I skipped a week....whoops ;-) It's been busy. Every day seems to fly right on by.
This past weekend was my Olympic distance Triathlon prior to my 70.3 in August. It was quick after the Tempe International Triathlon (3 weeks). All in all, I felt ready for this race. My weak link right now is the run, but I was able to work myself up to the 6.2 miles last Sunday. My coach has been slowly building my runs weekly as I took so much time off from feet issues last year. It's crazy to think I have only been back running for 16 weeks.
Deuces Wild Triathlon Festival...http://trisportsracing.com/
A bunch of my friends attempted to do this races last year, (a nasty stomach flu took most of them down), so I had a good idea of what it was going to be like. It is a race in elevation (6300 ft), a lake swim, (COLD), a fast rolling bike course with a few good climbs, and a sun exposed moderately hilly run through the park.
I drove up to Show Low Friday morning, (a beautiful three hour drive) quickly unloaded all my gear at the house, and then headed over to the race site for packet pick up and to scope out the scene. When I say it was windy, I mean it was windy....30 mph sustained winds. It wasn't supposed to be much better on race day either. There was a horrible fire about 50 miles SE of Show Low and because the winds you couldn't smell the smoke. But you could see the dense smoke clouds in the distance. After packet pick up my roommates Jamie and Byran and I had a carb loaded dinner and went to bed early.
5:00 am wake up call, (not that bad actually) and off to the race to get transition set up by 6:30. I put on my wetsuit and was in the water for a 8:08 start. My coach said that it would be harder to breathe in this water bc in higher elevation there is less O2. So I was supposed to start slow and build. Well I started slow and within two minutes I was gasping for air. Now I can swim upwards of 60 min at this point continuously....but after two minutes I couldn't breath!?!?! So I did a mix of backstroke and free style until the torture was over 1500 meters later. Plus that water was freaking cold....58 degrees! Because I put my wetsuit over the timing chip I didn't get a number for my swim split, but with transition it was 40:17. Not my best as I was hoping for 35 min with transition.
Next up the bike....
It felt great to get out of that damn water and move on to something I was comfortable with. At this point (9 am) the wind was really blowing. I heard that during the bike portion of my race there was some 40 mph wind gusts. I biked my heart and lungs out...literally. I passed several girls in my age group that passed me in the swim, and many men who started 4 min before the women's swim start. I ended up with a 1:23:28 time averaging 18 mph. With that crazy wind I was ecstatic to place 5th out of 18 in my age group on the bike.
Lastly the run.....
So I started off with severe cramps in my diaphragm and stomach from pushing so hard on the bike and not drinking enough. With those wind gusts drinking and holding on to my bike was not fun. I had to walk/run most of the first two miles. It sucked! I just wanted to be able to run the whole damn thing. Once I got over the cramps I was able to hold on to a slow but steady pace. I really had a hard time breathing throughout the run course. There was a nice big hill that they had you finish on and that was a partial walker for me too. But when I walked I was seriously power walking ;-) Still....not cool. I had a 1:09:43 run time with transition included.
I have a whole new appreciation for altitude racing. But, I did it and really enjoyed the race, my friends, and meeting new people. I was so impressed with the Tri Sports company out of Tucson who put this race weekend on. There were four races on Saturday and Sunday they coordinated- a 70.3, an Olympic, an Xterra and a Kids Duatholon. All went off without a hitch.
My total time was 3:13:29 12th out of 18 in age group. I wanted to finish in 3:00, but did not happen in Show Low for me this year. I am proud I finished and was able to keep my shit together in the moments I wanted to quit. Mental training at it's finest.
Onward....
This past weekend was my Olympic distance Triathlon prior to my 70.3 in August. It was quick after the Tempe International Triathlon (3 weeks). All in all, I felt ready for this race. My weak link right now is the run, but I was able to work myself up to the 6.2 miles last Sunday. My coach has been slowly building my runs weekly as I took so much time off from feet issues last year. It's crazy to think I have only been back running for 16 weeks.
Deuces Wild Triathlon Festival...http://trisportsracing.com/
A bunch of my friends attempted to do this races last year, (a nasty stomach flu took most of them down), so I had a good idea of what it was going to be like. It is a race in elevation (6300 ft), a lake swim, (COLD), a fast rolling bike course with a few good climbs, and a sun exposed moderately hilly run through the park.
I drove up to Show Low Friday morning, (a beautiful three hour drive) quickly unloaded all my gear at the house, and then headed over to the race site for packet pick up and to scope out the scene. When I say it was windy, I mean it was windy....30 mph sustained winds. It wasn't supposed to be much better on race day either. There was a horrible fire about 50 miles SE of Show Low and because the winds you couldn't smell the smoke. But you could see the dense smoke clouds in the distance. After packet pick up my roommates Jamie and Byran and I had a carb loaded dinner and went to bed early.
5:00 am wake up call, (not that bad actually) and off to the race to get transition set up by 6:30. I put on my wetsuit and was in the water for a 8:08 start. My coach said that it would be harder to breathe in this water bc in higher elevation there is less O2. So I was supposed to start slow and build. Well I started slow and within two minutes I was gasping for air. Now I can swim upwards of 60 min at this point continuously....but after two minutes I couldn't breath!?!?! So I did a mix of backstroke and free style until the torture was over 1500 meters later. Plus that water was freaking cold....58 degrees! Because I put my wetsuit over the timing chip I didn't get a number for my swim split, but with transition it was 40:17. Not my best as I was hoping for 35 min with transition.
Next up the bike....
It felt great to get out of that damn water and move on to something I was comfortable with. At this point (9 am) the wind was really blowing. I heard that during the bike portion of my race there was some 40 mph wind gusts. I biked my heart and lungs out...literally. I passed several girls in my age group that passed me in the swim, and many men who started 4 min before the women's swim start. I ended up with a 1:23:28 time averaging 18 mph. With that crazy wind I was ecstatic to place 5th out of 18 in my age group on the bike.
Lastly the run.....
So I started off with severe cramps in my diaphragm and stomach from pushing so hard on the bike and not drinking enough. With those wind gusts drinking and holding on to my bike was not fun. I had to walk/run most of the first two miles. It sucked! I just wanted to be able to run the whole damn thing. Once I got over the cramps I was able to hold on to a slow but steady pace. I really had a hard time breathing throughout the run course. There was a nice big hill that they had you finish on and that was a partial walker for me too. But when I walked I was seriously power walking ;-) Still....not cool. I had a 1:09:43 run time with transition included.
I have a whole new appreciation for altitude racing. But, I did it and really enjoyed the race, my friends, and meeting new people. I was so impressed with the Tri Sports company out of Tucson who put this race weekend on. There were four races on Saturday and Sunday they coordinated- a 70.3, an Olympic, an Xterra and a Kids Duatholon. All went off without a hitch.
My total time was 3:13:29 12th out of 18 in age group. I wanted to finish in 3:00, but did not happen in Show Low for me this year. I am proud I finished and was able to keep my shit together in the moments I wanted to quit. Mental training at it's finest.
Onward....
No comments:
Post a Comment