Make-A-Wish Sea Colony Triathlon - TriathlonOlympic

Well, because of heavy surf abd a strong rip tide, they cancelled the swim portion and decided to make it a one mile beach run. They walked everyone out of the resort and down the beach and had us cross a timing mat to line up by waves. My AG started in the 2nd wave with all the men 39 and under.

I lined up in the second row on the left side after having tested the sand in a few places to see how running in it would be. I also wore shoes as did most of the field. Finally gun goes off and we take off back towards the resort. Came off the line good but the sand was definitely not working for me and it was tough to keep a solid pace. There was no way it was a mile as I hit the timing mat in world record pace if it was. So judging by my time, I'd say .6 miles at the shortest.

But it was tough to know where I stood in my AG when there were 4 other ones mixed in. Actually did fairly well and got into transition pretty well up in the group. The run from the timing mat to the transition area was pretty long and I don't see why they didn't just put the mat as you enter. Would have been a lot closer to a mile!

Not much. First ever beach run for me in a race. I have to say ...... I was actually disappointed we didn't swim! But I totally understand. The water looked pretty nasty.

Pulled the shoes off. I had decided to wear socks since the whole race would be dry and there was no reason not to. So just put the helmet on, glasses on, bike shoes were on the bike and took off. Actual time at the rack was really short, it was just the run in and out that took time. I did not get into my shoes well at all once on the bike. And while that time is counted in the bike portion, I easily lost 30 seconds futzing with my shoes and then getting up to speed.

Not a blazing transition, but stil not bad. 8th in AG but still around :30 off of the fastest one.

After the problem of getting into my shoes it did not take long to get up to speed and start picking people off. We had a tailwind to start and for a bit of the first portion. I knew that there were not too many in my AG ahead of me, but wasn't sure how I sat in the overall. First portion of the ride I was clicking off 27 - 30 mph easily.

It didn't take too long before I was running out of people to catch in my wave. There was a guy in a black Roock tri suit that I passed that was similar in speed to me. He fell back when I passed him and held a good distance behind so as not to draft. We swapped places a bit before I eventually left him. Good clean racing and it was nice to have that kind of race.

After getting away from him I caught a 25 year old guy who I started the run right behind in the beginning. He was moving out and I couldn't just slingshot off of him and leave him. So I passed him and he didn;t immediately fall back. Without being too unkind he was pretty much drafting off of me for a good portion. I gave him the fingers close sign and mentioned to be careful about the draft. He'd back off for a bit but eventually get back on. A few times I let him go by and dropped back to the proper distance, but it was always a little too easy for the effort I wanted to go, so I'd pass him back not long after.

This went on for probably 8 miles or so before we turned back towards the beach and into more head and front quadrant cross winds. I glanced back after starting on that section and there he was, still only a few feet back, but I also noticed two other guys who were in line (legally distanced though) behind him. I got a little frustrated then and slowed down quite a bit to get him to come through. He did, and I had to let the other two go by as well because I didn't want to get in a draft. I also took a Gu and a drink. Well, they started to pull away because I was trying to stay out of their draft.

Ride went on, these guys were always pulling slightly away from me and it was brutally windy. I didn't want to put out the effort to get back on to the group, but I also didn't to lose much time on them. I passed two more people with one being in the 50+ wave that started ahead of us and another 30 year old that started in my wave.

Even though the group ended up about :45 - 1:00 finish ahead of me, I still am pretty happy with my ride and the way I raced.

Not let the small group get away. Following the rules and staying 7 meters back would have still given me a slight draft which would have been helpful on that portion and would have gotten me into T2 right with those guys.

Not a blazing transition, but I could see there were not a lot of bikes in the transition. I thought I was in a decent place overall based on that but I knew that the 40 - 49 guys started behind me and there are usually some fast people in those ranges. Transition time was good for only 13th in my AG. Not great, not bad.

Move a little faster. Not that I thought I was slow, but definitely not as good as I should be. Between T1 and T2 I lost :45 or so on the guy who finished ahead of me.

As I was leaving transition one of the course workers from the Columbia Tri Assoc. said I was sitting in 10th out of the transition. Wow! That was nice to hear! Gave me a little more focus on trying to stay smooth. We were running with the wind on the outbound portion which scared me knowing we'd have to come back into the wind on tired legs. Wonderful ...

First mile went well and I could see most of the guys not too far ahead, all within eyesight. 6:22 according to my watch. Pace felt realistic but as I found out later, the mile markers were not really that accurate. There was a guy a hundred meters or so in front of me that I was catching in the first mile, but he was slowly pulling away after that. Near the 2 mile mark the guy I passed near the end on the bike passed me. He was 30, so I didn't pick up the pace any. A glance back showed that I still had a good gap to anyone behind me.

The legs were really starting to twinge. I had to back it off a little or risk locking up. The two guys that were ahead of me were still slightly pulling away, but not at a ridiculous pace. I also caught a 60 year old guy from the wave ahead and he was looking great. We approached the turn around and I could see everyone ahead of me. The guy in the front was moving out and had over a 1/2 mile on me. The rest were spread out fairly evenly. I saw one guy from the older wave still ahead of me, but everyone else was from my starting wave. I tried to look at calves as I went by, but couldn't figure out how many 35-39 were ahead. I saw the guy with the Roock suit and he was looking solid as well as the young guy who drafted off of me. No way I was catching them.

Made the turn and boom ..... back into the wind. This 3.1 miles was going to hurt! The next one was uneventful and I was looking for anyone that might be coming up on me from my wave. There was only one guy and I didn't see his age, but he was moving out and with my slowing earlier some he was almost assuredly going to catch me! At the mile marker it dawned on me ....... these were actually on the ground BEFORE the other ones on the initial outbound leg which didn't make sense at all. Those should be have been closer on the return leg with the 3.1 turn around. As such that mile was like 7:53, and I knew that wasn't right!

The next two miles were a focused struggle. Just get through the damn race! I couldn't go faster, but I wasn't needing to slow down. The next mile was in the 5:13 range showing me it was definitely wonky markings. But I could see the resort towers and the stream of people was continuous. The guy that I saw came up and went by and I happily noticed he was in a younger age group and didn't try to muster anything up to stay with him.

Finally made the turn and had 100 feet or so to the finish. Rob Viggorito called off "Here's comes Team Zoot" and then a few seconds later as I crossed, "Rick Carter from Fulton, MD."

Nothing much. I ran about as well as I could with my pace off the bike. If either of the guys that passed me were in my AG I would have tried to pick it up, but they weren't so I didn't push it more.

Shook hands with some of the guys who finished ahead of me and talked with them, especially the guy in the Roock tri suit. He said he wanted to say something to the young guy that drafted, but he was a friend and didn't want to be too harsh with him. Fair enough. Still the guy needs to learn how to ride with other fast people. The young guy finished 3rd overall. And while I think he could have still done that without drafting off of me with his bike and run speed, I certainly made it easier for him .....


Lack of training, especially since LP. I have less than 1,600 miles on the bike this year. And I still put up a strong split. But it comes at the expense of a better run. Really need to work more on the transitions. With a sprint tri next weekend that can make the difference in placing or not.


Other than the swim being cancelled this was a good race. I am a little bit better at the shorter/faster stuff as I can use my strength on the bike without taking too much out of my run because the distances aren't long enough to sap everything. I am happy with the performance overall as I really do not think I could have gone any faster throughout. I'm just a little disappointed that I was so close to the podium and couldn't pull it out. Not surprising, out of the top 13 (they did not have a 13th place person in the field on the timing sheet that I could find, just 12th and then me listed as 14th) there were 5 people from the M35-39 age group! Man I'm in a tough field!