, right glove off. Helmet buckled. Glove on. Sunglasses on. Mr. Turtle on...crap. Can't fasten it. Glove off, Mr. Turtle fastened, Glove on. OK. Race belt on...are you kidding me? Glove off, belt on, Glove on. Finally. Ran my bike to the mount line. Slid on, buckled in, and tried to start Mr Turtle. Sheesh. No, I'm not taking the glove off again. I bit the start button and heard a beep. Sheesh. This was silly. Off I went after a stinking 4 and a half minute transition. What would you do differently?: Um...put gloves on last? I could have podiumed if I had shaved 3 minutes off this time. Would have been 4th if I had shaved off 9 seconds. Crazy.  Bike
Comments: Ouch. This hurt. There was chip seal from the start, but it was manageable. Passed a few people early and started to warm up pretty quickly. One we made the turn onto the loop, the new section of chipseal and I met. This was bad news. Some of the worst I've ever ridden on. The kind that just sucks the life out of you. I was watching my Garmin and didn't like the numbers I was seeing. I was only around 17.5 the first half of the out. At first I was upset, but when I noticed that only 1 guy had passed me so far and I was still passing people I felt better. Not all courses are PR courses. This one certainly isn't. Begin rant...At the turnaround there was a dude being put into an ambulance. Not surprisingly he was shivering uncontrollably and only wearing a tri top and shorts. I have a hard time feeling sympathy for folks who don't put on clothes when it's below freezing. Apparently there were a lot of people who did it too. (Rolling eyes as I type this) Think, people! It's below freezing, you're coming out of the pool soaking wet and you're going to go 16-22 mph on your bike into the wind. What did you think was going to happen? Rant over. There was a good hill at the turnaround. It felt like it went forever to me. Any speed that I had from the downhill was already killed by the turnaround, so it was just spin practice. Watched my RPMs and shifted down whenever I got below 80. Ended up in my lowest gear at the top. Lots of negative thoughts here. Could be the course, or maybe it was having the Doobie Brothers - China Grove in my head. Where the heck did that come from? The last 4 miles I played tag with a guy in a red jersey on a road bike. I would pass him on the hills, he would pass on the straights. He left me when we hit the chip seal again. Oh well, so much for that. Set a goal to catch him on the run, then I sat up and decided to spin in at high cadence. Saw Sean heading out as I was heading in. Yelled at him to have fun. I sure did... What would you do differently?: Carry my own personal chip seal smoother. This stuff sucked. They already had to change the course from 3 years ago when I did it because they chip sealed the old course all the way. I'm sure the rest of this course isn't going to be smooth for long either. I need to fight negativity when things aren't going like I want. I had a 3 hour ride the weekend before just a hair slower than my "race pace" for the ride. Looking back now, I was 5th in my AG. It wasn't just me that was slow. It was everyone. Had I focused more on what I was doing instead of how slow I was going, I would have gone faster. Also didn't try drinking anything or trying to get my Gel at mile 9. With my gloves on, I didn't trust myself to grab anything. Probably would have dropped it and gotten a nice abandonment penalty. Transition 2
Comments: Better than T1, but still not great. I decided to take my gloves off first and leave them off the entire time. No fumbling around there. But when I pulled my left glove off, Mr Turtle decided to fly. OK, really he just fell off onto my towel, but for a turtle that's not bad flying. Unfastened my shoes and slipped out of them while I took off my helmet. Put on my Walmart Racers and tied a double knot. Didn't have time before the race to get them where I could just slip them on. Then, rather than taking the time to put on Mr Turtle, I just carried him in my hand. I held a fanny pack for an entire marathon, so I figured I could handle a watch for 3 miles. What would you do differently?: Have shoes ready to go.  Run
Comments: Back in high school track they gave us some Asics waffle racers. There was absolutely nothing to them. Some rubber spikes in the front, and completely flat in the arch and heel. They were maybe a quarter of an inch thick soles. Yet they were infinitely more comfortable than my Walmart specials. It's a good think my feet were completely numb the first 2.5 miles. These were just awful. No support whatsoever. The first half mile was up a gradual hill. I spied a pack of 4 runners at the top and mowed them down. One of them got right on my heels and paced off of me until the turnaround. Saw Aaron, Dave, and Scott on the way out. Passed Phil at the 1 mile mark. I felt like I was going dog slow in the shoes, so I was shocked to see a 6:35. My pacer passed me soon after this, and he just left me behind at the turn. Crap. Does that count as getting passed if he started before me? I decided it didn't. Heading uphill now, and my left calf started cramping on me a little bit. Not fun. 2nd mile was slower than I wanted, but I managed to run through the cramp until it subsided. Still passing people, so that's good. I would spy a couple a few yards ahead and reel them in before moving on to the next target. Butterfly (Andy jargon for Suck it up)! Only another mile. I finally caught up with a guy that had passed me on the bike course. I wanted revenge and got it. Hit the top of the hill and had only a third of a mile left. Out of nowhere, a girl blows by me in the last 1/4 mile. She was flying. Dang, I got passed. I hate getting passed. Oh well, she was moving. What would you do differently?: Gee, I wonder? Heck, I still bested my best sprint 5K time by 10 seconds. Less than a minute off my standalone. Post race
Warm down: Stretched, changed socks, put on windpants. Chewed the fat. Chewed some of Lou's birthday cookie. Ok, I chewed a lot of it. I was hungry. Watched Sean come in, then stayed inside for the awards. Then off to Jack in the Box for my cheeseburger. What limited your ability to perform faster: Weather and wardrobe malfunctions. Event comments: Not a PR course like most of Jack's races. I did it a few years ago before Jack took over and it was very disorganized. That's not an issue with Jack's races. But oh, the bike course, it was tough. I don't foresee the highway department doing anything but more chipseal around the loop. Logistically I don't know what they can do. I love Jack and his races, but that was suck. No complaints about the swim or run. And I love getting tech shirts for a sprint. Much better than a cheap single color cotton shirt that some "other race organizers" give out that end up in the garage as work towels. Profile Album Last updated: 2007-12-12 12:00 AM
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United States
Athens YMCA
30F / -1C
Sunny
Overall Rank = 48/336
Age Group = M 30-34
Age Group Rank = 5/27
Drove down to the cabin (20 minutes S of Athens) Friday night with Sean and Jo. We dropped the kids off with Shannon's parents and went to Randy's cabin where I've stayed for deer season the last 4 years. Got everything unpacked only to find one minor detail...I only had one running shoe. For some reason I didn't pack my shoes in my bag. I just threw them in the truck. Apparently during one of our 3 stops on the way, one of my shoes fell out. Oops.
So I weighed my options - run in Shannon's running shoes, which were way too small for my feet; run in Shannon's mom's shoes, which were not as small, but still too small, plus they were crappy shoes; run in my boots (ok, not really); run barefoot (too cold); or go by Wal Mart and pick up a cheap pair.
So after my prerace shower and Clif Bar the next morning, Sean and I left a few minutes early and went by the friendly neighborhood Athens Walmart Supercenter at 5:45am. Quite the selection. There was an amazing variety of quality running shoes, all in my size. After several milliseconds of deliberating the differences in quality between the $10 and $18 shoes, I finally went with the $10 ones. I think that $18 is just a little too much to pay for a pair of running shoes.
Got to the Cain Center about 6:30, and my truck's thermometer said 25. Nice. Going to need those layers today. Got the new shoes on, you know, to break them in during the walk to the transition area. Had to wait in line a bit for body marking. Thankfully they were doing it inside so I didn't have to strip down outside (yet). Saw Mike a few folks behind me in line so had a few yells at him. On the way out I ran into Aaron, Clint, Gina, and a few more of my fellow LTF swimmers - Dave (coach), Lou (coach's girlfriend), Scott, and Phil. Everyone got a snicker about my shoes.
Got into transition and started setting up. Popped on some Flock of Seagulls first to get some positive tunes in my head or at least some loud ones. Laid out my towel with bike shoes on it. Leg warmers went on the aerobars along with my race belt. Turned on my Mr Turtle and set it up for multisport mode. This was when I noticed my HR strap was loose. Crap. Did the same thing at White Rock, and I'm still too dumb to figure out how to tighten it, so I just took it off. No HR data this race. Oh well.
Flock of Seagulls was followed by some prog rock Yes (Tempus Fugit). Felt around in my bag to see what I forgot. Oops, almost forgot to put my sunglasses in my helmet. Might help. Oh yeah, might want to put your chip on your chip strap, doofus. Ok, gloves on the shifters. Everything's a go.
Crap, time to strip. It sucked taking off my nice warm jacket. Oh well, I'll get it back on soon enough. Then off go the shoes and socks. Frak! Body glide on the feet and shoes, now inside quick as NIN - Wish gets me moving.
Made a quick trip to the john and headed to the pool for a warmup. Shannon and Jo had just gotten there, so I handed off my tunes and gel. Good timing.
Got in the lane with Mike, Dave, and Lou. Got all of 75 meters when they blew the whistle. Time for the prerace meeting. Great. Who needs a warmup anyway? I shivered my butt off for 20 minutes while Jack answered lots of newbie questions and sent us off. I made a quick pee stop and then kissed Shannon goodbye.
Watching a pool swim is painful. There was a guy within the first 50 swimmers who should have been in the last 50. The pool was a shallow entry with a drop off at 12.5 meters. This dude was walking the shallow part and side stroking or dog paddling the deep. Sheesh. And of course, Mike was stuck behind him. Felt sorry for him. The folks around me and I were just shaking our heads. Dude. Not cool. And he wasn't the only one. Lots of folks at the front that had no business being there. OK, I told myself, time to show that YOU belong up there in the sub-100s.