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 Swim
Comments: Really I had no expectation of putting up any sort of decent time and since there were 3 waves of 35-39 I had no clue of where I would sit in the overall aspect of the age group. And to be perfectly honest, there was this little tiny shadow way back in my head that kept saying "You might become another tri death statistic." Yes, it was a really really small voice ....... it wouldn't have been there before I had the heart condition evaluated (even though technically I guess I've always been at risk). But now it is. You know what though?? F-ck you heart! I'm doing what I want when I want and you are not going to screw it up!! Got in the water. Plenty of room. Started well and could use the shore to sight so no problems at all navigating at the beginning. Very little contact and was able to get into a groove pretty quickly. From then on it was really uneventful. Did not zig zag much at all, only bumped into a few people and no fists or feet to the face. It really was a pleasant swim and considering how little I've swam lately I think I did really well! Heart never bothered me and I was able to get back in with little issues and not tiring. What would you do differently?: Swim more obviously. I have only swam around 50k yards for the whole year, and nothing at all really in the last two months. The fact that I was able to stay even and on course and have really zero problems the entire swim can be accredited to my experience in the sport I guess. I was never out of control or out of breath. Just nice and relaxed doing what I needed to get to the land where I do much better. And I made it out of the water alive and in one piece. Take that little shadow of doubt!!  Transition 1
Comments: It was a HUGE transition with close to 4,000 participants. Bigger than even my two IM events and really spread out. Made for a long run to the bike and another long run to the bike out mat. For this reason alone I did what I almost always tell people not to do - I had my shoes pre-clipped to the bike. Out of the water, suit top off, start to peel the bottom down as I'm running the 300 yards or so to my spot. Suit off, helmet on, sunglases on and go. Out of the bike out section and hop on at the mount line. Waited until I was well up to speed to get into shoes. Pretty decent overall and judging by others times, pretty quick. What would you do differently?: Nothing really. This was pretty quick and efficient. It was one of the rare instances where it was a good idea to keep the shoes clipped to the bike, especially since I just bought new cleats for the pedals! I didn't need them getting all gunked up.  Bike
Comments: Well, I made it through the "hardest" part with the swim. But I still had a big unknown with the bike portion as I haven't trained for it either. And knowing my penchant for wanting to push the bike (with often disastrous results on the run) I was leery of how to go about racing this leg. I got up to speed and into my shoes fairly well. Since I almost never practice that (I will usually put my shoes on and hop on my bike to get up to speed and clipped in quicker) I made sure I was moving out hard before putting them on. Still got passed by one guy though doing that. Didn't take me long to pass him back after tightening the straps though. I settled in and took a look at my cadence seeing it was right where I like it (100 - 105 rpms) and noticed that I was comfortably doing that in my 53/17 gear. I have not ridden with speed on my cyclometer in a bit (no sensor on my disc wheel) and have simply gone by feel and cadence but I know based on that gearing that I was rolling along around 25 - 27 mph. Hmmmmm, a little faster than I would have expected to be able to go! I tried to make sure the effort level was not to high, and it wasn't so I said, "Okay, let's roll with it!" From then on it was almost business as usual as if I was not ever off the bike training. Flying past people, especially when the road tilted up (the course was somewhat flat but there were a lot of gradual climbs - false flats really). The poople were fairly spread out in the beginning of the course but as I got further in and was catching the waves ahead of me it got a bit more crowded. In general the race was pretty clean but about 6 miles out I was coming down a hill and came upon a group of about 8 guys. One of them had just passed me and got stuck in the group trying to find a way through. I yelled at them to break it up as I wound my way through. About a 1/2 mile later they all came up on me with a few of them telling me to move over so they could pass (as a group mind you). There was no separation at all and it was a definite pack. Well ...... I went ballistic. I said some VERY choice and not very nice things yelling at them the whole time. And then I proceeded to destroy them all sprinting off the front and begging them to try and latch on. If anyone had tried I would have gone into total road racing mode and eaten them alive. At that point I did not care about my run performance. I hate cheating baztards and they completely suck and ruin the sport. But surprise surprise ..... none of the main group could stay with me. The only one that did was the guy that I had been leap-frogging with earlier who got stuck in the group. I rode over to him briefly and apologized to him saying I was not yelling at him as I knew he was riding clean and he and I both shook our heads and said what a bunch of crap they were doing. I let him go ahead as he was riding a half tick faster than me and in the next mile we came into the transition. Overall though, this was a really unexpected and solid ride for me. I couldn't have asked for a better one based on where I was and ended up really surprised by the way I rode. What would you do differently?: Ride more as two months off the bike really hurts your abilities. Maybe not blow away the azzhats that were drafting. I know that sucked a little out of me. But it felt sooooooooooo good to do it. Especially when none of them caught me again. Transition 2
Comments: Long run in and out again. Futzed with the running shoes a bit too much but overall pretty efficient and again, based on times went fairly quickly compared to others. What would you do differently?: Not much. I was a bit tired from the bike and that throws off the speed and urgency.  Run
Comments: Started out of transition really well. Form felt right, turnover was comfortable and effort was consistent. I was picking off people relatively easy and was surprised how well the run was going after the unexpected bike result. Back of my mind I was wondering when it would fall apart ...... That started a little after two miles. Started to be dragging and breathing was getting a bit more labored so I backed it off a little. 2 to 3 seemed to take a long time and a few people passed me. From then until the finish it was not so much a slog, but definitely felt a lot slower and I had no pop. When someone passed me I didn't even bother to try and go with them. It was also sunny and warming up and I don't race well in the heat. But luckily the last mile was more in the shade and I just plugged away until crossing the line. Thank goodness that was done! What would you do differently?: Not push the bike. I know that slowed down my run especially on very limited bike fitness. But I knew I was not going to win anything this day, so I simply went as well as I could with the fitness I had available. Post race
Warm down: Grabbed water and Powerade and met with my friends/neighbors who had come out to watch the race. They were able to see me at the swim exit, bike dismount and on the run and I heard them cheering for me which was great. So huge thanks the Julie, Matthew and the kids for coming out to watch the race! It was going to be logistically impossible for Mir and the boys to come out, so it was nice to have a friendly voice out there cheering me on. What limited your ability to perform faster: Training, heart problem and medication. Event comments: I was concerned about the size of the event and wondering if they were really over-extending themselves. But overall it was really well run, things flowed fairly smoothly and the course was not nearly as crowded as I thought it would be. Of course I did go off earlier but still was in the 7th wave, so there were probably 1,000 people ahead of me on the course. After race grub was decent and they had chairs and tables set up for participants and friends to sit and listen to a live band and other stuff. I'm overall very satisified with my performance given all the concerns I had coming into the race. Even with the really slow swim I still finished top 10% overall and in the AG. I pushed to the best of my ability for the day and had no real disasters at all. Just another solid effort and good day. Couldn't have asked for anything more! Last updated: 2009-03-25 12:00 AM
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United States
TNT productions
65F / 18C
Sunny
Overall Rank = 262/3933
Age Group = M35-39
Age Group Rank = 44/426
Got up at 4:30, took the dog out, grabbed my stuff (most was already in the car), got on the road to DC. I brought a pack of Clif Shot Bloks that we had gotten at the expo because I was out of Gu Chomps (which I like much better) and my order won't be in for a few more days. Got down to DC by 5:30 and parked then walked to transition. Set up, talked briefly with a few people. Transition closed at 6:50 and we all went into the swim corral to get ready for the start. Took a Gu ROctane and swigged it down with some Gu2O with about 30 minutes to go. Talked with an old client from my old office and met jldicarlo from BT and talked for a few minutes. Then it was time to get down to the swim start for my wave.
A little background for this race to help explain what is going on in my life. For years I have had this heart flutter/murmur thing and I had not gotten evaluated. It would feel like my heart went into hyperdrive and would be beating not only fast but really erraticaly. It started probably about 10 years or so (that I noticed) but this year it has become progressively worse and I was having more episodes. I'd have some dizzy spells when I had an "episode" and wouldn't be able to do much. The fact that this happened TWICE in the pool while training this year really started me being concerned. One time I had only done 25 yards of a 100 yard swim interval and could barely think straight. By the time I got back to the other side of the pool my HR was probably around 240 (it was so erratic I couldn't count it right) and I was really light headed. So I got out of the pool and sat on the side. A woman had just gotten in the lane where I was and was really concerned and said she would watch me while she swam as she was a medical professional (of course I told her I was okay - stubborn Aries in me).
After that Mir had enough and told me I needed to see a doctor. Her cousin's husband is a cardiologist in the same practice as one of my old customers from the bike shop I worked at, so I trusted him to give me the real deal. After a visit, an EKG, scheduling and doing an ECG and wearing an event monitor to see if I could record an episode (which luckily I was able to) he determined that like both my father and uncle (his brother) I have Atrial Fibrilation. It is not a very uncommon thing and the risks are not that high for problems overall EXCEPT ......... the way it works is the wiring around the upper part of the heart fires in a weird sequence and instead of good solid constant pumps, it will just kind of sit there and flutter all over the place. Not a big deal expect during those periods there is not a lot blood actually being pumped out! This means people can get light headed and dizzy (see example above) with extreme cases of passing out. And worse .... there is a risk of developing blood clots as the blood just sits there in the upper chambers not really being moved.
The only real options available right now are beta blocker medication which would have to be taken for the rest of my life or ablation surgery (they kill a bunch of the nerves that are mis-firing). Because I'm healthy and low risk he wanted to opt for the medication first at a fairly low dose. Well, if it will help control the episodes and make them go away, that's a good thing, right?
Here's the caveat ....... the way a beta blocker works?? It basically acts like a rev limiter for the heart. Think about an engine that can rev. to 8,000 rpms. Now retard the timing and throw on a governor. Now the engine only can get to 5,500 rpms. The drug does that to your heart. It cuts off the risk of it beating all over the map and keeps it under control. All fine and dandy except that the engine (heart) is what allows an endurance athlete perform at higher levels!!!
Yeah. Let's see. Chance of passing out from being dizzy in an open water swim and becoming a statistic or take 20 years of endurance sports and throw your abilities out the window. I've just got a win-win going here!! So of course I am on the medication now. Still not 100% it is the right dose as I still get some fluttering every now and then, but nowhere near what it has been. The thing I have noticed though is that if I take my medication and THEN exercise, I have a terrible workout. So for the race I did not take it in the morning ........
Bascially because of that and the fact that I have not swam OR ridden my bikes more than twice in the last two months I was going into this race the worst prepared I've been in years and fully expected a lackluster and/or dismal performance. But I was given the opportunity to participate in the race by Gu Sports and my partnership with them so I did not want to let them down.