Well, crap. It's been over two months since the actual race so lets see what I can remember.... first there was the part where I swam. Then.......... Wheels. Definitely wheels. Ok. Well, not important. Then I crossed the finish line and I felt... a great sense of... ? Wait. No. Fizziness? Yes. Ok. I am DONE.
This is going to be a clusterf**k of a blog, so unless you are doing something really boring right now, like work, I suggest you go waste your time elsewhere.
Where to start? Maybe with why I decided to do another triathlon?
Motivation
Last summer, after my first race ever (SF Half Marathon), I started training for my first triathlon, the Marin County Olympic distance triathlon, that's roughly a 0.9 mile swim + 25 mile bike + 6 mile run. I've been weekend-warrior cycling for years, and had just proved to myself that I could run 13.1 miles in less than 2 hours without stopping. For me, the bike and the run portion of this were already "in the bag", it was just a question of could I learn to swim athletically (i.e. sober and without a "Fun Noodle") and could I successfully wrap up the three sports together.
Ok, I wasn't a horrible swimmer. I'd grown up with a pool, and by pure coincidence I also grew up having lots of friends in the summer. It's so much of a coincidence that I don't know why I'm even mentioning it here. Those guys were just really busy come winter. So, lots of practice playing marco polo and perfecting my wicked cannonball. In 2000, I went scuba diving for the first time, and ended up getting certified and doing some more diving, though I have not been since 2002. What I'm trying to convey here is that, I'm pretty comfortable with the idea of being in and under water. That said, I don't think I'd ever swam more than two consecutive laps in my life. A 0.9 mile swim equates to about 32 laps in a standard 25 yard pool.
It turns out, I was a pretty horrible swimmer. Two laps of thrashing up and down the pool was about all I could manage before having to completely stop and pant for air. Over the late summer and early fall months, lots of practice and great coaching eventually honed me into a completely average swimmer. I got great tips from my TNT coaches and teammates and brother Danny recommended that I read a book called "Total Immersion", a kind of bare-bones "natural" swimming technique.I practiced twice a week either in a pool or in the Bay at Aquatic Park in a wetsuit. That. Shit. Is. Cold.
In the fall, I also learned the basics of triathlon-ing. Nutrition/hydration planning, smart transition planning, essential vs. excessive gear, race psychology, injury prevention and most important of all, do NOT look down at your watch the second you cross the finish line, it makes for a really shitty picture. Not matter how shitty you feel, throw your arms up in the air, or pump your fists or do a Charlie Chaplin jump or something. I think for my next race, I will stop right before the line, turn around and moonwalk to victory.
I went into that race super confident of my ability to finish, and to finish well. I had set a personal goal of under 3 hours, and met that goal. I even beat my brother's personal record for the same distance event by 1 minute!
Allright. So now I'm a triathlete, right? Yes, but even though I started out a crap swimmer, and had never done a triathlon, the relatively short distance of the event made me confident from the day I singed up that I would be able to finish it no problem. I'm not being cocky, just honest. I had already biked way more than 25 miles and had run more than 6. I knew I could do it. I just needed to learn to swim.
In the course of training for these things you end up talking to people who have done harder events and I invariably end up thinking: That sounds crazy, but I bet I might be able to do it. I knew from early on that I wanted to do another tri, and I wanted it to be a distance and course which would make me nervous to sign up for. I decided to do another training season with TNT, and sign up for the Wildflower 70.3. The training was long and intense and fun and frustrating but that's not what this entry is about. It's about THE RACE.
Wildflower 70.3
What the hell is a "70.3"? It's how many miles of suffering there are in a Half Ironman distance triathlon:
- Swim: 1.2 miles
- Bike: 56 miles
- Run: 13.1 miles
Races which are not official "IronMan" branded races are usually called a "70.3" or a "Long Course". So this is roughly double the distance of the bike and run from my triathlon in the fall, with a slightly longer swim.
The Wildflower Triathlons have been going on since 1983 and are held at Lake San Antonio in the California Central Valley. In addition to the "Long Course" they also hold an Olympic-distance event and a mountain-bike sprint-distance tri. The long-course and sprint are held on Saturday, the Olympic event on Sunday.
"Known for a particularly hilly and grueling course, it is one of the largest triathlon events in the world, with 7,500 athletes and 30,000 spectators attending each year. "
Seriously folks, there were a lot of people there. The closest lodging to Lake San Antonio is over an hour away, so most athletes and spectators end up camping for this event. Imagine a huge tent-city, with multi-thousand dollar bikes locked to trees and lots of people in spandex milling about. It's called the "WoodStock of Triathlons". Yeah, maybe if everyone at Woodstock went to bed at 9pm.
As a quick side-note; About a month before the race, I'd gone down to camp in Lake San Antonio with my training group for a "Training Weekend". We went down to preview the race course, doing the entire swim and bike course on Saturday (in the pouring rain), drinking all Saturday night, then running a half marathon the next morning. If I had to pick a fourth sport for my triathlon training teammates, it would have to be keg-standing. I will be referring here and there to "Training Weekend". Just want to keep you guys up to speed.
Course Description:
Yes, there is a hill on the course called "Nasty Grade".
Preparation: Day/Night Before - Friday April 29th,2011
Friday morning I spent packing and re-packing and checking my bike for any last minute mechanical issues. I was still in SF and had time left to hit up Sports Basement for gear and a tune-up if needed. The night before my last triathlon, I was all packed and went over to look at my freshly tuned-up bike, the wheel wouldn't spin. Broken spoke. Luckily, sports basement was open for about another 10min, and fixed my wheel. For Free. I love those guys.
Ok, so I'm totally neurotic about most things in life and I am also extremely forgetful. Imagine me packing three sports worth of gear and camping supplies for a weekend. I would no sooner pack something then convince myself that I didn't exactly remember whether I had packed it or not, and end up unpacking to find out if yes, I did bring an EXTRA set of goggles. Yeah, with the exception of my bike, helmet, wetsuit and bike shoes, I brought an extra set of everything. You know, in case I forgot something even though I packed it 5 times, or what if something breaks, or what if someone else forgot something and I'll save the day, I don't have OCD. Extra sunblock, gloves, running shoes, running hat, tire levers, tubes, sports drink/gels, bottles socks, even an extra tri-suit. This last one is not totally unwarranted, as during one of my team practices in a pool I suffered from a "critical apparel malfunction". Chris's bare ass, meet 50 people. 50 people, Chris's bare ass.
My Ass.
I packed the extra gear into a second bag and my main gear into my fancy new tri-bag. It's basically a big duffel bag that will fit all your tri-gear, has separate pouch for wet stuff, and has backpack straps and metal support rods so you can ride your bike to/from the race start. This model in particular folds out into a functional transition spot, or so the dude selling it told me. More on that later.
OK. So, we're all packed up. I go pick up Kara and the rest of our camping gear, we meet up with my teammates Chris, Molly, Mike and Kyle and leave SF, a nerdy caravan of cars with bikes strapped to them. It was a nice day for driving, and my personal excitement really started to build for the race as we got closer, seeing tons of other vehicles all loaded up for the race. And once we turned off the 101, we were treated to 40-ish miles of hilly bucolic beauty. I seriously recommend going to Lake San Antonio.
A = Latte Drinkin' Commies and Mom-Jeans. B=Middle of Nowhere.
We arrive at the park around 4pm, I think. We find the TNT campsite, and start unloading. This is the same campsite we had for training weekend but it looks totally different. For that weekend it was just us bay-area TNT chapters. The park was empty otherwise. And it was pouring rain and everything was cold and muddy. Now there are thousands of ppl. Everywhere. Every other bike I see is the fanciest damn bike I've seen in my life. And it's warm outside. Sunny and warm. Kara and I unload, set up our tent, lock my bike to a tree, and then a group of us walked down to the race expo to pick up our registration material. The race expo, lines the finisher's "chute" and is set up in a parking lot, overlooking a lower parking lot, where the transition area is. For you non-triathlete folks the "transition area" is where you park your bike and change from one stupid outfit into another.
We grab our race materials; race-bib, stickers with your bib number for your helmet and bike, event tech-shirt, and a bag full of swag that everyone throws away. Ooh a bite size serving of BRANDNEWEXTREMEENERGYPRODUCT. I spent a few minutes looking at the expo booths, and then walked down to the transition area and over to the boat ramp which would serve as the starting line of the race, and the "swim out" chute that went back into the transition area. They hadn't set up the swim buoys yet, but I got a good look at the water and made a mental note of which direction I would be swimming and turning so I could pre-visualize that part of the race before I went to bed. During training weekend, we had done our practice swim in the lake, but not exactly in this spot. We returned to the campsite, Kara made dinner and we sat around chatting with teammates, my friend and teammate Chris Ham made a joke that he was going to rudely spectate and scream insults and obscenities at our team, rather than words of support. FORESHADOWING. I drank a bunch of water, until it was time for me to try to get some sleep, maybe 9pm. Some people who weren't racing until Sunday, or who weren't racing at all (coaches, support, spectators, etc.) stayed up later, but I would say the entire camp was eerily silent by 10pm.
Come get away from it all.
I layed down in the tent, and mentally walked through my entire race day, step-by-step. Tomorrow morning I will wake up at 5:30am. I will get out of the tent and start boiling water for tea. Etc. Etc. I will cross the finish line. I'm not sure if I slept or not. I knew that I was dreaming at some point in time, but it was an active observation within an dream... you know, where you're like hmmm i'm still awake oh wait, what I just thought about can't possibly exist ergo I must be asleep.
I woke up at 5:30am. I got out of the tent, and it was still pitch dark outside, not a hint of light on the horizon yet and I'm the only one in the camp who is awake. It's strange being the first one up. I fumble over to my car to get out our camping stove and breakfast materials. Start the pot boiling, earl grey tea for me and coffee for Kara. Kara wakes up and starts making me my standard pre-race meal: avocado on bagel, banana. Except for that when I make the avocado on bagel, it is exactly what it sounds like and tastes rather bland. When she makes it, olive oil, salt, pepper and lemon juice magically appear IN the avocado. So good.
This may be TMI, but one of my primary concerns during the morning of a race is to get any bathroom responsibilities out of the way as soon as possible, which is why I always get up super early for races. Get the biological out of the way, and you get more time to prepare mentally. Sounds weird, but it's how I feel.
Next, I change into my tri-suit put on sunblock layer #1 and apply Body-Glide in places where I cannot apply in public at the transition area. I'm talkin' nether-regions, folks. I'd like to personally thank the folks over at Body-Glide for keeping me chafe-free.
Thanks!
Around 6:45am, the camp is at like DEFCON-8, people running everywhere in spandex and wheeling bikes around, everyone having a really low-grade flip-out. It's a strange sight to see this in a campsite. My wave started at 8:30am, and I wanted to get down to the transition area at least an hour early to get my transition set up and still have enough time to reflect/chill the fuck out. My race plan was to walk my bike and gear down to transition, about a 20 minute walk from our campsite. I was hemming and hawing over the time lost when my teammate Lauren was like "Well, I'm riding down now." I threw out that part of my pre-visualization and strapped on my tri bag and bike shoes and rode down to race start. It's a super dangerous ride down, because a) it's downhill, b) everyone has just woken up and c) everyone has a massive backpack on.
Transition Setup
I get down to the transition area and find my rack. This transition area is out of control. It's so massive. This picture shows the left HALF of the area:
I'm not in this half, so don't even bother.
I finally find my rack, and hang my bike by the nose of the seat. Two bikes down from me there's a late 70s/early 80s steel road bike. It wasn't all done up, it wasn't anything special, it honestly looked like someone had bought it off of Craigslist and gotten a tune-up. With all the surrounding spandex, hi-tech gear, carbon disc-wheels, aero-helmets and electrolytes, it just seemed so out of place but also seemed to be pleasantly mocking everything. Like it was saying "Look at me, I am ALSO a bike." Anyway, kudos to whoever rode that.
Bike racked and tri-bag unfolded into "transition mode" I realize that while this tri bag could certainly be used as a transition area, it was way too big for the personal area for which we were allotted in this race. The area that you get to keep all your gear is basically what will fit underneath your wheel an not get in the way of the people next to you. So I unload the bag and stash it between racks and get to setting up my transition on a towel. What you want here is an easy and memorized system of how you dress and undress. Get out of the water, strip wetsuit, use secondary towel to dry off feet, grab gloves and sunglasses which are inside helmet, put on in that order, socks sticking out of shoes, put on socks, grab pre-opened gels out of inside of bike shoes and eat, put on shoes grab bike. GO. Come back, rack bike, kick off bike shoes, exchange hat for helmet, put on race number, eat gels inside of run shoes, put on run shoes, grab race bottle. GO. Something like that. It has yet to go that smoothly for me.
After my area is set up I go over to get body-marked. With a fat Sharpie pen they write your race number on both upper arms, on your left calf and your age on the right. Here, I made a slight mistake. You are supposed to tell them what age you will turn that YEAR, for me that would be 33. But I said 32. Oh well, it's still the same age group.
I head back to transition to apply more sunblock and low-and-behold, my teammate Chris Li is racked RIGHT NEXT TO ME. What are the odds of that. We trained together all season, I was CeeLo and he was CeeLi. We even had a rap worked out. I figured it was fate smiling on me, it wasn't until maybe the next day that I figured out that we were racked first by age-group and then alphabetically. Certain things just don't occur to you when you are less than an hour away from destroying your body.
I put body glide all over my neck to prevent wetsuit chafing, and then all over my wrists and ankles to facilitate getting the wetsuit on/off easier. Chris and I were both getting changed into our wetsuits and helped eachother zip up and gave eachother a wetsuit wedgie (this is a good thing).
Teammates Paul and Joe were also racked close to me, and in my age group. The four of us donned the powder-blue swim caps assigned to our age group and walked down to the swim start to watch the pro men and pro women wave starts. These people are amazing.
I walked from the swim start along the side "Swim Out" chute back to the transition area and walked straight to my bike. I looked for a few visual cues to help me find my spot for when I actually exited the water and hell was actively breaking lose. Ok, third row up from this gatorade thingy, and about 10 ft down from a smiley-face baloon some guy had tied to his spot on the rack. Done. Too bad I remembered none of this. I walked back down the ramp to the swim start.
Waiting to Swim
Joe, CeeLo, CeeLi, Paul pre-swim
After watching the elites kick off, it was time for the regular-people age groups to start. The age groups were set up with men going first, youngest to oldest in 5 year age ranges, i.e. Men 24-29, Men 30-34, etc. Then the women age waves, then the relays. My wave started at 8:20am, the first female wave did not start until almost an hour later. Worth remembering.
Our head coach, Samir Ghosh, seen in the left of this picture was walking around taking photos of all of us.
Awwww.
Lots of TNT folks everywhere giving high-fives and hugs. It's good to have friends at these events, it keeps your spirits high. :)
I watched the men 24-29, all in yellow caps, kick off, the second they were all in the water the next group 30-34A waded into the water to flood their suits and get a few strokes in. A couple minutes later the annoucer warned them to get out of the water and line up and 3,2,1 GO. And as soon as they were all in the water, I slowly walked down the ramp into about knee deep water, turned around and pushed off onto my back into the water. I pulled open the front of my wetsuit and flooded it. The water was WARM! Well, not warm, but wasn't cold at all. This was a marked difference from any other open water swim I had ever done. All of my open water swimming to date had been in the bay, which varies from cold to holy-shit. The exception was training weekend, we swam in the lake and it was just as cold as the bay. This was a welcome surprise! I swam to the end of the swim chute and back twice to get into the rhythm of my stroke. Then I waded out a little further and took a whizz. All triathletes whizz in their wetsuits, if you don't you're a prude. The race announcer called us back in and I walked back up the ramp, did a once over to make sure my Garmin GPS watch was ready to go and secure under my wetsuit, then checked that my timing-tag (looks like a house-arrest ankle bracelet) was both velcroed and bobby-pinned together and tucked under my wetsuit. Some of the dudes in the group crowded way up at the front waiting for the gun, I held back a bit in the middle of the pack. The way it works is that you cross a timing-strip when you cross into the water, so you aren't timed at the gun, but when you step over the timing-strip. Matters not to be up front, basically.
I had a minute left, time enough for some deep, controlled breathing and zoned out, listening to my breath.
3,2,1......
This is what it looks like. (2 waves before me)
SWIM!
I have no idea how to describe the feeling of a swim start in a triathlon. It's a mixture of "YES!", "NO!" ,"Shit.Shit.Shit.Shit.Shit." and "Hey, this ain't so bad." After the brutes up front pounded into the water, the rest of the sane gents and I casually walked/jogged into the water. As soon as I passed the timing strip, I dove in and struggled around a bit trying to find a strong and slow, deliberate stroke that would keep me moving forward while getting jostled around. My visualization included swimming through the initial confusion of 50 people swimming all over each other, start swimming fast to get some separation, then settling into a comfortable stroke. It's common in swim starts such as these to get kicked or slapped in the head. Luckily for me, no face shots but there was definitely a point when most of someone was swimming ON TOP of me.
I'm the one who is swimming.
You can see me a little better in this one.
As soon as I got past the lip of the swim start (seen above), I completely stopped in the water, floated and looked out to locate all the turn bouys, and committed their relative location to memory, put my face back into the water and promptly forgot.
My swim was great, a pure joy. As soon as I got past the cluttered swimmers around the first buoy (that weird triangle in the upper right of the photo), the pack really started to spread out. I had room all to myself and focused on slowing down my breathing to perfectly match my stroke. Right-Left-Right Breathe Left, Left-Right-Left Breathe Right. Every time I had a left-facing breath I was treated to an amazing view of big green hills and blue sky. The water even tasted good. Most of my open-water experience had been in the Bay, where if you accidentally gulp down some water, you end up retching. I found myself smiling while exhaling underwater. A couple times my sighting got off a little and I strayed from the ideal course while heading to a buoy... got a little too close to a volunteer on a paddle board once.
I had two physical interactions with other swimmers near the last turn bouy, one was funny, one a little scary. First, there was a swimmer next to me who was swimming at almost exactly the same pace, and our sights to the bouy must have been just a few degrees off because every 20 seconds or so we would bump into eachother... this happened 4 times in a row, the last time it happened he reached over and gently put a flat palm on the side of my ribcage and pushed me away from him. Ha. After getting to the last turn bouy there was a cluster of swimmers in my wave, slower swimmers in the previous wave and the super fast from the wave behind us, I got the to buoy and turned hard to align myself with the swim exit and slapped someone hard. I think in the face. We both stopped and looked at eachother. I said "Sorry dude" and he looked at me for a millisecond then kept on swimming. I guess it wasn't too bad?
After 1.2 miles worth of constantly moving, my arms were getting tired as I approached the swim exit. Now, I started to get nervous. The swim part was easy, gun goes off, you swim. Now started the part which required the gear, the food, the pacing and all the legs that my body could offer up. For once, I was sad to see my swim finish.
Swim Time: 38:08, about 1.88mph
Transition 1
A swim exit can be a challenging thing. You've just spent 38 minutes horizontal, and not using your legs much. You get to the exit and its time to stand, and all the blood rushes down to fill your legs and leaves your noggin' empty. You get dizzy, you fall, and everyone is just standing there cheering. This happened at my first tri. I swam up and as soon as it was too shallow to swim, I stood up and immediately fell back down. A teammate of mine exiting the water at the same time helped me back to my feet. This time around, I knew better. On the approach to the swim exit I kicked my legs like mad to try to get the blood flowing... go to the exit, stood up, pulled off my swim cap and started running up the ramp to thousands of people cheering (all for me, of course).
One down.
Make sweet love to the camera.
The view up swim exit ramp.
Some people were sprinting up the ramp, stripping their suits off while running. Others took their suits off right as they got out of the water. For me, I was still a bit dizzy and just happy to jog up the chute and see Kara and my TNT teammates.
I got up to the top of the ramp and into the transition area, and immediately started running for my bike... or.. wait... was this even my row?!? Fuck. Shit. Where's the smiley-face balloon. WHERES THE SMILEY FACE?!? A race-volunteer saw who had no doubt done this multiple times that morning and would do it 100 more times saw my confusion and walked up and said "What's your bib number?" "680". "It's right there, one row over." He points to the row, and I'm lined up perfectly with my bike, just one row over. And these are BIG rows, full of bikes, so theres no going under a rack or hopping over, so I run out of this row and into the correct one. CeeLi is there, wetsuit stripped and almost ready to get on his bike, I tell him I'll see him on the bike course and wish him luck.
I fumble through my transition. The wetsuit comes off easy but gets stuck on my foot, I get kind of dizzy and decide to sit to put on my shoes and socks. I see Kara waving and taking pictures. My transition rack was close enough to the spectator area to actually get some pictures. I'm feeling exhilarated but also totally blanked out in the head, I'm dropping stuff and I have to keep reminding myself that I'm working on a time budget. I eat some gels, check my watch, secure my helmet and walk my bike to the bike out, cross the mount-line hop on and head out, soaking wet and feeling a little spacey, but mostly allright. I hop on my bike, and think to myself, at least I remembered to leave my bike in an easy gear. Ready to ride.
T1 Time: 7:31
For an idea of just how fumbly I was, the T1 for my first tri was around 4min.
Is this a right or left hand glove....uhhhh
Do The Walk of Bike
Here's a really cool sped up video someone took of the bike portion of the race
I don't even know where to start with this. This bike ride was great and horrible. I don't have any pictures of me on the course, so I'll just try to summarize some key memories.
As I left transition, my legs felt great. They felt store-bought and brand new, and I would venture to say that they even had a fresh-car smell to them. My first thought on the bike was "why the *#*@! will my left cleat not clip in"?!? I'd checked everything out right before the race, how could I have some sort of equipment failure right now, this isn't fair, aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhCLICK. Oh, ok. Cool.
About a mile and a half into the ride, triathletes are treated to a roughly 1-mile, 300 ft climb. Time to make sure those legs actually work. I start passing people going up the hill, people who were faster swimmers, or slower people in earlier age groups. I remember passing an 18-yr old who gave me a look of "what did I get myself into?" when I passed him. 2 miles into a 56 mile ride is not a great time to be wearing that expression.
About 30min into the ride, I remember seeing the first of many triathletes by the side of the road, fixing flats. Having never fixed a flat in a race, I would hope that I would be able to remain calm and let the tire-changing pass through me, rather than getting upset over lost time. It's pretty easy to spot the people who are upset.
My god, did I see some beautiful bikes. This season, I replaced my old 2004 entry-level Fuji Ace (aluminum, Sora components) with a brand new Felt AR-4 Carbon road bike with Full Ultegra. I love it. So much. I saw custom tri-bikes that had to be over $10K, full disc-wheels. Most of these bikes I saw as they were whizzing past me. I occasionally passed people with these bikes, their owners wearing the tear-drop aero-helmets... laughing to myself. Only to be passed by a 55 year-old on an old beater. I got passed, uphill, by a guy riding a fixie!
I saw a few teammates on the course, passed CeeLi, got passed by Jeremy, who called me a "savage". I dropped my chain, and had to stop and fix it. No other mechanical issues, thankfully.
I only saw one wreck, but man it was a doozy. Part of this course, approximately mile 19 through 35, were on a long straightaway road, with rolling hills and a headwind. Traffic was not closed for this portion of the course. Somewhere along the middle of the ride, lets say mile 25, and huge black semi comes barreling down the road towards me. No big deal, it's on the other side of the road. It's going so fast that as it passed, the wind from it smacks my body. It honestly felt like a massive hand slapping my entire body. A mile or so later, I come to a group of about 5 stopped cyclists, one flat out on the road, some others who have obviously crashed standing around him, and a mess of 5 bikes on the road. Later I find out from Paul, who was ahead of me, that as this same truck had passed by a group of riders in front of him, the wind PICKED UP one of the guy's bikes, a super-light will full-disc wheels (very susceptible to cross-windes). It picked him up and threw him, caused a wreck.
So, everything had been going as planned. I was averaging one 20-oz bottle of sports drink per hour, and eating around 200 calories per hour. Assuming you are an average cyclist, you'll need at least 3 to 4 big bottles of fluid for a 56 mile ride. This is too much to carry, and the wildflower folks have set up water stops with "bottle exchanges". What this entails is a group of about 15 volunteers standing in the road screaming WATER! and GATORADE! and sometimes BANANA! with their outstretched arms trying to hand you something to eat or drink. You chuck your bottle to the side of the road and grab one from a volunteer. It's the only time I've felt cool littering. These water stops are all along the course, as well as the occasional porta-potty.
Ok, so I've got my fluid intake and calories accounted for. Then why do I not need to pee? Around mile 30 I stop at a porta-potty, in the middle of nowhere, set up next to an old bridge. A race-volunteer watches my bike, I go in and... nothing. My belly feels full of fluids, but no pee. This is not good. This happened to Danny during a race last summer, dehydration. What comes next; fatigue, muscle cramps, and confusion. I feel fine so I try not to flip, and just decide to drink a little extra fluid for the rest of the day.
The bike goes on and on, and I'm so distracted by how beautiful this ride is that at times it barely feels like I'm exerting myself. My body has to check in with me from time to time to say "Ow". The dreaded climb starting at mile 41 is fast approaching. A group of 4 riders pass me and they're drafting! Drafting in triathlons is illegal, and usually results in a time-penalty if you are caught. Not more than 2 minutes later a race officials show up next to me on a scooter, one driving the other with a clipboard and pin. They pull up next to the group and hang out there for awhile. I'm guessing they all got time penalties.
Mile-41: "Nasty Grade". Something like 1200 ft over 3 miles. It's really not that nasty. I just put it down in my easy gear and sit and spin. Every once in awhile I shift down, and stand out of the saddle for awhile to stretch my legs. I've done this climb before, during training weekend, and I know it's not that bad. I just have to accept that the hill is there, and it will be gone as soon as it's arrived. And since I've done this before, I also know there's a false-top near the top of the hill! As I was getting up to this false-top I heard another rider exclaim "Finally!". Only to be treated to the rest of the hill right around the corner. Somewhere around here was an old man dressed up in an Energizer Bunny costume, beating a drum.
It was in the climb out of this false-top that I had my first serious problem of the day. I'm climbing and start to stand out of the saddle then all of a sudden... my leg. What is that, what the hell, then BOOM muscle cramp in the back upper portion of my left hamstring. I very rarely get cramps and I've never ever ever had a cramp here. It feels like there is a tennis-ball sized lump of rock-hard tissue that has decided to rent out the inside of my leg. I damn near fall off my bike, get it over to the side of the road, and stop to stretch it out. A nice older guy riding by tells me "You're almost there buddy, you're almost there." If by "there" he meant "excruciating pain" then he was correct. I stretched it out for about two full minutes, got back on my bike, and it felt ok.
I was treated to amazing view at the top of the hill and a breathtaking descent. I'm a total wuss on downhills, as soon as my bike gets to about 30mph, my mom's voice enters my head "Chrrriiiiiissssss...!!" and then I ride the brakes.
I was in the last 5-10 miles that I started getting passed by first of the uber-fast women. For most of the race, I had passed a bunch of folks and had been passed by even more, younger, older, much older, but all men. It had started around my age, then moved up. Getting passed by my first 50+ age grouper felt great. So there I am, pedaling along and zoooom, this woman, who I had close to an hour head-start on, just bolts past me. Amazing. She was so fast.
The rest of the ride consisted of two smaller climbs and downhills and a whole lot of me worrying. What the hell was that cramp? This must be dehydration. Can I run a half-marathon after this? Will I cramp up again? I started to get mentally tired, some from worry, some from having not stopped moving for close to 4 hours. My legs, brain, shoulders and lower back were sore. I was ready to get off this wheelie thing.
The last part of the bike is a nice big downhill into the transition area. As I was flying down this hill, I felt totally deflated. I felt sluggish, which is NOT something you want to feel before running a half marathon. I talked myself out feelings of despair, refocused on what a beautiful day it was and reaffirmed myself that all the hard-training I put in would pay off.
I was directed by a volunteer to turn off the road, into the bike chute, where 20 other volunteers were screaming SLOW DOWN DISMOUNT SLOW DOWN DISMOUNT I came to a halt right at the dismount line, high-fived Kara, got off my bike and walked into transition.
Bike Time: 3:34:41, about 15.6mph average. Not bad for me. I've done similar length rides at closer to 18mph, but it was with much less elevation gain, and I didn't have to pace myself to run a half-marathon afterwards. I also didn't spent a ton of time down on my aero-bars, because I'm still a little shaky with them.
Bike in
High-five Kara
Happy to be getting off my bike
Transition 2
Remember my pal Chris Ham, joking about cursing me out? Yeah, that happened. The second I got off my bike, he's running along side the fence to transition screaming at me PICK IT UP YOU WORTHLESS @#*UR%*@U PIECE OF @#^!%$%!$ IS THAT AS FAST AS YOU CAN GO YOU @#@!$@#%. It was awesome. It made me super embarrassed and super happy at the same time. The rush of being back close to the spectators, Kara, teammates, and Chris screaming at me gave me my energy back. I was ready to do this thing. It could also be said that my mind and body were rejoicing that I had temporarily stopped exercising. Little bastards thought it was bed time. Suckers.
I walked my bike to my rack. More like "duck-walked". It's impossible to look normal walking in cleated bike shoes, much less after your legs have been jellified. I rack my bike, get rid of my helmet, gloves, and bike shoes and quickly switch into my run shoes and hat. I put on my race-belt to which my bib had been properly attached to. Not sure what happened but one of the holes on the bib had ripped, so I looped the race belt bib-hook dealy through one of the bottom holes on the bib. You will see in my pictures, that my bib is crooked. Oh well.
Before heading out, I stopped for a bit to stretch out my leg. I ate a gel or two, and grabbed my hand-bottle and took a swig of hot sports drink. Ugh. Made a mental note to remember to ice my transition bottles next time.
My legs were stiff but felt ok. I jogged out of transition through a huge screaming, cow-belling crowd surrounding the run out. I saw Kara and ran up and stole a kiss. Right next to the run out... stairs. REALLY GUYS? Stairs?
Run Out. Note the crooked bib.
T2 Time: 5:05, I am happy with that considering I got in some quality stretch time.
RUN.....!
While training for a triathlon you are supposed to practice what are called "bricks" or "brick workouts". These are basically back-to-back swim/run swim/bike or, more typically bike/run workouts. They are called as such, I am assuming, because you are stacking workouts like, well, bricks. This season someone on my team said they're called bricks because thats how your legs feel. Like bricks.
Getting off of a bike after riding for three and half hours, only to start running again is a unique feeling. Your lower back is tight from leaning over and your shoulders and neck are sore and cramped up; not a great starting point for good running posture. Then, there are your legs. Your legs and hip-flexors have been doing one specific set of motions for hours, and now you expect them to switch gears. Get up and jog 20 feet, now imagine doing the same thing where your hip flexors say AW HELL NO DAWG each time you you try to bring a leg forward. It can take a few miles to whip your legs back into shape, and even then, they feel like they are being held against their will.
I had been overly cocky about the run portion of this race. I was damn near convinced that I would run a sub-2 hour half marathon. I had run the Kaiser Half in 1:40, at a roughly 7:30min/mile pace. At my tri in the fall, I had run my 6 miles at less than a 9min pace. Surely, I could keep my pace below 9:15 and finish the run in less than two hours?
For me, the worst part of a tri is the bike leg. It's the longest leg and it's the most mental, for me, or so I thought. You have to worry about pacing, gear failure, crashing, etc. I had told teammates that I would be relieved to be starting the run, because at that point, the mental game ends and it's just pure physical suffering, and I could power through that no problem. This run may have been the most mental thing I've done.
By the time I left transition and started my run, it was after 1pm, and the sun was blaring down, it was probably in the mid 80s? The Wildflower run course is 13.1 miles consisting of about 60% trail followed by 40% road with virtually zero shade anywhere. And lots of hills. Of course.
As I headed out, I realized: "whoops, no sunblock again." Then I realized: "Still haven't peed since before the race started." Less than I mile in, I stop at a porta-potty and am able to produce only a few drops of urine. Not good. I had drank bottle upon bottle of sports drink and water but still seemed behind on my hydration. I got back on the trail and started running, choking down the hot, sickly sweet sports drink. Each gulp made me almost barf. This wasn't because I was sick, but because I was bobbing up and down and felt full to the brim with fluids and I was so so tired of sugary sweet sports products. I wanted salt.
I felt vaguely worried, but this worry was thankfully distracted by a number of factors. There was the heat. My god, it was hot and I was hot. I was covered in dried sweat crystals. Look for the white stains all over my tri suit in the pictures below. Then there was the trail... this was no super-sweet smooth single-track trail. It was an exposed, loose, gravely fire-road running along the lake, with lots of switch backs sudden, short hills. The still air combined with the constant assault by feet had created a haze of dust floating above the trail. It took extra determination to stay focused on keeping my footing. A fall would have been devastating to me, even if I just slipped on my ass and didn't hurt myself.
The next distraction was my GPS watch, which I looked at incessantly until I realized that a sub-2 hour run was totally out the question. My legs were bricks. My form sucked. I couldn't get into a good rhythm for more than a minute or two at a time. I opted for speed-walking a few of the steeper portions of the sudden hills, as did everyone else around me. I was having trouble even maintaining a 10:00min/mile pace.
The volunteers. So so so amazing. Most of the volunteers are 18-21 yr old fratty college kids from Cal Poly. Some dressed in costumes, some shirtless, most wearing the bright orange AVIA WIldflower shirts. There were a group of about 10-20 volunteers every mile for a waterstop, screaming and hooting and hollering and completely acting their age. I ran through each stop these guys and gals screaming WATER WATER GATORADE etc. Each stop I would grab a water and pound it and then grab another and throw it on my face or under my hat. The only water stopped I actually stopped at, one volunteer was holding a garden hose screaming WANNA HOSE DOWN BRO?!? Um. Yes. Each water stop promised some smiles across my face, a welcome distraction.
(Side story: about 50 of these race volunteers streaked through our camp's big dinner tent the night after race. Then ran in, and did about 10 laps around our tables before running out and terrorizing everyone else.)
The other racers. I got passed a lot on the bike. Every once in awhile someone passing me would say "Keep it up!" or "Great Job." Or if it was me passing, I'd say the same, or "Go Team." if it was someone in a TNT jersey. But, with the bike, considering the speed and the rules of no drafting or riding side-by-side, it's pretty hard to have much personal interaction with anyone. With running, you get time to say a few words, maybe get some eye contact. And even though my pace was slipping, I was passing quite a few folks, the majority of those passing me now being the super fast women. Somewhere in a more technical portion of the trail, I came up behind a guy with one leg. The other was a carbon blade leg attached about midway up his thigh. As I passed him I started to get a little teary-eyed and looked at him as I passed and panted out: YOUREAMAZING. He smiled and told me to keep up the good job.
The spectators and my TNT teammates. Around mile 7, the run course left the trails and got back onto to the road and headed through the main campsites which were full of spectators providing encouragement and entertainment for the runners. As I closed in on my camp, I saw a bunch of my teammates (well, those not currently racing) lined up, flipping out. I went for a running high-five, smiling ear-to-ear.
Fivez. See the sweat?
The rest of the race was a big painful blur. I was tired. I wanted to be done. I didn't care so much about finishing fast, since I had now lost my sub-2 run, but I wanted to be done as soon as possible, so I didn't want to slow down. Around mile 10, I entered "The Pit", a short portion of the run where you run down a hill, only to turn around and run back up it. Unfair.
Fake Smile #15426
Halfway down, some burly dude passes me and points at my hand-bottle and says "You're gonna wanna switch up hands on that bottle." I felt an exhaustion fueled anger come over me; how DARE this random guy tell ME what to do! I petulantly blurted out "I KNOW." He passed by and I realized that I had had this bottle strapped to my right hand for all of the run. I switched up my hands, and I don't know how to describe the feeling other than that my entire right arm and shoulder suddenly felt euphoric. It hadn't been bothering me at all, but the sudden relief of removing this weight made my shoulder feel like it had wings. Everything else still hurt like hell though. This shoulder-bliss lasted for about 20 seconds and then flew away.
Near the bottom I saw teammates Paul and Jeremy running together. Immediately, my new goal was to catch those dudes. I picked up my downhill pace, ignored the water stop at the bottom and started to head back up the hill.
I saw people breaking down left and right on the sides of the road, people stopping to stretch out cramps. People stopping to walk. I saw a guy trip over a pothole and land really hard. Trudging along uphill, with Paul and Jeremy in my sights, my cramp came back. It wasn't as bad as before, but I was sure in a worse mood than I had been. I stopped and stretched it out, cursing aloud. I walked for about 15 seconds, started running again. Over the next mile, I had to stop twice more. I was really in despair. I was worried that I wouldn't be able to finish, or that I might fall, and I started getting a little panicky. I thought about the guy with one leg. At least I still had both my legs, why should I complain so much? I thought about my high school friend and honoree Shane, who died of lymphoma. At least I still had my life. As I was running these thoughts made me grateful to be where I was, and I started crying a little. Emotions can seriously amplify when you are this tired. These thoughts passed after awhile and my brain turned back towards despair, when all of a sudden I had a large moment of clarity: "It's supposed to feel like this." This is exactly what I had signed up for, this challenge. I can honestly say that until this point, I had never felt so slammed against my own boundaries and limitations. This was it. I repeated over and over in my head "It's supposed to feel like this."
I got to the last mile of the run, which is entirely downhill pretty much all the way until you get to the finisher's chute. What a great way to finish a race. I concentrated on my footing, it was a pretty steep hill and with my legs having been replaced by stone columns, it would be easy to fall if I didn't pay attention. I was running an 11:00 min/mile. Downhill. I hesitate to call it "running", more like a "gravity shuffle". No sprint to the finish for me. It just wasn't going to happen. On the way down the hill, I knew I was going to make it. I reflected that, if this race were any longer, I likely wouldn't have made it. I had used up everything I had. It felt great, actually.
I got into the finishers chute, and tried to pick it up a bit. I saw some TNT mates and Kara in the bleachers cheering. They announced my name over the loudspeaker. I threw my arms in the air and crossed the finish line.
Run Time: 2:14:15, an average pace of 10:14min/mile
Total Race Time: 6:39:40, I had wanted to get under 6:30 for this race. I think had I not been suffering from dehydration, I could have shaved off 10 mins of my run, maybe done my transitions a little faster. Overall, I am pleased with my time.
Aw, Chute!
You mean I get to STOP?!?
Hit play. That's me in the purple, crossing when the race clock says 7:04:36
I got across the finish line in one piece. I was immediately handed a towel which had been soaked in ice-water. I was like "what the heck are you giv...ooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh." I was like a baby tasting cake for the first time "This... is... AMAZING!" Who the hell thought of this, you could make so much money selling wet cold towels to triath... nevermind.
Next, one volunteer threw a medal around my neck, the next held my leg in one place to remove my timing tag. I saw Paul and we shared a sweaty embrace, you can see that in the video above. I milled about for a bit, they had some free snacks, which I ate. Then I again remembered, I still haven't peed. I wanted to go to the med-tent and get an opinon, and went over to the bleacher area to find Kara. I was told that I would not be allowed to return to the finishing area (which is where the med tent is) once I exited. I was getting a little light-headed and delerious, and decided I would just go ask around at the med-tent, then find Kara.
I walked over, explained that I hadn't peed in close to 7 hours, despite drinking 7-8 bottles of fluids. They asked "Do you have the urge to pee?" Nope. That was enough and they sat me down, put an IV in my arm and hooked me up to a saline drip. Next to me was a guy in a stretcher moaning. He looked like he was having a full-body cramp. Minutes later, they bring in a big burly guy and he plops down next to me. Similar issues, couldnt pee, and is having a wicked cramp. We get to talking about the race, and ourselves. He was fresh back from Iraq. It's amazing how two strangers were immediately united by what we had just separately done. Oh yeah, remember that hill?!? etc. Anyway, 40 min later, I came to my senses and figured out that my girlfriend was probably flipping out. We had agreed to meet outside of the finisher's area right after the race. Right about then, I had to pee. They came and un-hooked the IV, I went to bathroom and went out to find Kara. She had asked around for me, and no one knew. She was minutes away from knocking on porta-potty doors, afraid I had died in one, when we found each other. I ate a large burrito AND a BBQ pork sandwich and sat in the grass with Kara enjoying the rest of the day. That night we had dinner, sat around a campfire and drank a bit, and went to bed. The next day we got up bright and early to go spectate the olympic distance triathletes.
Well. I think I'm done. To anyone still reading this, thanks!
BONUS SUNBURN PIC!
