See bottom for race report.

See bottom for race report.

See bottom for race report.

See bottom for race report.

See bottom for race report.

I figured I would do this in a different format from my usual ramblings, so here is my best attempt to organise my thoughts about race weekend:

Pre Race:
Friday: So it was just me and my Dad on this trip, which was actually pretty cool. We took the Anacortes ferry down instead of taking the BC ferries over to Vancouver and driving through the border. We figured that would be the best move due to it being July 4th long weekend for our friendly neighbors to the south. We got into Everett around 3pm and found our hotel no problem. Great place to stay for race weekend. The Nest Western Navigator. Full kitchen. Magic stuff. We hit up a Trader Joe's(for those of you not in the know this is a great organic grocery store) to get some groceries and ended up having a couple great homemade meals instead of eating out at restaurants every day. We also hit up some outlet stores where I managed to get a couple good pairs of running shorts and shoes for cheap(compared to Canada). On a side note, when are businesses in Canada going to get the memo that they cannot charge an arm and a leg for something we can get for cheaper even if we have to ship it in from the States. This is very frustrating. Our dollar is no longer worth .65 USD. Come on people, get with the program.
Saturday: We went to the mandatory race briefing, which was brutal. The head ref, while sometimes amusing wasted over 30 minutes explaining rules that could have been done in 5 minutes. Seriously. They actually made this briefing mandtory, which meant we could not get our race packet unless we had attended a meeting. Terrible. After that, we drove up to the race site so I could get in a quick ride and run, dropped off my bike, and headed into Seattle for the afternoon(in retrospect not the smartest idea on my part). My Dad hadn't been in years and he wanted to check it out. He said he could go alone if I just wanted to hang out and rest, but I didn't want to ditch him, so I tagged along. 4 hours of walking around later we headed back to the hotel to have dinner and crash before the race. Managed to nod off around 10pm, not bad for night before a race.
Sunday: Woke up around 4:30 am, had a blueberry bagel with peanut butter and a peanut butter cliff bar, yum. Felt pretty good, managed roughly 5 hours sleep as I only woke up once. Nice. We packed up the car, checked out of the hotel and headed up to the race.

Warm up: Jumped in the water off to the side and managed to get in about 5 minutes of swimming before the pro's went off, felt pretty good, and the water was a good temp.
Swim: 32:51, age group rank 18.
Started out wide as the course cut outwards from where we started, this was a good plan despite being right in the middle of a larger group of athletes which made the first 200 meters more of a battle then I really wanted. It thinned out a bit at this point and just like last year you were able to see the under water buoy line so I followed that for the whole swim other than the occasional siting to make sure I wasn't going to hit a bouy. Swim was pretty uneventful, I didn't expend very much energy, and in retrospect I probably should have pushed a bit harder, but I am happy with my result here. This course definitely has the best swim course in my opinion, very easy to navigate, and the waves are well spaced. Good stuff.

T1: 2:28,
Struggled a bit to put on some socks( I have trouble cycling barefooted!!!) I just need to work on getting this faster, I have to wear socks though, otherwise I blister too easily which makes the run very painful!!!

Bike: 2:52:35, age group rank 22.
Started off with the goal of capping my heart rate at the low end. My goal was to not let my heart rate go lower than 140(bottom end of zone 2 for me). This was a good way for me to always be working on the bike, and that mentallity seemed to work well. I took the first lap way too easy though, I didn't push the big ring at all, and went through the first lap in 1:30:31. For nutrition I tried something new after discussing several options with a few sources. The first hour I took in a cliff bar(carrot cake, 240 cals, 1 bottle of gatorade endurance 125 cals and a bottle of water). The bad side of this was that the first aid staion was not until the very end of the first lap, and it was about 10 feet long so all I could manage to grab was a bottle of gatorade. I had one gel and a bottle of gatorade for the whole second lap basically. The second lap I realised I needed to work a bit harder so I decided to push the bigger gears for some extended periods of time. What a difference this made. It did not stress my legs at all and I was flying. I wish I had done this in the first lap as well. Oh well, it's good to learn something each race and I have learned that I can actually push some bigger gears this year, I need to remember that. Anyhow, the second lap was good, the aid station worked out as you ended up going through it with about 6 miles to go so I grabbed 2 gels and a bottle of water(I was parched at this point) and downed a gel and the water before transition and was feeling good. Total nutrition on the bike was 1 cliff bar: 240 cals, 2 bottles of gatorade: 250 cals and 2 gels: 200 cals, and 2 bottles of water. Total cals consumed on the bike: 690 cals, a little less than the 800 I had wanted to get in, but no damage was done. Another side note, the bike course safety wasn't the greatest, we had 3 cars who buzzed us really close, and 1 car who pulled right onto the rear wheel of a guy and honked at him almost causing him to lose control of his bike and go down. Trust me I saw the whole thing happen and he was doing nothing wrong, there was plenty of room for this jackass to pass him but he decided to scare someone involved in a licensed race. Brutal.

T2: 1:12,
Pretty good, almost screwed up my dismount, as my shoe hit the groud still clipped in and I nearly ate it, but other than that, quick run in, and quick run out. No probs.

Run: 1:38:58, age group rank 15.
The run was where I really wanted to do better. I have been running fairly well since Boise and was hoping to have a solid effort here. I took off out of transition and settled into a good comfortable pace, when I went through the 4 mile mark in 25:30 I was pretty shocked, it didn't fell like I was going that quickly, and the best part was I still felt really good, the next couple miles were a bit slower, but I was still ticking along at sub 7 minute mile pace, right through 9 miles. This is where it went a bit downhill, but not too badly at all. My recurring right hip, glute problems flared up a bit, which made me take a few walking breaks to keep from cramping up completetly, the good news is it wasn't a harsh pain like what was happening in April and early May, it was just a tightness that I couldn't quite shake. After that I had a bit of difficulty settling back into a good rythym, although I still finished the last mile hard and ended up passing a couple guys in my age group in the last mile to finish 15th and take 16:04 off of my time at this course from last year, and most people agreed that this years bike course was more difficult than the previous year and the swim was long.

Conclusion: Sorry for the long report, but in conclusion I have to say I am very happy with this result. I was just a bit off of my goal time of 5:05 for this race, but I think if I had raced the bike differently in the first lap I would have had that time. Plus the run is very encouraging for me and I hope with another months steady training I will be set for Ironman Canada. Lake Stevens is a great venue for a race, they just need to work on a couple things from an organisational standpoint and they will have a real winner here. For one, they need another aid station on the bike course. I am sure most of us managed, but people who were out there for 3.5 plus hours could have had some problems for sure. They could have easily had another aid station where the penalty tent was at 14 miles(that's where they had it last year). On the plus side, I think the officials did a great job monitoring the course. There wasn't any drafting that I observed, and the officials were coming by frequently. Good job.