i’m accustomed to getting up early for my weekend workouts but 4am is pushing the bounds of decency.

yet, 4am is what it was. up, quick shower, coffee, cereal, double check bag, put bottles together. little more coffee. hit the road late.

get to the park and rick heads off to find the swimmer on his relay while i pick up my packet, let people write on me with a sharpie and set up in transition.

did i mention we hit the road a bit late? did not even have time to take my bike for a quick spin before i had to be out of transition. found my parents. wished rick luck and headed for the swim start.

multirace decided to switch up the format for this one andstart everyone but the elites in a time trial format: the swim start is a line-up and athletes are sent off one at a time (or in pairs, if there was someone you wanted to race head to head with) with about 3 seconds in between each. the good: the swim was less crowded, i wasn’t bumped once; the grumble: it’s hard to get an accurate swim time when you cross the mat and then have to walk down the little slope into the water; the great: i actually had people around me on the bike and this motivated me; and the bad-but-not-really: when you finish you have no idea where you placed in the field.

i spotted some people in line at the swim start that i hadn’t known were racing – one superfast in the water (and on land, she was first overall female, her first race back from an injury) and the other just faster than me but not so much that i don’t feel like her swim time is out of my reach. seeded myself in behind them, thinking i could draft a little.

wrong. the race director started them, then gave a 6-second gap – just enough so that by the time i crossed the mat, walked down the little slope and hit the water i had no idea where they were. which basically described my entire swim – i had no idea where i was. i had sighting issues; i couldn’t make out the swim exit. i felt like i was swimming well but i had to keep adjusting course. i was hoping to go under 8 minutes: when i was getting out of the water i saw 8:08 on my watch. by the time i hit the mat, which was a short run out of the water at the entrance to transition, my time was 8:22. i can’t complain too much, it’s still my best swim there, but just not what i was hoping for.

did well in transition, except i should learn the whole clip-the-shoes-in-and-run-barefoot-in-and-out-of-transition-thing. really, you try running in bike shoes. it’s slow, and the mount/dismount line was not right at the transition exit/entrance.

but the bike! i felt good on the bike even though the course has a lot of sharp twists and turns and i kept having my rhythm interrupted. i’m not the most confident technical rider and this is more of a technical course. i loved racing on rick’s wheels. i liked having people around me, and yet never feeling crowded (except when the ref on the motorcycle decided to hang out and block me from passing). it was a PR by a minute and a half: 28:24, or 21.13 mph.

in transition, someone had put their bike in my spot. not just on my spot on the rack: on my towel, shoes and number belt. felt like it took me forever to move things around, rack my bike and get my shoes out from under the other bike. headed out and my legs were a tad unhappy but not bad.

or, not bad until i had to run up a little hill in the grass. then they were downright unhappy. but i started to get into a rhythm and spotted someone i really wanted to catch. and i did. i don’t usually catch people on the run.

the course loops around and runs past transition (and the finish line), then out for a loop in the other direction. i got to see rick and some other people from the team and i heard them yell for me when i went by. i was feeling okay, not stellar. someone passed me going just faster than i was so i decided to stick with him. i started feeling a little too comfortable, he must have slowed a bit after passing me because i hit the mile 2 marker slower than mile 1. i picked it up a bit, and crossed the finish line in 21:49 … exactly the same time as the last race there. 8:43 pace. as much as i really want to improve my run pace, with all this long slow ironman work and very little speedwork i’m pretty happy to have not lost anything.

in the end? 3rd in age group. 12/123 women. and 7th fastest bike split for the women. not bad for someone who’s been doing these things on and off for 7 years and never stood on the podium until this year.

rick’s relay kicked – 1st relay, 3rd overall and 13 seconds from the overall win. i just hope his foot heals soon.



Edited by debs 2009-09-02 1:35 PM