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 Swim
Comments: Floating start with about 250 of my closest friends. The course is a narrow swim chute probably 25 to 30 yards wide. The nice thing about this course is that sighting is a breeze due to the small area that you swim in. You have a seawall on the right as you head out for the first 350m and on the left as you head back up so my line was really straight. Now for the bad...this swim, again due to the small area you swim in, is a WAR for the first 200 - 300 meters. I crawled over bodies and was crawled over, I was kicked in the face, nuts, legs, etc...until I got go the bouy and got some space. At one point I had to flop over to let the water out of my goggle because some douche bag kicked them. What would you do differently?: Start up closer to the front and let people pass me...alot easier than doing the crawl over bodies like some damn war movie.  Transition 1
Comments: I'm never great at these because I am spent from the swim and try to catch my breath. Need to get better at these, obviously. What would you do differently?: See above  Bike
Comments: Very flat and fast bike course. The wind was blowing pretty hard from the north off of Lake Michigan which made the 6 mile "out" portion along Lake Shore a lot slower than the 6 mile "back" portion which was super fast. The northern most 2 miles of LSD was in HORRIBLE shape and looked like what I imagine the street of Baghdad to look like. There were 6 inch deep potholes, gaps in the seams between lanes, buckled cement....it was a bad deal. I bet I saw 50 bike pieces...bottles, cages, bento boxes, etc...scattered along the road. I also saw probably 30 to 40 people who got flats due to the rough conditions. Once you got past this portion of LSD heading to the south, however, it was a lot smoother, lightening fast, and what can you say but DAMN when you are riding towards downtown Chicago with Lake Michigan on one side and 1,000 sky scrapers in front of you...pretty damn cool. What would you do differently?: Not too much...very happy with my ride, especially with the bad road conditions. Transition 2
Comments: See T1 What would you do differently?: x2  Run
Comments: One of these days, I am going to learn how NOT to bonk on the run. I started really strong...was avg a 9:15 pace for the first two miles but at about 2.35 miles I had to stop and walk. The rest of the run turned into a series of 1/4 to 1/2 mile tempo runs then walk for a minute. My plan was to shoot for a 10:30 pace the first two miles but I felt so good early I went with it...it bit me in the ass, obviously. I got really bad stomach cramps from all the fluids I was taking in but could never quench my thirst...just like in Austin. Ran the last 1/2 mile strong because you run down a chute of about 5,000 people and there was no f'ing way I was going to walk and look like a putz...which I am but none of them saw me way back at mile 4! :) What would you do differently?: Learn how to run in one of these damn Oly's! Post race
Warm down: Ice towels, water, and mingling with P Fiddy, his family, and Steve after the finish. What limited your ability to perform faster: Poor run and transitions...but both are fixable. Event comments: AWESOME RACE! I beat my previous best time in an Olympic by almost 15 minutes so i was very pleased. This is the best event I have ever done...hands down. Very well supported (20,000 people out cheering us on), great volunteers, the host hotel is near by....and you can't beat Chicago as a venue. I will be back! Profile Album Last updated: 2008-03-18 12:00 AM
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United States
Capri Events
70F / 21C
Sunny
Overall Rank = 1599/4089
Age Group = M 35-39
Age Group Rank = 247/503
Due to the large number of people doing the Accenture (8700 we were told this year) and with the immense size of the transition area, the t setup starts REALLY early....4:15. P Fiddy and I got up at 4:15 to head over to the transition area and get everything set up. I had a banana, some nasty ass fat-free banana nut muffin and some gatorade. We were staying at the Hilton (the race hotel) and the walk from there to the transition area was about 15 minutes and at that hour of the morning, it's like a mob of marching zombies sliding along in the night. Got to the transition area which was the size of three or four football fields and then had to find our rack in the pitch black...not that easy. I found a couple of trees to landmark my spot...set up my stuff via the lights around the transition area and all the lights from the bldgs in Chicago and was done and we headed back to the hotel. My wave didn't hit the water until 8:35 and Pat at 8:41 so we got back to the Hilton at 6 and took an hour and a half power nap before heading back down.
Met my brother Steve in the lobby of the Hilton and he and Pat and I walked over to the swim start about 30 minutes before splash time. No warming up to speak of...just dealing with the usual nerves that go along with these things.