Couldn't have happened in a better race

It was bound to happen some time, but Sunday was the first race I've ever flatted in, in eight years of racing.  Not bad odds, really.

I went into this race with no expectations.  It's my first tri of a season that just isn't as tri-focused as years past.  With new home ownership taking up a significant portion of our attention and finances, it's fun to get out there to race, but it's not the priority it has been in years past.  I could race on auto-pilot.  No excessive list making to ensure that I have all my gear.  No pre-race visualization.  I've done this race for the last 4 years.  I know it pretty well.  And I wasn't going to red line it.  I was a little worried going into the race that it would affect my enjoyment, that without indulging my instinct to inspect every calf for an AG on the run, that it would feel more like training than a race.  Fear not, racing is fun regardless of your goals.

Swim:
I was a little late for the start.  I'd filed into the water with my AG, but I expected a warning from the race officials, instead I just got the start horn.  Oh, crap, time to put on my goggles. I hadn't jockeyed for position on the line, so I had a few people to swim through to get to a good spot.  I found some feet about a third of the way through that I hung onto for a bit, til it seemed she wasn't spotting well, then I just made my way home.  I swam about a minute and a half slower than last year.  But then again, I hadn't even checked my results from last year before the race, so I was happy with just feeling good.  And 6th place out of 35 ain't bad.

Time: 26:09 (1:44 pace)
AG: 6 / 35


Bike:
Confession:  I did not do any transition practice before this race.  In fact, I even considered wearing my bike shoes to the mount line.  I know!  Setting up my transition, I figured there's no point in going backwards, and I clipped my shoes in.  Despite the lack of practice, I mounted the bike just fine, and I got a good 30 or so feet when I knew something was not right with my bike. Something was rubbing.  I pulled off.  Yep, flat back tire. It must have exploded in the hot sun during the swim. I could see transition from where I'd stopped. I knew I could take the bike back to the mechanic there and get him or her to change the tire for me, but I also had what I needed to change  it myself.  The only real trouble was that I couldn't turn my bike upside down because all of the water would drain out of my speedfil. Definitely not desirable on a hot day. So bike balanced precariously on my hip, while I pulled out the old tube, replaced it, tucked the tire back into the wheel. Then, moment of truth, I took out my CO2 cartridge and screwed it into the valve. Confession 2: I don't think I've ever used this valve before. I've used other CO2 valves, but this one was untested. And it failed. As soon as I screwed it in, CO2 was spewing through it. I tried to adjust the lever, but it just broke off. Hmmf. That was my only canister and my only valve. So I made the walk back to transition, wheel in one hand, saddle in other, still barefoot.

The first volunteer I encountered gave me a dumbfounded stare when I asked if she could help me find a pump. The second pointed me to the mechanic's tent, which was vacant, including all gear. I asked some people in the coaching tent next to me, but no love. Then I saw a guy pumping up mountain bike tires in the main tent. I dropped my bike (chain in the dirt, eek!) and ran in to get some air. Ok:  gear on bike, wheel on frame, Laura on bike, time to ride. My garmin indicated that the whole thing had only taken 4 minutes. This seemed incredibly fast, but who am I to question garmin?  Not until after the race did I realize that garmin was set to auto-pause on the ride, so when it detected that I wasn't moving, it stopped keeping track of the time. I had actually spent almost 15 minutes changing that tire. I will not be seeking employment at le Tour.

By the time I got back on the bike, all of my advantage from the swim was spent. I was in 35th place in my age group, out of 35. And that was awesome! I got to let my competitive juices flow, catching girls in my age group, but I could stay out of the red zone while doing it. Best unintentional result of a flat, EVER! I passed 19 girls in my age group, which meant I started the run in 16th place.

Time: 1:23:03 (or 1:08:23 without the pitstop - 19.3 mph)
AG Rank: 24 / 35 (or 6 / 35 without the pitstop)

Run:
Goal here was to start moderately hard, then stay moderately hard through the middle and in the final kick, put in a moderately hard effort. That's exactly what I did. I focused on cadence, I walked through water stops, and I slowly picked people off as they burnt out through the back half of the run. Nice and steady, and I picked up two more girls in my age group.

Time: 53:33 (8:38 pace)
AG Rank: 11 / 35

Overall, I came in 14th in my AG with a total time of 2:45:18. Had I not had the flat, I would have come in 9th. A little slower than last year in all regards, but still an excellent race.






Odds and ends:

• There were a TON of flat tires out on the course.  I was very lucky that I didn't get a second one out there since I was riding without a spare
• This race nearly doubled in size this year (perhaps because of its designation as the regional qualifier).  My age group went from 16 last year to 35 this year, and there were some very fast ladies in that addition.  Last year's time would have only been good enough for 7th this year, not 3rd.

That final kick

I'm no good at surprises:  I schooled last year's time of 2:44 with a 2:25 and (mostly) broke my oly PR.  I say "mostly" cause, with a bike course that's only 22 miles, it's not a totally fair comparison.  If the bike had been 25 miles, and I held the same pace, I would have come in with a 2:34:46, which would still be a new PR, beating the time I set at Lobsterman last year by over 5 minutes.

My transition area.  Cheesy as it is, I love that my socks say "Run Fast"

Many things worked well for this race.  I felt better prepped, having gotten into town the night before, registered early, driven the bike course with A (she drove while I navigated with her phone displaying the route, my phone displaying our current GPS location and Coach Alan's description of the elevations) and gotten a full nights sleep.  As much as a 9am start puts a damper on doing much else on race day, it does give a nice sleep in.

I've also been trying to visualize my races beforehand.  Last year, in the run up to Nationals, I was so anxiety-ridden at the thought of the race, I couldn't even really think about it.  The butterflies were so intense.  This year, since I've done the course once, I can easily visualize myself at each step of the race.  I picture having flawless execution, and I picture what I'll do if shit happens (goggles get kicked off, puncture, etc) and how I'll move on.  I picture being calm and collected at the start, being excited, but not anxious, going through transition quickly, but not in a hurry.  I've been visualizing Nationals for a couple of weeks now, usually in those quiet moments before I fall asleep.  Last week, I did some work visualizing this race, and I feel like it really paid off.

Swim
With water temperatures a toasty 77 degrees, wetsuits were only just allowed.  A and I traded, so she used my sleeveless and I used her sleeved.  Despite Coach Alan's recommendation to use the sleeved one whenever they're allowed, I think A got the better end of this deal on such a warm day.  I'm comfortable with letting the real swimmers take off at the start, but I usually expect to be at the front of the pack of triathletes (not swimmers) in the water.  This swim started off the same, but heading down the back stretch, I got caught by a girl who was not wearing a wetsuit.  I swam on her toes for a bit, but she was just a bit too fast.  Then another girl caught up with me, and we swam shoulder to shoulder for a good 500 yards, until my stomach started cramping with effort, and I let her go to focus on my own form.  I came out of the water 20 seconds behind the first girl and 16 behind the second, but just ahead of one more.

Time: 24:38 (1:39 pace)
Rank in AG: 3 / 16
Rank in Women: 17 / 124
Rank overall: 47 / 343

Bike
The transition to bike felt a little off.  I was lightheaded from the effort on the swim.  My heart rate was high, and I took it a little easy running out to the mount line.

Once on the bike though, things settled in.  I got passed by a girl whom I thought was in my age group (but turns out was not) pretty early on, and I turned my attention to just executing the plan and hitting my heart rate goals, and not coasting.

A few weeks ago a friend posted his power file from a race, and the thing that struck me was that his power never dropped to 0.  This means he never coasted, never even freewheeled, he was constantly applying the pressure.  This is not typically the case for me.  I stop pedaling... a lot.  I coast when I'm going downhill, I coast when I'm coming into a turn, I coast when the road surface is bad.  So, a goal for this ride was to pedal throughout.  Here's my cadence file:

You can see only a few coasts.  First to put on my shoes, next as we went through town and the road was narrowed, once cause a car almost pulled out into me and one pot hole.  I'm pretty pleased with this.  Except for the car part.  This car was coming into the road from my right and attempting to make a left turn.  The driver was looking right and inching into the lane without realizing there were bikes coming right toward her.  I actually yelled "HEY!" at her, and swerved around the back side of her.  She stopped short and the two riders behind me passed in front of her.  It was a little scary, but seemed like an acceptable reason to coast for a bit.

Despite this I passed a woman on the bike.  In fact, looking at the results, it looks like I passed two, but on the course I only noticed passing one.  Still!  Yay!  Passing a woman on the bike!

Time: 1:07:55 (19.44mph)
Rank in AG:  6 / 16
Rank in Women: 34 / 124
Rank overall: 180 / 343

Run
Getting out on the run, I figured I was in 3rd place at best, depending on how I'd done in the swim.  I thought about looking at my total time to calculate how fast I'd have to run to break my PR at this race.  But I also sorta liked just being out there for myself, not getting too caught up in the competition, just trying to be in the moment, and making the best of it as it came.  After such a well executed bike, I looked to the run to continue the trend.  I pulled out my gel flask to find that my cheat sheet had been completely worn off.  I knew what the top end of my heart rate zones should be, but I wasn't sure what the mileages were supposed to be.  So I sorta guessed.  

Around mile 2, I was feeling good, picking people off, and I passed a guy, and he got right on my heels.  And stayed there.  For four miles.  I started thinking of him as my shadow.  He fell right into my cadence, sped up when I sped up, slowed when I slowed.  I wanted to shake him off, but I couldn't without spiking my heart rate.  I hated the idea that he could put in a stronger final kick at the end and pass me, but I tried to put that out of my mind.

Just as we were nearing the finish, I caught up to a woman who had been just ahead of me for most of the race.  At first I thought she was 37, but as I got closer I saw she was 34.  My age group.  I looked up, and I could see the finish line tent through the trees, so I picked it up.  I was on a mission.  I passed her, and I didn't look back.  I didn't want to see what she was doing, I just wanted to put as much distance between the two of us as I could.

Finishing kick

That final kick finally shook my shadow (shirtless guy in the pict) and dropped my competition, moving me into 3rd place in my AG.

Finish line

Check out that sub-2:30 finish!  I finished 12 seconds ahead of 4th place.  This run was still around 51 minutes, so much better than last year, but still not a very solid 10K.  Could I have run this faster?  Maybe, but my heart rate was hovering just above where I thought I should be (and more than that in the last mile).  I felt like I ran this very close to the limit.

The F30-34 podium.  More glassware - love this race!

Time: 50:52 (8:12 pace)
Rank in AG: 2 / 16
Rank in women: 27 / 124
Rank overall: 135 / 343

PS
Thanks for sticking with me through this one, seems like I can't get a brief race report this season.

A had a good race: a nice solid swim, surprised herself with her bike, and a tough run that she persevered through.  She beat her goal time by almost 25 minutes.  And her toe held up well.  Congrats!

Finally, I've uploaded my cleaned up spreadsheet of the results to google docs here.  I've fixed all the times, so they add appropriately.  I've also shown cumulative time at each of the timing mats, so you can see what position you were in relative to your competition.  Fun!

Not long now

This weekend is the Mass State Triathlon (it's not a championship of any sort, that's just the name).  It's my last race before nationals, so last time to work out any kinks before the big show.

I've done this race for the last two years, and both years it has been hot.  This year looks to be a little better, though still humid.  Hopefully, I'll be done before the temps hit 80.  

There's a non-zero chance that the race will not allow wetsuits due to the water temperatures (they didn't two years ago and the difference between that swim and last year's was about 5 minutes).  So I'm hoping for a wetsuit legal swim.

On the bike, I want to fine tune my power - how hard can I push and not blow up on the run?  The last two years I've averaged ~18-18.5mph on this race.  The beginning of the race season my biking was feeling a bit rough.  I'm feeling a little more confident in it these days, so I'm hoping to improve on that speed.  And the course is changed this year and a few miles shorter, so a PR on this bike is expected.

Last year and the year before both pretty much blew up on the run.  More so last year, but really neither was pretty.  The run is hot and despite what the race organizers say, not shady.  My running has come a long way in the off season, so I'm expecting great things here as well, or at the very least, no stopping.

Overall, if the swim is wetsuit legal, then I should beat my time of 2:44 from last year.  And maybe, just maybe, beat my PR of 2:40.

Mass State Race Report: Unexpected results

Well, that was rough. I was cooked on that run. It was hotter than expected, and I needed more water on the bike. Lesson learned, take a second bottle of just water. I got through the first mile and half before stopping to walk. My heart rate kept creeping up over 180, so I kept stopping. Eight times in total. Ended up running a 59 minute 10K. Yeesh.

At first I didn't like having the gps watch on the run cause those splits were brutal, but I ended up appreciating having it, monitoring my heart rate, slowing pace or walking when it got out of hand.

Here's the thing though: I had exactly the same time as last year. I did the swim in 23 minutes (so 5 minutes faster than last year - advantage: wetsuit), did the bike 1:19 (2 minutes faster, average of 18.5mph), and then did the run 7 minutes slower. And I took second in my age group, and I got a pint glass.

I felt sort of bad that after such a crappy run, I could still place. If I had been in one age group up or one age group down, I wouldn't have placed by about 20 minutes. But, that said, I came 2nd out of 18 in my age group.

Lessons for next time:

• Water on the bike. Also drinking all the way up til the start.
• My stomach was still not happy, but considering it was unhappy for the whole day I'm not sure how much of that was race-related.
• Need to practice those mounts/dismounts again.
• Definitely more taper for that next race.
• Also may try to do a little more mid-day running to better acclimatize.
  

Mass State Race Plan: the Dry Run

Here we are. July. One last race before Nationals. Yeesh.

I'm thinking of Mass State as my last chance to really try out the game plan before the big day. I want to practice really pushing, keeping that "go faster" mentality from Griskus. But the big experiment is nutrition.

By the time I got to the run at Griskus, my stomach was a wreck. It was not interested in taking on anything else. I had originally based my race nutrition on Hammer's recommendations for endurance athletes. (There's something really satisfying about sinking your teeth into 144 pages of nutritional info.) The basic takeaways that I used were: Eat 3 hours before exercise and not again til you're moving, take in about 250 calories/hour, drink about 20 oz per hour.

After the race, I talked with my coach. She suggested perhaps the gel I was using was not mixing well with the sports drink. So, I've switched those up (now I'm entirely hammer-fueled). I also think that I was probably just trying to take on too much. I came across another local triathlete's blog, who suggests a lower calorie approach, so I'm reducing across the board and going for the lowest end of the hammer guidelines (150cal/hour, 16oz/hour). The hammer guidelines are written for people doing all sorts of endurance events, and although olympic races typically take me over 2.5 hours, they're not endurance in the traditional sense. I like olympic races because you can race them. The heart rate is higher, and I think that's why it's harder to absorb quite so much. Also, it turns out I'm not that big of person.

I've been trying out a less-is-more philosophy in training, and that's what I'll have on Sunday. Plenty of water before the race, a gel before the swim and one on the bike, a single bottle with half sustained energy and half heed (so it's not too sweet), then water on the run. On the whole, no-eating-before-the-race thing, I never do that in training. I always eat something before a workout, even in the wee hours of the morning, and it's usually within an hour of the session, so I'm having my clifbar when I feel like it. So that's the plan (and here's the spreadsheet).

Oh, right, except there's more to the race than what I eat. I've been approaching this race as a C race. My body is still feeling the effects of some very heavy sessions last week and early this one. I'm taking it easier now, but I'm still not to that itchy I-have-to-move feeling that indicates a nice taper. I want to race on perceived effort and not get too caught up in numbers or podiums.

OK, who am I kidding? I live for numbers. So here they are: last year I had a strong swim at this race, so let's do that again, 25 min goal (if I swam my pace from this morning I should finish in 22). That bike has got a wicked hill, twice. I averaged 18 last year for the whole thing with a negative split. This year, let's go 18.5 for the first lap and see what I've got for the second lap. The run felt long and wicked hot. It's supposed to be cooler this year. Goal for the run is to keep the legs turning over and shoot for 7:30s.

This should be fun.

Oh, and I've been playing around with my new gps watch. Here's my swim from Walden this morning. Looks like my sighting is improving.

Mass State Race Report: Managing expectations

It wasn't quite what I had hoped for. I finished in 2:44. A minute slower than my PR. But, I did finish 5th in my age group (out of 12), and I did have the 2nd fastest swim in my age group. And I did go hard. Here are my highlights:

1. If I make my oatmeal a little on the soupy side, I can just drink it if I forget a spoon.
2. I bought new sunscreen for the race. I opted to go with Mission cause it's made by "athletes and scientists." But apparently not industrial designers. I couldn't get the bloody thing to spray, the cap just wouldn't lever enough to depress the internal plunger. Luckily, I discovered this on Saturday, and Paul helped me pry off the outer cap. Other than the can, the sunscreen worked well. I'm a fan of spray, because if you do it in light coats it doesn't smear your race number, obviously a must for the discerning triathlete.
   
3. I still find it quaint that races in the US insist on singing the National Anthem before every race. I don't think I ever heard Advance Australia Fair at a single race, but it's a nice touch.
4. I gotta remember to hit my start button on my watch.
   
5. On the first lap of the bike, it became clear that my goal of averaging 19.5 was just not going to happen: there was a head wind on the flat, and the mile long hill killed my momentum in the first few meters. After 12 miles I had a 17.5 average. I reset my expectations, and decided to shoot for a 18 average. Just as I turned into the park to head to transition, I hit 18. Woohoo.
6. Putting my gu for the run in my bike bento box was not a good plan, I forgot to move it to my pocket.
7. Sub-one-minute transitions!
8. My teammate Christina commented on how salty I was after the race. That's right, I was covered in salt crystals.
9. I need to re-evaluate my goal setting practice. I've never swum 1500 in 25 minutes in open water, I've never run a 50 minute 10K on its own. Why should I think that I could do both of those things for the first time in this race?
10. I've got an awesome team.
    

Mass State Race Plan

This Sunday is the Mass State Triathlon (http://www.maxperformanceonline.com/massstaterace.html). I'm doing the olympic distance race. (Check out the video of the bike on their site).

I haven't really been too focused on training since the Patriot. Still training, but nothing exceptional. Some weeks even taking 2 rest days! Low key rides, nothing longer than 50 miles, nothing faster than 17. Long open water swims with friends. Overall just enjoying the training and not going crazy. This could mean that I'm super well rested for this race, or it could mean that I'll just be slow. Guess we'll find out in a few days.

My goal for this race is to go hard. It's been almost a year since my last olympic distance (since Mooseman didn't really count). Patriot was about pushing, but still reserving something in the tank. This time, I want to go all out and see what I've got.

My 2:43 olympic PR was from Mooloolaba last year, so it's been a while since it's been truly tested. I went into training last fall with a goal of having a 25 minute swim for 1500m, which translates to 1:40s per 100, by the end of this season. Seems like this race is a good chance to test out how close I am to that goal.

On the ride, I'm not entirely sure. It's a mostly flat ride, but has 1 hill (done twice) that's about a mile long and at points it's 4%. I held 18.8 for the first 27 miles of the Patriot, so seems like 19 should be doable. 19.5 is the stretch goal. It would make the ride exactly 1:15.

Finally, for the run, I've always wanted a 50 minute run. That's 8 minute miles. My run at Mooseman was 51:21. I don't really have much of a reason to think that I can go faster than that, but it can't hurt to try, right? Or it will hurt, but it will be temporary.

25+1:15+50 = 2:30 without transitions. So with transitions 2:35? Shaving 8 minutes off my PR seems ambitious. So how about a hierarchy of goals:

1. Go hard!
2. 2:40 overall time.
3. Meeting one or more individual discipline goals
4. 2:35