My first
triathlon! The Chaska River City Days triathlon is a 1/3 mile swim, 16 mile bike and 5K run. I signed up for this
triathlon as a back-up plan. Originally,
I had only signed up for the Lake Marion sprint triathlon in July, but I
figured that I should do a couple races in case one had bad weather or I
monkeyed things up.
Leading up
to the race, I was averaging the following during training.
9:00 minute pace on standalone runs of 3-4 miles
9:30 pace on brick runs of 2-3 miles
16mph speed on bikes of 9-16 miles
1100yds split two or three ways for training swims
My time
breakdown and predicted reactions were as follows:
Over 2:00 Failure
1:55-2:00 At least I
did it
1:50-1:55 Happy
1:45-1:50 Awesome
Under 1:45 Able to retire
as champion of the world
Packet
pick-up and pre-race
I picked up
my race packet on Friday afternoon (Saturday race). There was a sign noting that, due to flooding,
the bike course would be altered and the distance would be 15.4 miles instead
of 16 miles. Since I hadn’t participated
in the race before, I didn’t really care.
Also, I figured my time would have to be a bit faster, so this had to be
a good thing.
I had bought
a bike rack off Craig’s List that was supposed to fit on the trunk of my
car. I tried hooking it up, but I can’t get
it to a point where I trusted it not to fall off on the drive to the race. So, the night before the race I took the car
seats (2) out of the family car (Dodge Journey) and flipped down the back seats
to lie my bike in the cargo area.
I bought
Zoot triathlon shorts for the race, but I don’t have any sort of tri
shirt/jersey. I decided to go with a
sleeveless compression run shirt for the bike and a sleeveless loose run shirt
for the 5K. If I wear the loose shirt on
the bike I can feel the parachute effect, and I didn’t want to wear the tight
shirt on the run because it makes me look / reveals that I am scrawny (6’5”
195lbs). I packed everything up, didn’t
forget anything, I set my alarm for 5am and had a good night sleep.
In the
morning I got up, filled the water bottle, had a couple waffles with a banana
and hit the road. It’s only about 30
minutes to the race site from my house.
When I got there, I unpacked, topped off the tire pressure (my bike is an
amazon.com brick, 30lbs) and set up transition.
I had been looking forward to and planning for this for so long I was a
little surprised that I wasn’t more nervous. I got my timing ankle band and my
numbering without any problems. This was
all new to me so I didn’t know that they write your bib number (225) on your
arm and your age (35) on the back of your leg.
The pre-race meeting had a moment of silence to hope/pray for no rain,
they played the national anthem and said a few cheeky jokes about the hilly
nature of the course.
Swim
Hope: Don’t embarrass yourself.
Actual: Embarrassing
I waded into
the water before the swim to check out the temperature. COLD!
Maybe it wasn’t caps lock cold, but it was cold enough to be
uncomfortable. When the elite wave
started, everyone got out of the water and stood around waiting for their time
trial start. The starting order was by
bib number which meant that I had about 220 people ahead of me and about a
12-20 behind me. Everything says that
you should be sure to get some open water swims in before you try a race, and
they are all correct. I, however, did
not do any open water swims before race day.
As soon as I
hit the water, I couldn’t breathe. I
don’t know if it was the cold water or just being over excited/nervous, but
suddenly I couldn’t inhale deep enough to exhaling under water. After a couple minutes, I tried to calm
myself by turning over to my back and taking some deep breathes. That didn’t work. I couldn’t catch my breath to get in a normal
stroke, and when I did try to exhale underwater seeing the weeds was freaking
me out. I ended up swimming the entire
thing with my head out of the water. I
might as well have been doggy paddling.
At one point, I was swimming past a lifeguard and she offered me her
floater for a rest, I felt like an idiot.
Just a little bit later, a racer swam by me and asked if I needed
help. I almost quit right then and
there. Luckily, at that point quitting
and finishing the swim were about the same length, so I finished it out. Coming out of the water I was tired, and a
little dizzy.
My posted time
was 13:53 with a 2:31per 100yds average.
I did start off with a watch, but it didn’t like being in the water and it
was not working by the time I returned to land.
T1
Hope: Don’t forget your helmet.
Actual: Mission Accomplished.
As I reached
my first transition ever, I first noticed that there were nearly no bikes left
in the transition area. Again, I almost
felt like quitting. It would have helped
if I had remembered that only 10-20 people started after me, but that didn’t
register at the time. I splashed some
water on my feet to get rid of the sand and got my shirt to slide on after only
three tries (I need a better plan). I
wore socks and my running shoes. I’m
told some people go without socks, but I’m pretty sure they must be crazy. The MC announced some people by name as they
left the transition area (maybe he was using a referencing sheet with bib
numbers?), but I wasn’t lucky enough to hear my name.
T1
Time: 3:07
Bike
Hope: No
flat tires and 16 mph
Actual: No flat tires and 16.5 mph
The bike
course was nothing but hills. I
overheard someone saying before the race that this was the most challenging
sprint bike course in the state, and without any frame of reference I would say
that he was correct. About half a mile
into the bike, I met the leader coming back to T2. I suppose that could have been discouraging,
but I actually thought it was pretty funny.
I know it's unlikely that I will ever be competitive in a
race; I’m only racing my expectations.
At the first
turn, the hill is very steep. It’s so
steep that at the pre-race meeting the MC told folks to pull over to the side
of the road if they need to walk up the hill.
Yikes! I made it up without
walking, and I believe I even had one gear left on the bike. I don’t know if I was amongst slower bikers because
I was slow on the swim or because I started late in the time trials, but I
ended up passing a lot of people on the bike.
I don’t know if anyone I passed was in my age group, but it felt good to
keep saying, “On your left.” I think I
saw two people with flat tires, but I got through it without any problems. I only brought water for the race. I had a few drinks on the bike, but otherwise
I tried to go the whole race without any fueling (might have hurt me in the end). The bike started out uphill, so at least you
end of the loop with a screaming fast downhill.
My posted average speed was 17.1mph, but that was based on the previous 16 mile route.
Bike Time:
56:13 with an average of 16.5 mph My posted average speed was 17.1mph, but that was based on the previous 16 mile route.
Hope: Quick
Actual: Quick
Coming into
T2 I could hear my wife and oldest son (Cooper 3yrs) cheering, I racked my
bike, changed into my run shirt with the bib pinned to the front, waved to the
family and took off.
T2 Time:
0:42
Hope: 28:00 No Walking
Actual: 29:36 One Stop
I was so
looking forward to the run. I love to
run; I wish I could run farther; I wish I could run faster; I wish I could run
for ever. The first mile of the run is a
pretty steep up hill. At this point I
was having a lot of fun. I passed a couple
walkers and a couple runners passed me.
It felt like I had a pretty good pace up the hill, but my watch was dead
so who knows. The second mile is mostly
flat. At about 1.5 miles I was passed by
a 51 year old lady who was moving at an incredible speed. As she passed I said, “Wow, that’s
fast.” She said thanks and was on her
way. I looked up her time later; she did
a 23:30 5K. Awesome. The second mile went fine. On the third mile I started to get some terrible stomach cramps. The third mile is mostly downhill, so I hoped I could tough it out for a strong finish. But, in sight of the final turn, I had to stop and take a breather. It wasn’t long, a few seconds, but it helped a lot and I was able to run out the rest of the race. As I approached the finish line the MC called out my name over the mic, noted that I was tall and asked if I could dunk a basketball. I waved him off, finished the race and felt a great sense of accomplishment.
Run Time: 29:36 with a 9:32 pace
Post-Race
Total Time: 1:43:32
My watch had
stopped working during the swim. I had
no idea what my total time was. The
clock at the finish line was only a reference to when the elite wave went
off. I didn’t know how long I went off
after the elite wave, but I guessed had been about 10 minutes. With that estimate, my time was going to be
around 1:55-2:00. I was a little bummed,
but my wife and kids were at the finish line and seeing them made my day. We walked around a bit while I had some water
and post-race snacks. We snapped a few
picks and the family left; they had to take a separate car with the car seats
and no bike in the back. I changed into
some less smelly clothes and got some more post-race snacks (great food, and lots of it). At that point, I noticed there was a results board and anxiously went to check my time.
I think I actually did jump up and down when I saw that I had broke 1:45,
but that’s hard to confirm.
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Fletch on the left 1year old
Coop on the right 3 years old
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