Week 20 - My first Half IM of the Season

I have that feeling of great fitness after this past week. Did all my scheduled workouts as planned, throwing the hardest ones in at the beginning of the week. This allowed me a bit of rest before the big race yesterday. I even got my new wetsuit, a Nineteen Frequency model which I managed to try on once at an interval session at Fuller Lake on Wednesday. It seemed a bit tighter than my QR suit but felt good in it and allowed me the boyancy I needed to balance me properly in the water. As usual with the wet suit on I felt faster and it gave me the confidence I needed not to worry about this aspect of the triathlon.

Now on with the race report. The day before Saturday was a beautiful day and was hoping for a similar day on Sunday. I was a bit worried about the water temperature but the sunnier days this week should have warmed up the lake a bit more. The previous reconasance race bike course last week was good because I now knew where all the hard spots would be and where I was to take it very easy. It was not a delightful course, as the roads were rough and lots of pot holes. And depending on the traffic could be a bit hazardous. I had never run on that particular trail course so that was a bit of a mystery for me.

The night before, I had packed up all my stuff and put it in the van as I did not want to fool around at 4:00am in the morning to do all that. I went to bed at 9:00pm that night and kept waking up every two hours or so to check the time on my digital clock. I also set a battery powered one just in case of power failure. My clock was set to go off at 4:00am but woke up at 3:45 and decided to get up and make my coffee and have breakfast. I had Vector cereal, a banana and almonds and figured that would suffice me for the 3 hours prior to the swim. I would also have a Gel 1/2 an hour prior to entering the water. At 4:15 I was on the road and on the way to the race. Got there early enough to get a good parking spot, but still to early for body marking therefore I just laid and rested on my mattress in my van listening to calm music and mentally prepared myself going over every aspect of the race for that day.

I had set myself a plan to use this Tri as a training platform for my Ironman and was determined to execute that plan. I did not want to think about placing, time or any kind of medals for that day. I just wanted to experiment with relaxing and slowing it down for the first two disciplined in order to see what I had left in the gas tank for the run. Even the run, I was not going to run at my usual faster pace. I still had weeks of hard training to go before my next half and did not want to blow myself up needing too much wasted time for recovery. The only real thing that I was a bit worried about was shoulder problems that had been plaging me this past year. Old age and arthritis was starting to set in but I was determined to not let that hinder me.

With 45 minutes to go before start time, I went and got myself body marked and to my transition spot to prepare my bike and gear. We had to leave our bikes there overnight from the day before and was crunched up with other bikes with not too much room to assemble my gear. However the transition marshall annouced that we could move our bikes to other empty racks if we wanted to and I quickly took advantage of that in order to find myself the ideal spot right at the end of the rack where I could lay out my gear on the side instead of in front or behind my bike. This strategy would also give me a place to lean or hold on too for balance while I was transitioning. I blew up my tires to the right pressure and donned my wet suit, two swim caps with my goggles and 10 minutes to start time stepped into the water for my pre-swim warm up. Surprisingly the water felt not bad at all and swam back and forth and stretched before the gun went off. Did I say gun??? How about a big howitzer cannon those Army Reserve Guys brought over? Quite the touch AND quite loud.

I positioned myself on the outside edge behind most of the crowd. I was determined not to get thrashed around by other swimmers. Call me chicken but I knew my limitations in the water and like Lisa Bentley, I knew my swim would be the slowest but also very confident that I would more than make up the time in the other two disciplines. My run was my fastest discipline and I would overtake many competitors in that last and most important part of the race. However more importantly was to discipline myself to take it more easily at the beginning of the bike and hydrate, eat and pace myself throughout that whole leg. I must and did not get carried away with the exitement of it all and the adrenalin rush as I tended to do in past races and forget about he effort and hydration.

The Swim:

The gun went off and I took off easily letting the thrashers ahead of me go. Everything was going fine until I got bumped by another swimmer and my right goggle started leaking. In order to fix it, I had to stop for a moment, let the water out reseal my google and I was on my way. But for some reason I swallowed a bit of water and started coughing, I kept control, did not panic and kept swimming and coughing for about two minutes until I got it under control. However when I sighted next, I saw the swimmers ahead of me quite far and holy cow! I had lost a lot of time. But as I kept on swimming, it seemed I was gaining quite rapidly on them....Too fast actually until I had a look around and realized that I was swimming off to the right in the oncoming lane of swimmers heading back to the turnaround point. I looked to my left and they they were, the bunch I WAS suppose to be with. Oh me gosh! I truly had to correct my course and get moving as I had lost a lot of time.The second loop was a bit easier and had gained momentum and finally caught up to a few swimmers that I could draft on the way in. I finally got out of the water and ran to my transition spot unzipping my wet suit on the way. M.y shoulders were a bit sore but did not warrant any Ibuprofen

The Bike

I got out of my suit and changed in about two minutes and off on my bike I went, remembering to relax and get my heart rate down. I knew I was quite a ways behind everyone because of my slow swim, but did not panic and start pedaling too fast. Once my heart rate was stable, I drank and resumed a cadence that was not too hard and kept the speed under control. Pretty soon I was in a rhythm and the first set of hills were ahead of me. I would have 3 more loops after this to do so kept it down a bit not hammering the hills. About 5 km's later, we had this steep long hill to climb that I had to get out of my saddle for. But I kept the cadence easy in my easiest gear and climbed up with no problem. At the top of the hill was the only aid station on the bike course and topped up my aero bottle. Pretty smart of them to position that aid station there as everyone would have slowed down quite a bit making it easier for them to grab gatorade or water and a gel without the helpers having to run after them if they were too fast.

My computer on my bike was also not working properly and could not get a read of how many km's or my speed so went by feel rather that visual indicators. As I got into my rhytm again, I noticed myself starting to pass some bikers. How many I am not sure but maybe about 15 - 20 in the whole race. My friends Julie and Alanna were out running the course for fun that day as well as to support me. It was quite nice seeing them everytime I looped and appreciated their words of encouragement as well as my beloved whom I threw a kiss at evertime I saw her. I was focused, concentrated on my drinking and actually drank 4 complete bottles in the biking component as well as one gel every loop also. So far so good the plan was in action and I was following it with precision. Finally I was approching the transition at the end of the bike and downed the rest of my gatorade before arriving and dismounting. This time I did something I never tried before and that was undoing the velcro strap on my shoes prior to dismounting the bike. Shoud of practised that but it worked well and when I racked my bike did not have to struggle taking off my sockless feet out of my shoes.

The Run:

I heard the voice of Ironman announcer Steve King, and over the loudspeaker found out I was about two minutes behind my first place competition. This guy was from Texas somewhere and for a minute thought he was a hot shot from the states. I decided not to let that bother me, but at the same time knew that this was the stage where I was to test myself out to see if the slower steadier paced bike ride was going to work in my favor. As I took off on the run, I realized my legs seemed like they were still fresh with no sign of cramping at all. Bonus! I said to myself. I steadily increased my pace and no more than two hundred meters in front of me passed a guy that seemed like he was my age. I felt certain of it. As I zoomed by him I heard him mutter something seemed like "Oh well!" I kept on increasing my pace a bit until I was in a fast enough but not breathing too hard pace and tried to maintain that pace. However by now, the sun was out in full force with not too much cloud cover. In addition the trail was somewhat sheltered from any cool breeze. I decided to stop at every aid station and to keep on drinking. I was starting to sweat quite a bit by now because of the heat and cursed myself for not having brought any salt tabs with me. Because of the cold spring, I had not even trained with them yet. That was about to changein the future, I said to myself. As luck would hold out I was running behind this tall guy who had a buddy give him a container of salt tabs and he kindly offered me some as he had noticed my sweat pouring out of my body. The temperarures were quite high by this time and we still had 10k to go, so I took two of them right away hoping these would be sufficient to sustain me until the finish. They were! From 11K to 16K it was an unexpected upward climb on soft sand and this proved to be quite difficult and energy consuming. I definitely could not keep my pace on that section and it seemed like forever until the turnaround came. At this time I had passed quite a few runners and knew that I was still making good time on the run. Some had slowed down and were walking. The second time I ran into whom I thought was my competion, I knew I had gained quite a lot of time on him and knew he was not even a threat anymore as he was running slow, labouring. From 16K to the finish it was a downwards grade where I was able to pick up more speed. I started hearing the announcer and crowds in the distance and knew I was close to the finish. When I got off the trail, for the last 150 meters to the finish line, I poured on a blazing downhill sprint and came across the finish line smiling and not totally exhausted for the first time ever in a triathlon. I got a great appreciative applaude from the crowd and was totally elated. My friends, all came and congratulated me and even my wife who was so proud of me, did not mind getting my sweat on her as she gave me a big hugged.

Conclusion:

I had executed my plan to a tee and it had worked for me. A few hiccups like the goggles and coughing and sighting and of course the salt tabs but mostly everything had went well. I had proven to myself that proper controlled pacing, steady hydration and nutrition could translate to a better feeling run. I was now determined to keep these critical points in my mind in future races. Overall I finished 1'st in my category with a time of 5:32:19. Not bad for a tough island course. I had exited out of the water in 84'th place out of 94 and managed to pick pass 40 competitors in the race to finish 44 overall. I was extremely happy with that. Apart from age, Canadian champion, Lisa Bently and I have a lot more in common with our race strategy. If it is your strongest discipline and have the talent for it, take it all on the run! Four more weeks till the next Half Iron which I hoped to do a bit better in as it a "B" race for me. I am hoping to have my best Half IM of the season at that one. Now twenty four hours later, I feel good, no soreness or stiffness but know there is some internal muscle damage there so will be taking it a bit easier for a while letting myself fully recover. Tonight I am going for a nice easy recovery swim with friends. Man! How I love this sport! Keeps you young, healthy, fully alive, and a zest to keep it up forever!