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 Swim
Comments: My best swim ever, leading me to believe the course was shorter than advertised, but I'll take pride in what it says I did. I did follow my plan better here than at any other race and I did swim for a good part of it. Plan was to swim 15 strokes, breathing every three (with as much time as I needed) before going into backstroke, breast stroke, or dog paddle mode, which I'd use to catch my breath and then repeat the pattern. I also tried to focus on swimming with almost a "catch-up" stroke because here lately that seems to be more efficient and faster (a relative term here). I did pretty well, although got caught up in a major maelstrom coming around the last buoy...what a mess that was! Closest I've come to the traditional open water tri swim. What would you do differently?: I want to experiment more with this stroke (head way down and using a catch-up type stroke) to see what it does. Other than that I don't know what I could've done differently, except maybe use 18 to 21 strokes before slowing down to catch breath. I'd have to rate it as a good swim for me (which is kind of laughable relative to others). And thank goodness...it covered me from what became a lousy run.  Transition 1
Comments: Bad transition. I was dizzy coming out of the water (first time that's happened) but I had the top off and the suspenders down by the time I got to my spot. But then I couldn't get the bottoms off over my ankles or heels; nearly fell over. Rolled my socks on, then discovered I'd screwed up during set-up: my bike shoes were strapped closed! S**t!! Then I pulled the strap completely out of the loop on one of them and had to futz around to get it back in. I was so discombobulated I dropped the Garmin and just decided to leave it there. Forgot to turn on the stopwatch on the bike computer so I had no idea what my time was but at least I did have a speed showing up. Long run to bike course; pretty slippery in my shoes which have a slick carbon bottom I'd never thought much about before. What would you do differently?: Main thing would be to spend just a little more time and be a little more observant so I don't make the bike shoe mistake again. Also need to practice getting the wetsuit off more efficiently. Probably would be more efficient to pre-clip my shoes in and get into them while riding but I don't think I'll be trying that anytime soon.  Bike
Comments: Not a big fan of the bike course, although the local police kept it totally free of traffic which was great; I'd never experienced that before...love riding without cars! But it just seemed like there were a lot of bikes out there and the turnarounds were tough, particularly when there were a lot of people trying to power their way through them and pass. On my second loop, I went into the far turnaround three-wide (although I didn't know it at first), bikers on either side of me, both trying to pass. On my inside was a woman who announced her presence, so I moved to the right a bit, both for her and because I wanted to take the turn kind of wide. Well, that's when I discovered there was a guy on that side and he sniped at me a little harsher than I thought was necessary, particularly since it's his responsibility to watch out for those in front of him since none of the participants (to my knowledge) were born with eyes in the back of their heads. Sorry, dude, but I can't see you back there! I snapped at him, told him to STFU, which I shouldn't have done and, if he reads this, I want to apologize, but with one small caveat: lighten up a little, bud, we're supposed to be having fun and you made it a little less so for me today. My plan was to do small ring for the first leg and then see how I felt, and then kick it up after that. But there was a headwind going out...I couldn't figure out why I was going so slow until I saw a flag snapping in the breeze. So I'd go small ring going out, then big ring on the way back. What would you do differently?: I was disappointed in my bike time...know I could've done better if I'd pushed a little harder, particularly on the first return trip; I should've gone to the big ring then, although I was around 19-20mph even in the small ring. Was hoping for 20mph average or close to it. More bike time, I guess. Transition 2
Comments: Time here is mainly a function of how far my rack spot was from the bike and run exits. Don't think I'd ever run this far in those bike shoes...not comfortable, I kept slipping. Once I got to the rack I transitioned fairly quickly. Had a little trouble snapping the race belt and I did do a gel because I figured I'd need it. What would you do differently?: Get there earlier and get a better transition spot.  Run
Comments: Disastrous. My runs have not been good this year; I hit the course and feel like I have nothing left. Don't know if I'm going too hard on the bike or running too hard at the beginning. But this one here took the cake. I didn't feel like I pushed too hard on the bike, so not really sure what the issue was here. Maybe it was the vacation and trip to TSW's dad's 70th birthday that limited my training somewhat, but I tried to do as much as I could during those times (and both vacation and party were great). I could blame it on the heat or the humidity, or maybe both in combination (heat index was probably over 90), but whatever the cause, this was one miserable run. I actually had to stop and walk on several occasions for a few seconds, on a freakin' 5K!! Pathetic. I was sweating so much my Halo visor failed, sweat stinging my eyes for probably the last half of the run. There was one point, when the one-mile mark came into view, I thought, "You gotta be kidding me, I've only come a mile?" I was already hurting and I wondered why the heck I was doing this. What would you do differently?: I'm thinking I probably just need to run a little more, and keep up the bricks, maybe lengthen them a little. Post race
Warm down: Walked around to catch my breath, got into a line to spray myself down with a garden hose. The guy in front of me was wearing a 2XU trisuit identical to mine...funny. Slugged down a Vitamin Water (they were a sponsor). The yacht club offered up a breakfast buffet, which was nice, but I wasn't in the mood to eat much...had a mouthful of scrambled eggs, half a bagel with cream cheese, and a banana. Sat out on the porch with TSW and talked with another one of the racers and his kid. What limited your ability to perform faster: Not pushing hard enough on the bike sooner and, evidently, run training. Fortunately, my surprising swim made up for the time I lost on the run. I'd hoped for around 1:25, 1:26, ended up just under that. So...I slightly beat my expectations, meaning it was an OK race, but I still had glaring weaknesses. Event comments: Overall this was a nice event and they pulled it off with what appeared to be relatively few volunteers. (The camera guy was also doing the body marking!) The police were great at keeping traffic out of the equation and the residents were great too cheering us on, spraying us with water and the like. Nice post-race activities too. Last updated: 2008-05-23 12:00 AM
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United States
Borough of Stone Harbor
76F / 24C
Sunny
Overall Rank = 303/386
Age Group =
Age Group Rank = 0/
Up at 4am. Ate toast with PB when I got up and drank some water. Also took an Imodium (took one night before too) in hopes of binding everything up and staving off any GI urgency (didn't work...more on that). Wanted to leave at 4:40...GPS said time to get there was a little over 2 hours; I knew TSW could make up some of that time but I just wanted to make sure, get a close parking spot (brochure warned this might be tough) and a good transition spot. We didn't get out until almost 5am, which pretty much had me freaking; thankfully I'd put the bike in the car last night and packed the transition bag too. TSW drove like a bat out of hell...by the time we headed into Jersey on the AC Expressway, arrival time was around 6:30. We lost a little of that when, yes, my GI let me know that, despite the Imodium, it was making a move. Stopped at a rest area on the GS Pkwy to do my business. Funny, but just as I left a guy came into the bathroom and, judging from how he was dressed, I figured him for a participant; I saw him later at the race. TSW said she saw a participant come into the ladies room. Funny how our stomachs act up.
One consequence of our late start was a lousy transition spot; I couldn't have been situated any further from the bike exit. Set everything up fairly quickly (too quickly as it turned out) and went to take a look at the swim course. I'd heard it described as a fish tank and that was fairly accurate; a square of water surrounded by the yacht club on one side and nice houses and boat docks on all the others (except for the exit into the bay, of course). I put on the wetsuit (wore the speedvest instead of the full top) and jumped into the water to do some swimming. Holy cow, was it cold...had to be less than 70 degrees. Salt water was a shock too; obviously knew it was salt water, but I hadn't thought consciously about it.