Race Report: Santa Cruz Triathlon (Olympic)

I'm so glad I decided to register and race the Santa Cruz Triathlon as part of SVTC's push to win the Southwest Club Championship again (we won). It was great to end the season with a PR at the international distance.

I wasn't sure just how well I'd do, given all my jet lag issues and lack of training the week leading up (I was on a business trip to Kenya from Sept 10 to Sept 17 and only did three 5km runs around the hotel property in Kenya in the "taper" leading up to the race). Hell, I wasn't sure I'd be able to break the 3:00 mark as I was hoping after seeing my progress during the club's training day on the Santa Cruz course back at the end of August.

No better way to find out than just doing the damn thing, so here's how it went down:

Woke up super early after about 5 hours sleep and made the drive down to the transition area across from the Dream Inn and got there just as it opened. Great spot near the bike out/in, just where I wanted it. Over the next hour, TONS of SVTC folks showed up for the day, so was in good company.

Lucky me, I'd done all my packing the night before, so I wasn't missing anything on my transition mat (unlike forgetting my Gu for Vineman). Got my wetsuit on and walked down to the beach with the 1000 other folks. We started waaaay off down the beach toward the roller coaster in a "swim pen" which I think shortened the course a little (?) but then they had buoys we had to stay outside away from the pier which probably made up for the off-angled start.

The water was smooth and the visibility was good (no fog). I was in the fifth wave, taking off at 8:20am, twenty minutes after the clock started. I felt good swimming in the pack, and it wasn't long before we were all strung out with lots of room between us. Yet, I couldn't quite repeat the form of the training day, and I kept drifting to the left, which meant I was drifting away from the pier, adding distance to the swim.

Nevertheless, I rounded the end of the pier faster than I expected to get there (took it wide, tho) and before I knew it, I was stripping off the top of my wetsuit running up the hill to transition. Seemed like I was in the back of my wave, but hadn't been overtaken by too many folks in the wave following, so felt ok going into T1.

My swim time was 34:19 (ugh!) ranking me in the bottom quartile of the race

T1 went smoothly (only 3:55 including the run up the hill) and I hopped on the bike and hammered through town, knowing this was my time to shine. I wanted to at least average 19mph to set me up with a cushion on the run should my wheels fall off from fatigue. As usual, I passed many more on the bike than I got passed by, and the 20 or so who passed me were all on tricked-out tri bikes, so I felt good at my pace/progress. By the time I got back to T2, I'd only spent 1:11:19 on the bike, for a pace of 20.8mph! (305th overall on the bike).

I made it through T2 as quick as I could (putting on socks this time!) but still managed to lose 3:08 in transition and then it was on to the run.

Unlike the weather on training day which started off with a foggy swim and then a hot run, the clouds never lifted during the race, so it was nice and cool the whole time, and was I grateful for that on the run.

My goal: don't get caught on someone else's faster pace on the way out. Then don't stop, don't walk: just push through. And with the exception of pausing to slam down gatorade and water at the aid stations, I didn't stop! Mind over matter brought me in with a 56:16 run time (9:04 pace).

I can't tell you how thrilled I was to approach the finish line at a sprint seeing that I could nip the race clock before it clicked over to 3:09:00 and I caught it just before it did, finishing in 2:48:57! (77th in my AG, 397th male, 500th overall)

Totally smoked my goal of 3 hours and couldn't be happier with the outcome. I'm already looking at where I can gain time next year. I'm pretty sure I can take at least 4 minutes off the swim, another 3 minutes off the bike and 3 minutes off the run.

And if I can recapture a minute from the transitions, I'll be breaking 2:40 next year :)

Garmin Forerunner 310XT swim accuracy

I've owned my Garmin Forerunner 310XT for just over a month now, and the thing that has frustrated me most has been the accuracy of the 310XT on the swim.

See, I'd owned the Garmin Forerunner 305 for a year and really enjoyed using it to track my on-land legs of triathlon training and racing.

So when I saw the 310XT coming out, I knew I had to have it, even though the 305 was still functioning just fin. Imagine, I thought, with the 310XT I could track just how much I drifted off-line in the open water swims!

So, imagine my dismay when I wore my 310XT for the whole race in a sprint triathlon, and the map at right is how the 400m swim looked when uploaded to Garmin Connect. (click it to get to the activity details on GC)

Say what? I know for a fact I didn't do any loop-dee-loops on the swim course, and while my sighting is bad at times, there's no way I'm that jagged in a swim. And a half mile course? I don't think so.

Ugh.

So I gave the 310XT another try on an open water swim training over in Redwood Shores that I knew to be one mile long. As you see in the map at left, the jaggies were back, and while the time was good (just over 30 minutes), the distance was incorrectly logged at 2.15 miles. Again, click the map to get the activity details on GC.

Grrr!

So, before participating in the Silicon Valley Tri Club's practice session for the upcoming Santa Cruz Triathlon, I decided to consult the internet to see how to make the 310XT more reliable on the swim.

The verdict? Tuck the 310XT under your swim cap. Not at the top of your head, but at the back of your head, so when you're looking down in the water, the GPS unit is facing up. And lo and behold, it works!

Take a look at the map on the right, and you'll see just how smooth the path is (yes, I'm proud of my sight lines) and the distance accuracy is so very close to perfect as well! (with 10% which is a great improvement over the +100% accuracy of wearing it on my wrist).

By tucking the 310XT under your cap, the timing of the distance is a little longer than it should be what with turning it on before putting your cap on, but the accuracy of both distance and path can't be beat.

I'm now pleased as punch that I can more accurately track my sighting abilities on my open water swims using the 310XT.

Next thing to conquer? Getting the damn thing to pair to my Garmin Heart Rate Monitor that I've been using with my 305. Always something to tinker with!

Report from the Scene of the Tree Fall of 2009 Vineman 70.3

UPDATE: I'm glad to read the cyclists injured during Vineman 70.3 when an oak tree toppled over on them are doing much better today. When I first arrived at the scene, I though things could have been a lot worse.

Thanks to the confluence of a variety of events (my swim time, my T1 time, my pace on the bike), I was amongst the first to arrive at the scene of the freak accident where the tree fell across the bicycle course at mile 6.55 of the Vineman 70.3 race.

Here's my story, culled out separately from my race report:

I'd come off a good swim for me (middle of the pack overall), and over the first five miles of the bike from Johnson's Beach down River Road I was averaging over 23 mph, getting ready to turn off onto Sunset Ave and then onto the rollers of Westside Road.

I turned off River Rd and made the initial steep climb onto Westside. I was about a mile and a half into the twisty rollers, and that's when it happened.

I was about to crest a slightly uphill blind right curve when I heard what sounded like a a trash truck dropping an empty dumpster on the ground around the bend.

When I crested the curve, I could see there was a tree down by the side of the road. Wait, no, it was down in the other lane. Wait, no it was ACROSS THE WHOLE FRICKIN' ROAD! I slammed on my brakes and came to a stop. There were three cyclists stopped in front of me just staring at this tree down, and that's when we heard the screams of someone who must've been trapped under the tree.

I quickly dismounted as did the other triathletes around me and ran up to the tree blocking the road to see there were two cyclists caught underneath. I shouted at one of the triathletes who was still on his bike to run back to the crest of the hill to warn the long line of cyclists coming up behind us to prepare to stop. And then I ran into the tree to see what had happened.

One of the downed triathletes (cyclist 1: the guy moaning/screaming) had take the full brunt of a big branch across his body and bike. The other one (cyclist 2) looked like he'd been lucky and was knocked over in the relative void between the two thick trunks of the tree. Smaller branches were broken all around him, but he didn't have anything heavy directly on top of him like cyclist 1 did.

I and two other triathletes made a beeline for cyclist 1 as he was making a lot of noise and had to be badly injured. He was scraped up pretty badly, and there was a good sized trickle of blood coming out from under him onto the pavement. We picked away the branches from on top of him and from around him and then the two guys with me started attending to his injuries right away.

I then jumped into the middle of the downed tree to help clear the branches from around cyclist 2. He was ambulatory and seemed to have his wits about him, but you could tell his day was over.

I then got back out of the tree to see there were about 15 triathletes gathered around wanting to do something to help but also wanting to race on. I saw one of them whip out a cell phone and tried to reach 911 (limited cell coverage out there), so I knew help was coming.

I also noticed that there were many triathletes who'd found a 5-foot-tall break around the left side of the felled tree where they could squeeze through and get back on their bikes. The only problem? The break was caused by a line (power? telephone? cable?) that was keeping that side of the tree from crashing to the ground. Some folks were simply clipping out to push their way through while others were dismounting fully, so I decided it was time to play traffic cop.

The last thing we needed was 100s of triathletes bunched up at the tree, so I thought the best thing to do was to help guide folks around the blockade.

The guy at the crest of the hill continued to warn people to slow down, and as they got to me at the tree, I told them to dismount and pass through the opening but DO NOT TOUCH THE WIRE! (later found out it was just a telephone wire). I could see a lot of the triathletes were shocked at the scene (nothing can prepare you for something like this), and they seemed grateful to be able to get around and keep going.

As I was directing people around the scene, cyclist 2 climbed out of the tree debris and came up to me asking how his shoulder looked. I looked at his shoulder muscle, above his race number, and only noticed some scratches and told him so, and he said "no, I mean did the collarbone pop?" It did look large, but I asked to see his other one to compare. Yup, sure enough, he'd broken his collarbone. His day was done.

I went back to directing traffic and not too long after, a fellow triathlete in a UK flag jersey told me he'd take over and let me ride on. I don't know how long I'd been there already (my Garmin would later show I'd spent 5 minutes at the crash site) but I was relieved to get back on the road. I grabbed my bike off the ground, ducked under wire and paused as I saw that cyclist 1 appeared to be doing better (he was no longer moaning) and he'd been cleared from under the tree.

I proceeded to mount up and pedaled quickly away, realizing that if I'd only been a few seconds faster on the swim or in T1 or hadn't sat up to take in some liquid in the first 5 miles, that could've been me.

The newspapers report there was a third man who broke his collarbone when he crashed into the felled tree, but I only saw the two. Maybe the third guy came in too hot after I'd left? There was a cyclist about two miles up the road (beyond) from the felled tree who was stretched out in the middle of the road next to his bike. He was clutching his shoulder as two other cyclists stood over him, waving us on.

As I rode the rest of the course, I felt a comraderie with the other triathletes who'd stopped to tend our fellow triathletes. I wish I'd remembered their numbers to give them shoutouts here. It's good to know we've got each others' backs.

Sure, we can compete against each other, but when you're going 70.3 miles as an age grouper, you're in it together to make it to the finish line.

That's what being a triathlete is all about.

Vineman 70.3 race report

Just 24 hours ago, I was finishing the hottest half marathon I've ever run. Hell, it was my hottest run, period. Yet, I persevered the 90+ degree heat, and made it to the end to complete my first ever Ironman 70.3!

My race plan had a target of six hours to finish my first half Ironman: I'd do the 1.2 mile swim in about 45 minutes, the 56 mile bike in 3 hours and the 13.1 mile run in 2 hours. That'd leave me with 15 minutes for transition times and for leaks on the run pace and still bring me in under six hours.

The week leading up to the race was an unintentionally severe taper. I had two big work projects land on the same week, which had me sleeping less than 5 hours a night from Monday through Thursday, and a flourish of 28 hours at the keyboard Thursday and Friday alone. I kept assuring myself I'd get my frustrations out on the course, and sure enough, that was a help come race day.

The Swim
My wave (men 40-44) took off at 6:38am in a warm (75 degree) Russian River. Compared to my previous tri, the Escape from Alcatraz, where the water was just 58 degrees, the river felt positively balmy. Didn't stop me from wearing my wetsuit, though, so I could take advantage of the extra buoyancy.

As we waited in the deep water for the horn to sound, I got a chance to admire the scenery, looking upriver to the two bridges we'd swim under. The sun hadn't yet come up over the hills, and there was a beautiful mist rising from the surface of the river providing a little blanket of fog for us to swim through.

Then the horn sounded and all enjoyment of the scenery ended abruptly when two minutes into the swim I got a foot to the face knocking my goggles off, I stopped to readjust them and got bumped into/run over by a couple guys from behind (totally expected) and when I finally slipped into a nice steady rhythm, I noticed just how narrow the swim course was. It was impossible to get more than a couple feet away from anyone at any time, unless you wanted to fall way off the back.

About a third of the way up the out-and-back course, we passed under the second bridge, and shortly thereafter got into about 3.5 feet of water. As I was swimming along in half-foggy goggles, I was startled to see shapes looming above me before realizing it was some of my fellow age-groupers actually wading through the water! I tentatively put my feet down on the rocky river bank and waded alongside them (was this legal? was this smart? was this tiring my legs prematurely? was this dangerous?) before dropping back into my freestyle for the remainder of the swim.

The turnaround for the swim was just over half-way, and while the current of the river was negligible thanks to the dam at Johnson's Beach where we started, I could swear my swimming was faster coming back to the beach. I touched down at the swim out and quickly scampered to my bike, making it out of T1 just 46:06 after the race started. My race plan was holding!

The Bike
After a short steep climb away from the beach, the first five miles of the ride is nice and flat. I was feeling good about the swim and my legs felt strong for the bike, I just knew I had to keep some in reserve for the run at the end. I'd broken the bike course into thirds and knew if I could hit my targets on the hour, I'd stick to the race plan.

Over the first five miles, thanks to my aero bars, I averaged over 23 mph, giving me some ground to lose on the rollers of Westside Road. We turned off River Rd and began the initial climb onto Westside and about a mile and a half into the twisty rollers, that's when it happened: just seconds ahead of me, an oak tree fell across the road, pinning two triathletes underneath it.

You can read my separate post on being one of the first on the scene of the tree fall, but for this race report, suffice to say I spent about 5 minutes at the crash scene before things look like they'd stabilized and I was relieved by a fellow triathlete so I could push on.

I proceeded to mount up and pedaled quickly away, realizing that if I'd only been a few seconds faster on the swim or in T1 or hadn't sat up to take in some liquid in the first 5 miles, that could've been me under the tree. Of course, thinking like that will quickly make you crazy, so I continued to push on. At about mile 9, I came across the first spectators since the crash scene and I stopped to tell them there was a tree across the road pinning two cyclists at milepost 1.5 of Westside and please call 911. Whether or not they did, I'm not sure, but by the time I got to mile 17, a CHP car was flying the other direction with it's lights flashing. The calvary was on its way.

Adrenaline must've been on my side after the crash, because I made my target of 19 miles in the first hour of riding, and then I made it to the 38-mile mark in 1:45. The steep climb on Chalk Hill Road at the 45-mile mark, which seemed so big back in April when I recon'd the route, was relatively easy and from there it was a quick downhill to T2. Even though I'd forgotten my gels in the hotel room (DUH!) and only managed to choke down half a Clif bar on the ride to supplement my energy drinks, I was feeling pretty good.

After all, I'd finished the ride in 2:54:53, still on track for my race plan!

The Run
Ugh, the run. My legs felt wobbly coming off the bike into transition, and when I got to my transition spot, I could already feel the heat was going to suck. How I managed to piddle away 5:48 in T2 is a mystery, but poof! there went some of my cushion for a six-hour finish.

I pushed out onto the run course and the first two miles seemed to go pretty well. I was averaging 8:30 pace, but I knew it was unsustainable given the heat and how my reserves felt.

I slowed to a walk on the first big uphill and resolved to run wherever the road was flat or downhill. If I could just manage a 10-minute mile over the course, I could make my goal!

But I could feel my legs start to tighten, and I spent more time walking than running as I tried to coax as much out of my quads and calves as I could without seizing them up.

A highlight for me was seeing my friend Dan at the aid station at mile 4 (and mile 9). He's done several Ironmans and was/is an inspiration to me as I've started doing triathlons. He checked in with me as he handed me Gatorade and water, walked with me through the aid station and told me to pace myself (unlike the yahoos on the side of the road screaming "push it!").

Another highlight was seeing all the other SVTC club members out on the course and giving/getting encouragement and high-fives as we passed each other. I'm so glad I got the SVTC tri top to wear in competition to stand out from all the other age-groupers sloughing along.

The turnaround loop at La Crema winery was beautiful what with the ponds and vines, if only there'd been some shade out there! And the run back was more of a fast-walk/slow-jog. More encouragement from Dan at mile 9. A fellow SVTCer passed me at mile 9.5 with a "less than 4 miles to go, let's run it in!"

I was melting on the run, yet thankful my day had started at 6:38 so I could avoid the heat that the last waves would be enduring two hours later (at my pace). I pushed myself as hard as I could, knowing my two race buddies, Neil and Thom, were behind me, trying to catch me.

By mile 10, I knew I wouldn't make my six hour goal. I was averaging 11 minutes per mile in my combined run/walk approach. My quads and calves and hamstrings were thisclose to seizing up on me. I was gulping down water and gaterade and cola and gels at each station to try and fuel me to the finish.

I managed to run the last mile in, cheered on by the crowds and their cowbells. And when I made it to the finish chute, I knew there was nothing to stop me from making it to the end of my first Ironman 70.3

The Finish
When I heard the announcer say my name halfway down the chute, I couldn't help but crack a huge smile at the achievement. I crossed the line, arms outstretched, sweating to beat the band with just shy of 6:21 showing on the race clock.

I'd strung together a 2:26 run to finish my first half ironman in a time of 6:12:58

I've already started going through the if-onlys in analyzing this race, and to me that's a sign I'll be doing more of them. (maybe even a full Ironman?)

But for now I'm trying to simply savor the accomplishment. I've got the mettle to do it, and the medal to prove it.

Final Vineman 70.3 Stats

Swim + T1= 46:06
Bike = 2:54:53
T2 = 5:48
Run = 2:26:09
Total = 6:12:58

Rankings:
Overall 1040 of 2286
Men 779 of 1517
Age Group (40-44) 158 of 320

fixing leaks: venous closure and phlebectomy post-op report

My surgery to close and remove the defective veins in my left calf went well yesterday (as well as could be expected). Interesting to note that if not for my tri training, I'd have gotten DQ'd prior to surgery as my pulse was a measly 43 bpm at check-in. As it was, the anesthetist attributed my slow heart rate to my being in great shape and gave the thumbs up.

The pretty picture to the right shows some of the nicks in my leg. The purple lines are pre-op markers of the veins to remove; the yellow is the iodine cleaner they neglected to cleanup afterward (don't know how I'm going to get it off).

Surgery prep involved shaving my left leg from mid-thigh down (what a luxury!). I couldn't persuade the nurse to shave the other leg while she was at it, so I'll either look like a half-shaved beast during recovery or I'll bite the bullet and clear the field of hair from my right leg, too.

The anesthetist did a great job of things, and shortly after I was wheeled into the operating room I was out before I knew it. I woke up two hours later to find that surgery had taken a bit longer than expected... they had to shave the inside of my thigh all the way up to my waist (yep, there too, just the left side) to get at the top of the vein that runs from your groin to your toe. The doc made 26 incisions, each about half a centimeter long, all over my thigh and calf to strip out the now-useless pieces of vein and leg wrapped tight to staunch the bleeding. Bonus to the small size of incision: no stitches!

Tylenol kept the pain at bay yesterday. No sharp pains involved, it just felt like someone used my calf as a punching bag. I took Tylenol when I woke up this morning but haven't taken any since, as I figure I'm past the worst of it.

I just took off the bandages (thus the picture above) for my first survey of the damage: lots of cuts and bruising, but all in all, I am on the mend. The picture to the left shows my leg pre-op with all its pretty popped-out failed veins (it's not just because I'm flexing).

I have to stay off my feet and keep my leg elevated until I go in for the followup ultrasound Monday morning. The standard instructions say no strenuous activity for two weeks (huh?!) which conflicts with the doc's earlier indication that I'd only be out a week.

I really hope I can get back to swimming/biking/running soon. Our practice weekend for Wildflower is April 4-5 and I'd like to get some significant hours of training in before then.

The trick to the next few days is to keep cabin fever away. Wish me luck!

Race Report: Woodside King's Mountain Half Marathon

This past Saturday, the skies cleared up long enough here in the Bay Area for me to run the EnviroSports Woodside Kings Mountain Half Marathon without wearing a rain jacket.

My official finish time was 2:10:16, which I'm rather pleased about. Why? Just look at the elevation profile to the right (graphic links to my motionbased entry). Yes, that's just shy of 3400 feet of elevation gain over the course of the race.

In addition to this being just my second half marathon, it was my first true trail run, so the sweat (and tears) I shed completing the race were well expended.

I have to hand it to the EnviroSports crew, too, for putting on such a fun race. There were just 183 of us running the half marathon (and another couple hundred there to do the 5-miler), and it seemed much more like an intimate jog through Huddart Park than some big organized race.

The trail was very well marked to the top of the hill and back, and given all the rain we've gotten recently, I was surprised there was but a single stretch of shoe-sucking mud on the whole course. The fact it was just a couple hundred yards shy of the turnaround didn't help much, but you take what you get, no?

Truth be told, I walked more than I wanted to on the way up the hill. But I was proud at how much I ran up that same incline. See, I'd spent the week prior doing nothing but coping my way through recovering from a cold, so the fact that I was out in the wind and cool and wet was a victory in and of itself.

The course wasn't a true half marathon in length (more like 12.6 miles) and the canopy of trees meant my GPS signal was weak throughout and throwing off bad data. But I rather enjoyed having to pay close attention to where my feet were landing and taking a few moments here and there to enjoy the nature around me. With so few people on the course, I spent much of the run down the hill with only one other person in sight. Now that's my idea of a fun run.

Next up: vascular surgery on my left calf (see prior post on my varicose veins) and a week of recovery before hopping right back on the training wagon. After all, I've got a practice Wildflower olympic tri to run in a month. Wish me (and the surgeon) luck!

2008 Silicon Valley Turkey Trot race report

This past Thursday, it took me 51:55 to finish the 2008 Silicon Valley Turkey Trot in downtown San Jose. (see full race results)

This year's race was a good check-in for me to see how much I'd improved since last year's Turkey Trot which I finished in 1:03:48. You see, last year's race was the first race I signed up for in my quest to do a triathlon (and only my second 10K, the first one being back in 2000). A year ago, I still weighed 200 pounds, down from my high of 222, and my cardio was nowhere near how good it is now.

Flash forward to this year, and I managed to come in 495th of 2,413 runners (last year I didn't crack the top 1,000) and I was 124th in my age group. In fact, I missed posting a PR in the 10K by a measly 12 seconds (back in 2000, when I was but 31 years old, I ran the 10K in 51:42).

I was hoping (against hope?) for a sub-50 minute race, but it wasn't in the cards this year.

I think I went out too hard at the start, as I was on a 7:50 pace for the first two miles and felt good about having banked 20 seconds for the latter part of the race, even with all the traffic to weave through on the course. However, at the halfway mark, I'd slowed to an even 8:00 mile and only got slower from there to finally finish up averaging 8:16/mile (small victory: I never walked!)

I do have to say, the folks who set up the course did a LOUSY job of intermingling the 5K walkers and the 10K runners for the last 1.2 miles of the course. They had us sharing a paved trail, hoping the 5Kers would stay to the right and let us 10Kers run on the left.

Wishful thinking: I had to keep yelling out "5Kers to the RIGHT!" as they spilled over to our side and gummed up our trying to keep up our pace on the run.

But it's all for charity, and so I should be pleased I was able to shave so much time off in a single year. I know I'll never make that kind of year-over-year progress again. But that's not going to stop me from aiming for a sub-45 minute 10K next time.

I've got a year to train for it, and I know I can do it, no matter how the course is laid out.

San Francisco Triathlon (olympic) race report

I concluded my 2008 race season by competing in the Olympic distance 2008 San Francisco Triathlon at Treasure Island today.

In all, given the fact that for the last month I've been sick with the cold and flu more than I've been healthy, I'm rather pleased at my 3:11:50 finish time (the picture shows the overall time... I started 30 minutes after the first wave)

My splits (as seen on the full SFTri results list):

• 1.5km swim: 37:43
• T1: 4:20
• 40km bike: 1:23:41
• T2: 3:24
• 10km run: 1:02:41 (yes, I walked stretches of it)

And this meant I placed 265 out of 333 men who raced today and 60/71 in my age group M35-39. Definitely not the fastest in the bunch (the winning time was 2:04:49), but I was racing to finish this thing, my longest race yet, not to place.

THE SETUP
The skies were overcast this morning, with a fog hanging over the city of San Francisco, but not covering Treasure Island itself. Temperatures were cool (mid 50s?), ideal for spending multiple hours on the course. The sun was trying to peak through the clouds, but without much success.

Thom and I had picked up our race packets the night before, so we were able to go directly to the Transition area to rack our bikes, set up our gear and get marked with our race numbers. The transition area was plenty big enough, and the racks actually were marked with our race numbers, so there wasn't any jockeying to be had for the spots closest to bike in/out (thankfully).

As an aside, I couldn't believe how nervous/anxious/tight I felt before the start of the race today. While I thought I was pretty calm, my stomach was doing flip-flops and I felt tight all over. Very unlike me to get so worked up over a race like that, but then again, this was my first season racing and my longest one yet. I swallowed the butterflies and pressed on.

THE SWIM LEG
Then it was down to the waterfront to start the swim. Two waves went off before us, so we were able to see how they swam the triangle course (two laps) and listen to the announcer chide the swimmers for swimming outside the midway markers in addition to the corner markers (you just have to stay outside the corners).

The swim start is a "bobbing" start which means instead of leaping from a platform or running into the water, you just swim out to the designated buoy line and float there until the horn sounds marking the start of your wave. Having learned my lesson from prior triathlons, I made sure I started from the far edge of the wave so there was a minimum of swimming on top of others or getting clobbered by others. The water temperature was a chilly 58 degrees, but with my wet suit and neoprene cap I was actually quite warm and with my open water swim practices at SF Aquatic Park (closer to the Golden Gate) in colder water this felt quite nice.

With only 71 guys in our wave and 1.5km to swim, it actually felt like I was swimming alone for all but a few pinch points rounding the markers. Once I was making my way past the final marker and heading for the steps out to transition, I got a shot of adrenaline with the knowledge my most feared part of the triathlon was almost over!

Once I made the stairs it was time to try to engage my legs again, which was no easy feat. All I can say is thank goodness there were plenty of volunteers on the stairs to help us swimmers out of the water. If not for them, I'd have tumbled backwards into the water as I lost my footing on the second step. But, they pushed me in the right direction and before you knew it, I was trotting through the transition area to my spot to get ready for the bike.

THE BIKE LEG
It didn't seem like I spent that much time in transition (but it was 4+ minutes), and then I was running my bike to the mount line before saddling up to set out on the first of six laps around the island. Talking with one of the elite racers the night before, I'd gotten the advice to keep track of laps by tearing off six bits of Power Bar (you know how sticky they are) and affixing them to your handlebars. Then, as you complete a lap, you peel off one of the Power Bar bits and eat it and know how many laps are left.

On each lap, there were 26 corners to navigate (21 of them 90 degree turns and one 180 degree turnaround) which made for quite a technical course. All but a quarter mile of the course was flat, but there was a nasty bit of a hill leading to the turnaround and it seemed to get steeper with each lap completed. Throw in the fact that the condition of the pavement itself wasn't too grand and some of the corners were surprisingly dirty with rocks and sand and you had quite the recipe for a challenging course.

My pace was significantly slower than prior races where I'd easily stayed above 20mph. This time around, I averaged slightly less than 18mph, and I attribute that to the fact I took the corners cautiously given the conditions and didn't do a good job of accelerating out of the corners anyway.

I was more than happy to climb the hill for the last time and then bomb on down to the entrance to the transition area to start the run.

THE RUN LEG
My T2 was a minute faster than T1 and aside from having some troubles transferring my Garmin from the bike to my wrist, it was rather smooth.

I hit the pavement knowing I had three laps of out-and-back flat running along the eastern shore of Treasure Island. Thanks to my training for the half marathon, I actually felt a lot better running than I thought I was going to after the previous two legs of the race.

The first lap went pretty quickly although I could feel my energy plummet as I worked through the second mile. When it came time to do the turnaround closest to the finish, I got confused and almost turned to early. If not for the helpful cry of a spectator saying NO!NO!NO!NO! I'd have failed to know to keep running through the gates by the finish line so as to cross the mat at the turnaround. When I emerged from the gates I gave her a running ovation as thanks for the help.

As I neared mile three, I could feel my calves start to tighten up, so I slowed to a fast walk for a bit and tried to zen my way back to relaxation. I took on quite a bit of endurance drink to try to help the situation. It helped marginally but for the first time ever in a race, I worried that I might cramp up so bad that I couldn't finish.

Nevertheless, I pressed on in my running with a few walking spells and made it to mile five before my quads joined the about-to-cramp party. At that point, the finish wasn't too far away, so I picked a hare in front of me and closed the gap to beat him by six seconds at the line.

THE FINISH
I can't recall having been so happy to finish a race as I was today. Yes, the half marathon was an accomplishment, but that was only two hours out on the circuit. I'd just put in three-plus hours at race pace and I could feel it. I had no blisters or anything like that, it was just my leg muscles were so spent and my body was tired.

The apres-finish setup was good with lots of yummy food, plenty of water and Joint Juice and, the best part: free 10-minute massages! While I was on the massage table getting my legs worked over, I thought I'd died and gone to heaven.

The Tri-California folks put on a great event, well administered and staffed with plenty of volunteers. My only complaint was about the condition of the pavement on the bike ride, but I think that's a bit beyond their realm of responsibility.

LESSONS LEARNED:

• Accelerate out of the corners on the bike
• Feed/hydrate consistently throughout the bike and run legs
  
• Relax and enjoy the entire experience

And with that, my first triathlon season comes to an end.

If you'd asked me a year ago whether I'd be doing a triathlon in SF Bay in November, let alone an olympic distrance tri, I'd have denied I'd be crazy enough to do such a thing.

I'm glad I was crazy enough to do it. It was a ton of fun and feels like a real milestone in my getting in shape via extreme sports.

Split times for my half marathon

At last, the split times have been posted for the San Jose Rock n Roll Half Marathon. Considering they are all PRs for me, I'm glad to be able to claim them again:

• 5km: 26:16 (8:28 pace)
• 10km: 52:23 (8:26 pace)
• 10mi: 1:26:29 (8:39 pace)
• finish: 1:55:49 (8:51 pace)

A little weird to see I picked up the pace in the second 5km. Not surprising to see I blew up in the last 3 miles. I could definitely feel it in the race.

Looking forward to seeing all these PRs fall in the next year!

San Jose Rock n Roll half marathon race report

Today was a beautiful day for a half marathon: clear skies, 60 degrees at the gun and no breeze at all in San Jose, CA. By 10am, I'd completed my longest run ever, beaten my goal of two hours by a comfortable margin and had my first ever medal around my neck for finishing a race.

I woke up before my alarm, was out of bed and dressed by 6am in time to gulp down a chocolate Ensure, a banana and half a PowerBar. Since my last few races have all been triathlons, it was nice to only have to walk out the door with my shoes, shorts and shirt and not a big bag of stuff for all the transitions.

I left the house in plenty of time to make it down to park in the HP Pavilion parking lot and walk over to the very crowded starting area in downtown. It was only 53 degrees (F) when I shut off the car, and I almost wished I'd worn my long sleeve shirt. By the end of the race, though, I was plenty glad I'd gone with short sleeves, as I was warm by the time I'd gone 10 miles.

The Elite Racing folks put on a well-organized race, and it was nice to see 10,000 runners out and about early on a Sunday morning in Silicon Valley. The bands every mile or so were a nice touch, but you could only hear a snippet of 40 seconds or so of any given band, so next time around I think I'll be wearing my iPod to help with my pacing.

When I registered for the race, I guessed I'd be able to finish the race in 2:05, and for that I was assigned bib #6089 (corral #6). When I picked up my race packet, though, I knew I'd be faster so I moved up in the pack to corral #4. I'm glad I did so, as there were fewer folks to pass as the race went on. Thanks to the disposable RFID chips we'd each been issued with our bibs, our timing was tracked in real time (and not gun time) from start to the 5K, 10K, 10-mile and finish lines.

After checking my gear bag with 20 minutes to the starting gun, we crowded into our corrals. It was nice to have all the bodies packed around if for no other reason than the warmth of the group. With 2 minutes to go, the gun went off to release the wheel chair racers and When the air horn went off, we began walking towards the start line, and I finally crossed the start line a good 90 seconds after the horn went off and got up to a decent pace by about half a mile into the race.

While I've been getting some good training runs in, I didn't expect to fall into the pack with a sub-eight pace quite so quickly. I was aiming for sub-nine to hit my 2 hour mark, and sub-eight was aggressive, so I had to force myself to slow down a bit for fear of sputtering later on in the race.

As we passed the two-mile mark, I realized I needed to pee. Cripes. Not a gotta-go-now-alarm, but a gotta-go-soon feeling.

Since there were plenty of porta-potties along the route, it wasn't for lack of opportunity to go, but how much time it'd take to go. I figured if I could hold on until the 10K mark, the crowd would be thinned a bit and it wouldn't be too hard to work my way back up. For every minute I spent off course, I was giving up five seconds per mile pace. I decided not to risk it and just keep running.

I crossed the 10K mark in PB time (52:27) and probably should've taken that as a sign I was running too fast. By the time I got to the 10 mile mark at ~1:26, I was well within a sub-two-hour pace and unless I blew up with three miles to go, I was going to make my goal.

Miles 10, 11 and 12 were tough for me, and I wound up walking at the water/Cytomax tables, and my pace slowed to around 9:30+ over the last 3km.

However, I got my adrenaline kick in the last half mile and picked things back up. With just 100m to go, the relief and happiness washed over me. I heard my wife and kids call out to me and new that they were just as happy as I was.

After finishing the race, I rushed through the refueling station in search of a restroom and you could hear my sigh of relief from a mile away.

My first half marathon's in the bag. Next time I'll be sure to empty the bladder before stepping into the corral.

I can't believe I'm going to be doing another half marathon after swimming 1.2 miles and riding another 56 on the bike.

It's all about the running now

At the beginning of 2008, I set a resolution to run 40 miles in the first four weeks of the year. It took some work, but I met the goal. My longest run back then was 4 miles, and even getting to that distance was a challenge.

Now, in just the last half month since my last triathlon, I've run over 40 miles as part of my training for the Rock n Roll San Jose Half Marathon coming up October 5, with my longest, a 9.3 mile run, coming last Sunday as I participated in the Nike+ Human Race 10K.

Over the next month, my training schedule has me putting running four times a week: 5 mile easy runs on Tuesday and Thursday, a pace run on Saturdays and a long run Sundays. This Sunday I'll be doing a 10-mile run and then add a mile to my long runs each week until I top out at half marathon distance the week before the race.

My biggest pleasure? The fact I actually enjoy my long runs and can go for 9+ miles at a sub-8:45 pace without stopping. Folks who know better say that I shouldn't be worried about finishing the half marathon... if I can do the 9-milers, I can complete the race. Now I'm focused on finishing the race in under two hours.

It still astounds me that a year ago I was struggling to be able to make it on a three-mile loop around the neighborhood without walking for stretches at a time. What a difference a year makes!

My Canadian race: Loop the Lake 10K results

Earlier this summer I signed up to run a 10K race in British Columbia as part of our road trip vacation to Canada (that's why I've been absent from this blog for a while).

The 13th Annual Loop the Lake 10K was around Lake Invermere in the eastern part of BC, just outside the Kootenay and Banff National Parks.

Since I've been doing more running than anything else over the summer, I thought for sure I'd post a good time on this 10K. After all, it was around a lake, so the course would be nice and flat, right?

Um, no. I was so very wrong to assume that. It wasn't until the night before the race, after I'd picked up my race packet (my bib + a single two-sided piece of paper with instructions) that I saw "It's a hilly course so don't expect any PBs."

So, at 8am on August 9, I lined up at the starting line with 375 Canucks and one other American and ran the course from Windermere to Invermere, up and around Lake Invermere.

Couldn't have asked for more breathtaking views with the Canadian Rockies all around us. The course was well-marked, the crowd congenial and the mosquitoes weren't too thirsty once you got up to speed.

While I was hoping to break 50:00 prior to seeing the course was hilly, I was content to break 54:00 with a final time of 53:42. What with the elevation gain on the course (800 feet) and the fact we were at 2600' altitude to begin with, I think I've rationalized the finish time as well as I can.

While I knew I'd done pretty well in terms of passing more than getting passed, but it wasn't until the final results were published to the web this week that I found out I'd finished in the top 20% of all runners! The fastest came in at 32:49, you can tell it wasn't a competitive field.

Final stats: I was 65th of 377 runners and 8th of 20 men in my age group 30-39.

Moreover, while I was able to add training runs in almost every state we drove through (OR, WA, MT, AB, BC) I can now accurately call myself an "international competitive athlete" but don't confuse that with a "competitive international athlete." I've got a lot of speed to pick up before I can say that.

My Garmin chart is posted below:

Pleasanton Tri for Fun #3 race report

My results: I finished the race in 1:10:05, which is a nice improvement over last time.

My breakouts (and comparable from June's race of 1:12:33):

• Swim: 7:24 (8:08)
• T1: 2:33 (3:00)
  
• bike: 30:27 (31:25)
  
• T2: 1:20 (1:40)
• run: 28:21 (28:20)

So with the exception of the run, I was improved all around! The funny thing is, I've done more running than anything else since the last time I ran the race. I actually think I ran faster this time, but I paused about 30 seconds into the run to stretch out my right calf which was cramping up after the bike. Without that pause, it'd have been improvements across every single area. Woohoo!

My color commentary on the day:
As I prepped my transition area this morning at Tri for Fun #3 under a beautiful pink and orange sunrise out in Pleasanton, CA, I found myself wondering how in the heck did it get to be August 16 already?!

No matter how time had flown, it was still time to race. I'd done my first Tri for Fun in June (race report here) so today's would be a good way to gauge just how much I'd improved in the last 60 days. I can't say I'd spent the whole 60 days prepping for the triathlon. In the meantime, I'd trained for and summited Mt Whitney (14,495'), taken a 2 week road trip vacation and kinda fallen out of a disciplined approach to improving my times.

As always, the race was well-organized with check-in and transition setup going smoothly (for those of us who got there before 6am). The Shadow Cliffs lake level was lower than ever, attributable to how little rain we've gotten this year, but it was still no-wetsuit-needed warm and mostly clear.

According to race organizers, there were 1,000 of us on the course this morning, split out into six waves (competitive, M16-39, M40+, F16-39, F40+ and relays/others) departing at five minute intervals. And just like last time, there was a very congenial attitude amongst the "competitors" with a warm welcome for the hundreds of first-timers doing the race.

I'd been steeling myself for a hot run (yes, even at 8am) but temperatures were quite comfortable even as we hung around cheering for late finishers past 9am.

Changes I'd made since running last race? I resolved not to take the long outside lane in the swim, I'd gotten a one-piece trisuit and I'd purchased a number belt. I also resolved to push harder on the bike and not walk up any of the hills on the run course (a bad habit I'd formed on the last Tri for Fun).

And in doing all the above, I managed to shave 2.5 minutes off my June time, and I'm rather proud of my improving in each area (calf cramping during the run aside) instead of taking out a big chunk in a single discipline. On top of all this, I posted negative splits for the bike and the run, so I think I'm developing good habits there, too.

My competition:
Of the three of us (Thom, Neil and me), I still came in last, but felt more respectable than last time as our times were closer. I also posted the best bike time of us three even though they both have Aero bars and I do not (still haven't installed mine), so just watch out when I get more aerodynamic!

Shadow Cliffs Tri for Fun Maps:
I saw a lot of traffic came to this site after my June race report looking for maps of the course. Good news for those searchers: I wore my Garmin 305 for the bike/run legs this time, so I have the map data as well as some good data to analyze re: heart rate and pace.

The Bike Map
Bike leg goes clockwise around this route with an out-and-back in SE corner


The Run Map (explanation below)

The run leg follows the jeep trails on site and goes in somewhat a clover shape that starts at the green pin, goes by Heron Pond and then cuts SE down around the Arroyo del Valle loop, back by the Heron Pond to do the NW loop and then all the way down to Arroyo del Valle again before heading along the Shadow Cliffs Lake shore to the red pin finish.

Next time?
Unfortunately, I'll be out of town for the Tri for Real race. I'd really like to see how much I could improve on that one over this, but it's not to be. I'll just have to wait for Tri for Fun #1 in 2009 on my way to doing my first half Ironman.

Mt Whitney training hike results: A-OK

Last night, our Mt Whitney summit team (minus one) did an overnight training hike up at Squaw Valley, USA by climbing to the four peaks that ring the Squaw Valley ski area.

I'm happy to report that the team passed the hike with flying colors.

We left the Bay Area at 8pm and arrived to Squaw Valley at midnight. We donned our boots and packs and headlamps and started hiking through the smoky pitch black up to the top of KT-22.

After bagging our first peak at KT-22, we traversed over to the top of Headwall, then across snow fields in Siberia Bowl to Squaw Peak and the Siberia Ridge and finally ended at the marker for Emigrant Pass before walking down the main jeep trail back to the Valley floor over 2700 feet below as the sun was coming up in the East (pictured above).

Why this overnight hike? I'd done the exact same training hike last summer in preparation for my first trip to the top of Mt Whitney. The training hike helped me get over my jitters that I could hike all night long (I can) as well as tested my ability to do the elevation gains and losses during the extended travel. From the sounds of it, the rest of the team appreciated being able to hike overnight, too... it was a first for everyone (and I hope not a last).

The wildfires all over Northern California made it a very hazy/smoky hike, though not to the extent that our lungs were bothered. The weather was surprisingly warm all night, yet we still had several snow fields to hike across on our adventure. In all, the team did a great job of pushing through and gaining the confidence we'll need for our single-day, overnight assault of Mt Whitney on July 11.

Personally, though... WOW, what a difference a year makes! Whereas last year I was near the beginning of my current health kick, as of today, I can say I'm now in great shape. While I struggled last year with some of the ascents at Squaw (especially from KT-22 to Headwall) with a lot of stopping and resting, this year felt like a walk in the park. Thanks to twelve months of endurance training for triathlons, my cardiovascular endurance is 1000 times better, as is my muscular strength, and I'm carry 35 pounds less on my frame than last year on the same hike.

All this has left me positively giddy about the physical progress I've made.

Most importantly, I feel like the trip up Mt Whitney in less than two weeks won't tap me out like it did last time when I bonked in the last couple miles on the return to the cars. Since I'm leading the group this year, I've got to have extra energy in my tanks to handle anything unforeseen.

And if last night's hike is any indication, I've got those reserves in spades. Can't wait to make it to Lone Pine on July 10 and the top of Whitney on July 11 at dawn!

Tri for Fun Pleasanton race report

Triathlon number two, the Tri for Fun of Pleasanton, CA, is under my belt, and I think I'm hooked. For this race, there were no timing chips distributed, only a clock overhead at the finish line so you can eyeball your time and subtract out your wave start to get the total time.

I managed to finish the 400m swim, 11 mile ride and 3.1 mile run in 1:12:33 which is better than the 1:15 I was aiming for, but I think with a little more work, I can pull it closer to the 1:05 mark by the time the August race rolls around.

I wore my Timex watch to capture the splits plus or minus a second or two and they fell out like this:

• Swim: 8:08
• T1: 3:00 (!)
• bike: 31:25 (avg 21.1 mph)
  
• T2: 1:40
• run: 28:20 (9:40 per mi)
  

The good: The swim went much better this time than last. I was a lot more comfortable in the water, and had a nice stead stroke throughout even though I took the long way around hanging on the outside of the pack. The bike was definitely my strongest and a big improvement riding my Felt instead of the K2. Happy I averaged over 21mph and with aerobars, I'll go even faster next time. Only two walking episodes on the run and these were on short uphill sections when others were barely moving faster while they were "running" up the hill.

The bad: My T1 time sucked, plain and simple. I didn't even have to wrestle with a wet suit! I do know I spent a good 30 seconds trying to get my tri shirt on, which is something I struggled with in my first race, too. I've got to work on my run pace to get that down (no walking!) and make sure I leave more of me on the race course. I again crossed the finish line (overtaking someone in the last 100 yds) with some energy left in the tank. Better planning will mean I push harder longer and bring my times down.

For next time: Several things I plan to do before the next triathlon on August 16, one of which is already done:

• swim: work on the open-water swim and sighting techniques
  
• T1: I stopped by Sports Basement yesterday and used my 20% off coupon to buy an Orca one-piece tri suit and a race number belt to chop a good 40 seconds off my T1
• bike: install my aerobars and train with them
• T2: practice dismounting technique
• run: work on my increasing pace and continue to increase endurance

Still, I had a great time yesterday and enjoyed the camaraderie of Thom and Neil and the friendly competition between us three (Thom finished ~4 minutes ahead of me and Neil finished 30 seconds ahead). I know we'll push each other in future races, too.

I'm also so very proud of a couple of my triathlete coworkers, Linda and Dimple. Not two weeks after dismounting at the end of the 570+ mile ALC bike ride from SF to LA, Linda showed up in Pleasanton with a strong showing in the race. And Dimple notched another achievement by competing in and completing her first triathlon. I'll find out Monday if Dimple's going to become a repeat racer like Linda and I. In any case it's great to work with folks like these.

Now, it's time to focus on making it to the summit of Mt Whitney on July 11.

biking: my hill climb workout

Thanks to my Garmin Forerunner 305, I'm able to graphically enjoy the results of yesterday's hill climb up Kings Mountain Road in Woodside.

The graphic below shows heart rate v elevation as I climbed from near sea level here at the house to just over 2100 feet up at Skyline Drive.

The first plateau (mile four, at 350 feet) was my cycling through downtown Woodside before starting up the hill. Then it was four miles and 40 minutes of 7% grade to the top before screaming down again.

Seeing my hear rate stayed in the 150s on the climb shows me I likely could have pushed a little harder on the way up, and I'm glad to see the recovery on the ride down put me around 100bpm.

While my legs were definitely fatigued by the time I made it home, I didn't really feel all that sore afterwards (happily).

And this may have been my last training ride on my current bike (a K2 Astral 4.0 hybrid). I've got a chance to pick up a 2007 Felt Z35 road bike at a great price today from a local bike shop. I did a short test ride on it yesterday, and I'm smitten.

best triathlon training books

I just got a package from Amazon with my latest triathlon training library additions, and I can't wait to dig in and learn how to take my training to the next level.

I feel like I've got a solid fitness base to work from, so now it's a matter of learning how to take it to the next level (especially if I'm going to aim for a half-Ironman by 2010).

So what's new on my reference shelves? These three paperbacks:

• Joe Friel's Triathlon Training Bible (2nd Edition) which picks up where his Your First Triathon book leaves off. It's packed full of great advice on setting training schedules, planning for the race and dealing with the mental aspects of triathlons.


• Gale Bernhardt's Training Plans for Multisport Athletes: Your Essential Guide to Triathlon, Duathlon, XTERRA, Ironman, and Endurance Racing which has a variety of plans to fit all kinds of time frames for all kinds of races. Will come in handy when I finally pick the date of my 70.3 race and have to fit a training schedule to match the time left before the race. Given how well I responded to Friel's first tri training schedule, I know Bernhardt's book is going to be great.


• Todd Down's The Bicycling Guide to Complete Bicycle Maintenance and Repair: For Road and Mountain Bikes (5th Edition) which will help me keep my bikes in shape whether it's the one I'm racing in the tri or the one I use to commute to work.

Lots to learn, and I'm glad to have the resources on my shelves now.

my first triathlon - split times are in

So, the official results of my first triathlon are in. I've known for a week that I finished the race in 1:55:42, coming in 282nd of 385 racers. That felt pretty good, all things considered. Way above the last one in.

So, here are my splits (and how they rank among the 385 competitors):

• 1/2 mile swim: 0:16:44 (279)
• 13 mile bike: 0:55:17 (277)
• 4 mile run: 0:43:41 (273)
• Total: 1:55:42 (282)

In looking at the times, I'm assuming the transition times are included in the leg that follows, since by my bike computer, I know it only took me 48 minutes to ride the course, and it took a while to get from the lake to the transition area.

But when I'm stacked up against my age group, I came in 40th of 42. Meh.

I take comfort in the fact that guys from my age group placed 2, 3 and 5 in the overall race, so it's a competitive bracket. If I think it's going to get easier as I get older, I'm sorely mistaken, though. The 40-44 bracket is almost as big as my 35-39 group, and I'd have placed 32nd of 38 in with the same time in the older bracket. (It seems I'm not the only one discovering triathlons are a great way to get and stay in shape.)

At least now I've got my baseline from which to get better, no?

Oh, and I caught the Ford Ironman 70.3 Florida Triathlon on TV this week. Inspirational stuff, and I think I've set my sights on doing something that distance in a couple years :^).

my first triathlon - the run and the finish

This is the last post covering my experience actual doing my first triathlon race, the ICE Breaker Triathlon in Granite Bay, CA, on April 13, 2008. See setup to swim to T1 and the bike and T2 for the first two installments.

Turns out I'd bested Thom by three and a half minutes on the bike leg. By now, it was 82 degrees and sunny, and the heat really started to get to me. At the first aid station (just 100 yards out of the transition area), I stopped and took on Gatorade and water. No need to try to drink and run at the same time (and spill most of the cup's contents), I could pause, drink, then go.

As I started running again, my calves felt like they were trying to cramp up. This was a new sensation for me after a bike-to-run transition. In previous bricks, it'd always felt like my legs were made of rubber and my thighs somehow weren't functioning properly. Never a problem with the calves... until today. Likely, it was due to the heat and my fluid intake. I was hoping it wouldn't get worse as I kept going.

The run path exited the nice paved sidewalk and entered the dirt path (cross country, oh fun!). By now, I'd picked up a running partner. Actually, he'd picked me up, coming up from behind and then passing me (barely). By the number on his right calf, I could see he was a 58 year old guy. On his left calf was a big red Ironman M tattoo. Was he an Ironman? A wannabe? Much to distract me as we ran, up until he pulled away from me after a little uphill section on the run.

By the time I hit the first aid station at mile 1, I'd been able to run through the tight feeling in my calves and by the time I entered the second mile (fueled on a little more water and gatorade), I was feeling in the zone on the run.

I'd done all my run training on the road, and here this was a trail run with a lot of little up-n-down hills. I wasn't used to all the little up-and-down roller coaster hills, and they started taking their toll, especially as we were running on what I assume used to be lake bed. In other words: no shade, hot sun, misery.

I started walking the up-hills because I could feel my temperature rising as my energy drained. Yes, I was getting passed by stronger runners (the top women racers were now catching up from their wave start). Every time I was passed, I tried to same something encouraging to the passer ("go go go!" or "nice running" or "keep it up!"). I figured I'd appreciate the same treatment if/when I passed anyone, and by now I knew I was going to finish this race, my first triathlon was almost over!

After the turnaround, I managed to keep in a pack of guys that took the same walk-the-uphills-run-elsewhere approach to the running leg with me, and we held together through the biggest hill just before mile 3 and through to the last aid station at mile 3.

Truth be told, the run went so much faster than I thought it would (in my mind at least, don't know about the actual time on the clock). Before I knew it, I had gotten to the end of the parking lot opposite the transition area with about 300 yards to run to the finish line. Lots of folks in their portable chairs along the course watching us sweat it out. More than one person said "I don't know how they do it!" as I ran past them... a nice pick-me-up as I knew exactly how I'd done it: months and months of training.

To motivate me to go a bit faster, when I saw the finish line and the clock above it still 200 yards away, I set my sights on the guy 50 yards in front of me as the one to pass before we finished. At almost a sprint, I pulled ahead of him with barely 20 yards to go.

As I ran across the finish line (hearing the announcer say "here's number 141, Thomas Kriese!") I looked up at the clock to see I'd managed to pull it all in under two hours. Soon I heard the screams of "Daddy! Daddy!" as my daughters caught sight of me crossing the finish line.

They weren't too crazy about hugging me as the sweat poured off, but they seemed happy to dance around (the long wait for daddy to finish was over). My lovely wife wasn't so bashful about the sweat and gave me a great hug and kiss. She told me how proud of me she was, and I can't even begin to tell her just how important her support of me has been these last months. Her making the space for me to train (I tried my best to do things early in the morning while they all slept) allowed me to be fully prepared for the race. I couldn't have done it without her.

And as I looked around to see where Thom might be, there he was, right beside me grinning ear to ear. We exchanged congrats as I began to wonder, did he pass me on the run? How could I have missed him? Maybe when I stopped at the aid station at mile 3?

Turns out I'd beaten Thom by 30 seconds. I'd put enough distance between us on the bike to squeak out a win overall. It was a bit of a hollow victory though, as Thom had muscled through whatever had ailed him during the swim and was hampered by an inability to catch his breath the rest of the race (Thom got checked out by a doc, and we suspect he had a swim-induced pulmonary edema - SIPE). I know if he hadn't been hampered with SIPE, he'd have beaten me easily. Still, I appreciate him letting me best him in my first triathlon (this was his fifth).

So, I've done it. My first triathlon is in the bag. I can call myself a triathlete.

And just like Joe Friel had promised in his Your First Triathlon book, by following his training program, I'd finished with a smile.

It's still just sinking in that I finally did it. Wow, my first triathlon. After six months of training, it's done.

Before I do my next one, I really have to work on my swim. Time to start training again.

my first triathlon - the bike and T2

Now that I can call myself a triathlete, I'm sharing the details of my first race with you so you can learn from what went well and what didn't as I completed my race. This post picks up where my previous post on setup to swim to T1 left off.

After clipping into my pedals, I started working my way up the gears on my hybrid K2 Astral 4.0 bike. While in college, I did a lot of bike riding, so this leg felt the strongest for me.

The course for the ICE Breaker Triathlon was two laps on twisty, rolling terrain with a lot of little 5% grade hills. The biggest challenge (as we'd all been warned) was that our cornering skills would be tested, and boy was that advice dead-on.

However, before getting into the twisty rolling portion of the ride, there was a flat straightaway that stretched out for about 3/4 of a mile. Perfect for a high gear push to get up to 24mph. As I was heading out and into my first mile of riding, there were already guys from the first wave of swimmers returning to start their second lap on the course.

I made sure to focus on keeping my own cadence and not get caught up on being passed by guys on tri bikes leaning over onto their aero bars. I set my sights on reeling in the bikers in front of me. By the time I'd reached the far end of the course, I'd managed to pass up a half dozen folks which was harder than it should have been due to all the twists in the road.

Shortly after the first turnaround, I passed Thom while he was still outbound (he did the race on a mountain bike... what a trooper!). After that, it was focusing on the road ahead of me while still noticing there were a lot more bikes on the road as the waves of racers entered into the bike course.

By the time I was on the straightaway heading back to the start of my second lap, the road was full of people racing their hearts out.

While drafting was forbidden per the race officials, it seemed there were a lot of loose interpretations as to how close one could follow without technically "drafting." Since there was no one looking out to make sure the no drafting rule was being adhered to, there were clumps of cyclists moving their way around the course. I guess if folks really were that set on getting a better time, they'll just have to live with themselves.

As I came around the bike lap turn around, I looked down to see that my bicycle computer was registering 80 degrees out on the blacktop.

The second lap was similar to the first in that I continued to get passed by folks on road bikes and tri bikes. The folks hunkered over their aero bars as they passed didn't bother me so much (they should have been passing me, no?), the ones on their road bikes bothered me a little.

As Thom put it, "if I hear 'on your left' one more time, I'm gonna scream." I still took solace in the fact I was continuing to pass others, both male and female as I made my way around the course on my last lap. So I got my share of saying "on your left" in, too.

While I worried a little bit about getting a flat, I wasn't so unfortunate as the four folks I saw cursing their luck as they peeled their tires off rims on the side of the road.

The only bad thing I saw was out towards the turnaround at the far end of the course, one of the volunteers was at the side of the road hovering over a racer who'd either crashed or collapsed on the side of the road (nowhere near a turn, tho). By the time I passed the spot on my return leg, the EMTs were on site checking her out more thoroughly. Thom told me that by the time he passed the scene, she was on a stretcher. Here's hoping she's ok.

After 47 minutes or so on the road, I sped back into the transition area to hear a very sweet observation: "and we have our first hybrid bike finishing!" (yay me!)

I coasted to a stop at my towel, threw off my helmet, changed into my running shoes (more Gu, more carbo-water) and exited through the run-out chute feeling pretty good. My T2 felt really fast.

The swim leg was long behind me, though not forgotten. The bike leg went well, and now just one leg was in the way of me finishing the race. I could walk from here and be able to call myself a triathlete, but I was going to run as far and as fast as I could. After all, Thom is a much stronger runner, and I'd hoped I'd put in enough of a gap between us on the bikes that he wouldn't catch me out on the run course.

I said I hoped, right?

Next post: the run and the finish.