I guess let me start with a few comments on my swim fitness and whats been going on there. I added in two masters swims a week for the first time since college swimming. I've been doing all of my swimming in the past years by myself. It was nice to recently have a decent push from some other guys at the pool twice a week. But, some time in the last 4 weeks my swim as fallen off the face of the earth. Form is gone, technique is gone and I feel terrible. I guess we all go through those patches in the season I just didn't like that mine was leading into my first race. So I have been working on a lot of quality work with more rest to get my stroke back. So, leading into this race I had no idea what to expect.

I was in the 2nd wave 3 minutes back of the first wave. I started all the way to the left of the field. As far left as I could get. I could barely hear the announcer but did hear the horn sounds and made a decent run into the water. Some high strides and then a few dolphin dives and I was off. I made quick separation from the field and didn't really lay on the gas as much as I normally do. I wanted to try to start off controlled and not go into O2 debt like I sometimes do. I realized I had one guy with me and he was swimming pretty solid. I was going to let him go in the first 200 yards but I’m glad I didn't. I only pulled up along side of him 1-2 times and I think he saw my white cap and didn't like that. Each time he laid it down and pulled ahead of me. I didn't want that type of effort so I just sat right on his feet and let him tow me along.

Overall, navigation on this course seems tough to me. This is the second year I felt like I was all over the place. At times I felt like I was struggling and then other times I felt pretty good. I didn't use my legs at all in the swim except for the start and may be a bit at the end. I will focus on getting a better kick going in the next race.
Came out of the water feeling pretty good, heard my wife yell my name and my kids were going nuts. That's always a great boost.


Swim straight!

Made it to my bike quickly. Wetsuit came off in one pull. Ran to the mount line at the base of the big hill and had a heck of a time getting moving. Shoes were on the bike but I could not get any speed to get the bike rolling up the hill. Finally got some speed and was off.

Nothing

Got moving out of the park pretty quickly and by the time I was almost out of the park I was in 2nd place in the race. The goal was to catch the race leaders and then put in a solid stretch of work and ride out of sight. I caught the race leader on the first right turn after you get out of the park and then really started to lay on the gas up the hills to get away. The lead motorcycle led me out for the entire first loop. By mile 10 I didn't have anyone in sight and I felt good. Speed was about 24.7 avg and power was over 300 watts. I kept things in a fairly easy gear on the bike as I wanted to really start to add some harder work on the 2nd loop. At the back end of the first loop I had a really rough patch. I started to feel bad and the roads get really choppy. It's also a lot of false flat sections with rollers and it's deceptive for sure. A few people asked me what I thought about that part of the course. By the time I made my way to the start of the 2nd loop I was coming out of it a bit but was losing speed off my AVG and it had fallen closer to 24.4 which I was not really happy about.

The 2nd loop was pretty uneventful but I started to feel much better. At this point I had to negotiate race traffic and there were a lot of people who simply don't get it. I can't count the people who ride on or near the yellow lines when they are not even near anyone. I had to yell move right 20 times to get people out of my way. A fine line between being polite and starting to lose my cool a few times.

I made the last left to make my way back to the lake and my avg watts had dropped closer to 285 which was fine with me. Over the last 5 miles it's mostly rolling and downhill back to the lake. I kept things spinning fast and really focused on smashing the downhills. I didn't want to lay off and rest on the way back in, I wanted to use the extra speed to gain every second of separations I could.

I came back to the bottom of the hill, jumped off the moving bike which was tricky on this hill and was back into T2.


Nothing

A little slower here as I had to put my Garmin on. Visor on, race belt on, shoes and socks on and I was out of there.

Nothing

It's been a goal of mine at this distance to really get some sizable time gains regardless of course or race. I've been running 6 days a week for over a solid year now and feel like my body has been really starting to handle the increase in miles. Again, I'm very prone to lower body injury so I take things very slowly in my training. But this year, I've been about 10 miles per week more than last year for the entire year so far. I had no idea how I was going to respond to that on race day.

Quite frankly I've been pretty tired the last few weeks after a change in the weather hear lots of pollen and the increase in bike and run volume.

So off I went on the run and did the quick out and back near the transition area. Glenn Cook was leading me out on the bike and we were chatting a bit. The pace over the first half mile was way too fast. Over the first qtr. mile I looked at the Garmin and my avg pace was 5:40. Ops. Especially considering the massive hill I had to go up in about 100 yards. So I went through the first 4 mile loop and was feeling pretty good. Stomach was a bit off but I just tried to stay focused. The Garmin read low 6:20s avg pace which I was a little concerned about. I thought it was simply too fast with two more laps to go. I stayed on it though and worked on keeping my stride in check and managing the uphill’s and then blasting the downhill’s. By the end of the 2nd loop and about 8 miles in I was still on the same pace. I was either going to have a massive melt down or I was about to drop a big chunk of time from last year’s race.

I hit the 3rd and final loop and it was great. Every time I would come through the main spectator area I had a little cheering section of my kids and a few other racers kids going nuts. It was really awesome. A big boost to see that.

The last up hill was good but I got half way up it and felt like my body was responding to the pace better so I just kept on moving which was a shock to me. Pace still in the 6:20s so I decided with the lead that I had it was time to shut it down over the last 3+ miles and not do anything stupid. I came out of the loop in the back of the run course, stopped at the aid tent, got a full coke, Gatorade and water in me and was on my way. Only time I stopped on the course. I didn't need to but I wanted to be sure those last 2 miles were going to be ok. Pace dropped closer to 6:29 pace which I was ok with and made the final push to the finish line. Once I got to the wooded section where you do the downhill kamikaze run I really started to pick it up again. Hit the back stretch of the course and laid on the gas to the finish line.


Nothing

Fastest 13.1 to date. Very happy with the effort and run time.

Water, shower and then lots of chatting with great people.


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2nd Year for me doing this race. I love the area of VA that it's in. Greg and Setup Events do a fantastic job of putting on a great race. So much so, that you don't even really know they are there. They are in the back drop the whole time. But, you can clearly see, they work very hard to make the race run as smooth as it does.

Fantastic weather in 2012 and a great day. Highly recommend this event for anyone looking for a tough half ironman to race.