Couples Sprint Triathlon – The Rabbit

Only one more race report to go to get caught up – and that’s from this past weekend and I’m still writing it!  Below is my recap for Couples Sprint Triathlon (July 14th)…

I had a pretty frustrating race here last year – while I love TRAINING with Joel, for me, racing side by side with someone is just not good times.  I really internalize, get into my head, focus… and Joel likes to talk to people, feed off the scene.  We both pace ourselves differently at different times.  And there’s nothing more frustrating than trying to race hard… and then have to wait for someone… and then have them outpace you 5 mins later… and then they have to wait for you…  We enjoyed starting together in the same wave, but said “never again” about trying to pace each other on the race.

Couple that (hehe) with the fact that while the knee is (slowly) getting back to normal, I was still feeling the effects of the lack of fitness from missing training, and I was only 14 days out from beating myself up hardcore for seven and a half hours at BSLT 70.3, and this is on my least favorite course pretty much in the world (Decker Lake and Walter E. Long Park… sorry, it’s not me, it’s you…), I didn’t expect much from this race.

This little airplane did have a few goals:

  • Swim in the same zone where I felt at Pfluger.  It’s my last sprint swim, let’s go hard!
  • Bike fast, and with the confidence I felt at BSLT.  Carnage is not a thing compared to that switchback at mile 35, but just to state the obvious, not getting off the bike and walking up that stupid hill.
  • Run smart.  Keep as fast a pace as possible while keeping my knee happy.  Run up that dumb hill instead of getting all angsty and walking up it like last year.
  • Keep my head in the game at all moments.
  • Beat Joel – if I can.  We will be racing head to head this time…
  • A Couples PR would be nice, but if I put together all the other goals and it doesn’t result in a PR, that’s ok too.

How did I do? Stay tuned….

Day before:

We had a fun day of packet pickup, queso and veggie tacos at Magnolia Cafe (questioned whether that was good pre-race food – but since it’s just a sprint, we went with it because it sounded good), saw Pacific Rim (AWESOME!!!), more errands, grabbing a turkey sandwich for dinner, batch cooking for the week ahead, packing up tri stuff, laundry, random other stuff, and all of a sudden it was 10pm when we went to bed. Badness.

Plus, I had to make sure and rest every hour or so when my butt muscle started to get sore so my body certainly wasn’t completely rested from the day before.  We definitely overdid it a bit.  One great thing about out of town races… you can’t do errands all day.  You are forced to just sit in the hotel room and have downtime.   Next Austin race, we’ll strive to do a little less (how often do you get to say that?).  10pm bedtime wasn’t as tragic this time because transition didn’t open until 6am, but I would have liked to be in bed an hour earlier and lots more relax time that day.

Morning of:

Got up, emptied well.  Yay poop!  Had a coconut chocolate cliff bar (yum), skipped my normal tea and just split Zliten’s energy drink with him, and got to the tri about 15-20 mins after 6.  We got a pretty awesome spot on the “Married” rack (you rack by division, and the divisions are by who you’re partnered with), and did our normal walking around (bathroom, car again, finding our friend B, other dithering around) and got down to the race start in time for the pre-race meeting (which we ignored, sorry Couples, I’ve raced Decker like 5 times now, I’m cool), and chatted with Brian and caught up on the happs since Pfluger.

We were able to get a pre-race swim, and I got in and, holy crap, it was total bathwater.  I MUCH prefer bathwater to freezy water, but it definitely was a contrast to 2 weeks ago in that gorgeous spring-fed 74 degree lake.  It was at least 84, the announcer pretty much said it was a million degrees and no wetsuits allowed period.  I got my stroke dialed in on the way out, did some race pace on the way back, and on the way out, stepped sideways and tweaked my knee a little.  SPOILER: this is the last time I’d think about my knee this race, so while that made me nervous, my body held it together.  Hooray!

Then, the race got going with the national anthem, cheering off the first wave, chatting more with B, eating chompies and beans (which I shared with Joel since his gel fell out while swimming), and then we BOTH were on double deck, which is nice (usually, every triathlete and their mother gets to do that, and then, I get in line), because “married, combined age under 70″ was wave 5.  We lined up, I earplugged up, got in the water, hugged and kissed Joel good luck (looooooove that part of this race!!!), got up in the middle near the buoys (figured, let’s go for it), and then the countdown started.

Swim:

The airhorn blew, I dolphin dived (first time, it just felt right) and got to hurting.  I swam over dude right in front of me, next person in front of him (apparently I should have started closer to the front), and kept that pace for a bit until it cleared and I was gasping.  I did my best to settle into uncomfortably hard (like PF), and concentrate on long, lean strokes.  The problem I had with amazing sighting skillz from BSLT “plagued” me here as well, but today it was a boon.  Since I wasn’t swimming with M dot people, I’m much more competitive against the local tri folks in the lake.  Before the first 1/3 was done, I swam over (sorry) caps from the previous wave (and apparently I swam over Joel too, oops), and I had convinced myself I was doing awesome.

I hit the turn buoy and all of a sudden, the concept of how to do a efficient and effective catch part of my stroke became completely transparent to me.  *Angelic Choir*.  I did not get swam over, nay, I passed about a billion people on the 2nd part.  I saw lots of caps from the previous wave (4 mins), caps from the wave ahead of them (8 mins), and I caught my first pink cap (12 mins).  I had to be on pace for a record setting swim (for me).  I didn’t see ANY of my cap color around and I decided to believe it was because I was way ahead of most of them.

I turned around turn buoy #2 (for the last third of the course), feeling pretty strong, and felt that thing that triathletes never ever ever ever want to feel on the swim… someone knocking my timing chip loose in deep water.  I grabbed my leg and tried to refasten it, and it just came off in my hands.  Well… crap.  At least I still had it.  I wrapped it around my right hand as best I could and swam.  Forever and ever from now on, I’ll use a safety pin to hold it on.

I won’t use it as an excuse, but I definitely felt the difference in my catch, which had just clicked a few minutes ago.  I felt like a one and a half legged woman in an butt kicking contest.  I did my best, still surrounded by caps of the waves ahead of me, only getting passed once, but I still left the water feeling stoked about the first 2/3rds and a little frustrated about the last 1/3.

Swim Time: gonna say 19:25 for 800m.  Since I didn’t have my chip on my foot, it didn’t record a swim, but a REALLY LONG T1.  I subtracted last years T1 from the total time of 23:23 (3:58) and got that.  It was under 20 for sure, and that’s at least TWO MINUTES better than last year.  I was hoping for closer to 16 when I entered the water, but that was unicorn and rainbow dreams on par with pool time pace.  If I had to guess, I think this course was a bit long (both years).

T1:

Jogged my butt up the hill, did my normal stuff, got out, and noted I was definitely “the rabbit” and I was going to lead the chase.  Joel’s bike was there, and I didn’t see him the whole transition or hear his name, so I just got out on the bike as quickly as possible to prolong the time until I would see him again. Mounting went fine, and I was off.

T1 time: estimated 3:58.  I don’t know, so I’m claiming last year’s time.

Bike:

I’m sure the “shoes on your pedals” trick is good for some people, but some lady on an expensive bike pedaled past me, then she struggled to get her shoes on, and I passed her, and I don’t remember seeing her the rest of the time.  Equipment and trickery only counts for so much.  I chomped a chomp, and got in aero and got going.

This course can be described, in a nutshell, as RIDICI-hilly.  There are very few flats – you’re either going up or down.  It’s only 11.2 miles, but there’s nothing easy about it.  After some mild uphills and downhills on the front of the course, you turn onto the side road (at the time – my average was about 16.5 mph).  You get more of these, and I did my best to a) pass everyone I could and b) stay in aero, since my little crutch of riding the drops didn’t work as the tape was falling off and startled me every time I touched it (note to self: FIX DROP TAPE and don’t ignore it like you have been for months).

I worked on being prepared for Carnage (sharp right turn into a stupid steep hill) by dropping down to little left gear and accidentally went down to little right gear too.  I started the hill with less momentum than intended, but after BSLT, I know what I had to do and just worked up it without the fear I’ve had each time in the past of falling over, and though it was crowded (out of my mouth came: : “on the…middle?” while passing two people) I made it and recovered and got up the next one, no big deal.

I leveled up a bit more in holding aero.  I spent a lot of time there as I have lately, but I also rode down quite a few hills in them.  I maxed out at 32.3 mph, which is usually Freaky Friday speeds for me.  Even with Carnage, about at the 2/3 point, I was at 17.5 mph. Super solid.  I kept looking back after this, figuring it was any minute that Joel was going to come up and fly by me, but it never happened.

However, the last few hills killed my pace.  I made it up double hill feeling pretty strong, and quad buster, but I think I just lost it a little bit from the last hill to the dismount line.  I just couldn’t get my legs going again and I think I mentally psyched myself out after being SO FREAKING DEAD on the run at the 70.3 two weeks ago, and I saved too much and spun too easy the last half mile and up the last little hill.  My speed at the dismount had amounted to just a 16.2 on the garmin, which, really, is not horrible, but I know I can do better.  It was a few seconds better than last year, so I was happy.

Bike Time: 41:56 (16.0 mph)  Better than last year by about 15 seconds.  I think I held back a bit because I was so scared of being as drained as I was off the bike in BSLT, but I’m pretty ok with this overall. I don’t do well on this bike course, and this is the best I’ve done here, I keep taking seconds off every time I ride it, and considering I’ve ridden my bike twice (indoors) in the last two weeks, I’ll take it!

T2:

I felt a bit of ye olde transition gravity here, got my stuff on (this time was an added degree of difficult – it wasn’t just put on the shoes, but also put on the visor and the race belt since I was running with my handheld and 3 things is officially too much to deal with in my hands), and got out.  I thought I might have seen Zliten on the bike coming in as I ran out, but still being the rabbit, I didn’t want to stay to find out.

T2 Time: 1:54.  10 seconds more than last year, but accounted for because of the handheld shenanigans.

Run:

I had felt pretty good on the warmup run (sans garmin, so no idea if my “I’m going fast, wheeee” was 11s or 9s), but when I got out, I was in the 9s and 10s and the legs and lungs were feeling ok.  The head seemed to be into it too.  Aight.  We’re all here.  Let’s party.

The problem with this course is that a) it’s just about all sticks and twigs.  I have a recovering knee injury.  Any jostling side to side last year would have been uncomfortable.  This year, it could be potentially race ending and b) I’m pretty sure they figured out how to rack up about 3x more uphill than downhill on this course and gave it to us triathletes on a course as a present with a bow.  Smiley face.

At this point, my run fitness was nowhere.  I didn’t have it.  Tyler’s not here.  Tyler gone.  All I can do lately in races is run by feel, pay very little attention to pace so it doesn’t piss me off, and keep my heart rate up where it should be.  I know that if my average HR is 178, I’m giving all I can, no matter what speed it is.  I pushed up, and then down the sticks, onto the grass, up the hill, and then on the down, I saw my pursuer the first time this whole race.  HE WAS SO CLOSE, like a tenth of a mile away.  I dug in and pushed with every ounce of run-up-the-hill I had.

I got into the woods and just knew he was going to pass me with that stupid grin on his face (which I love, obviously, but this is a race, and I’m competitive…) and be going a speed I couldn’t match.  I wanted to prolong that as long as I could with every fiber of my being.  I wasn’t going fast (remember: fitness gone) but I wasn’t letting up.  I hit mile 2 and I wasn’t caught yet (looked over my shoulder at least 10 times as people came up behind me), and got some good momentum on the downhill (though I did go slower than I might have before the knee thing) and then I hit the turn which started the part of my course that infected my nightmares.

I turned, threw my visor down low, and started chugging.  It wasn’t nearly as bad as I remembered.  Then I looked up and it was the turn before the turn, and I was running away from the race course.  Ha!  Pushed my visor up a bit, turned the NEXT corner, and then it was go time.

This was my test.  This is a huge, about half mile, extremely steep run hill.  In most race situations, I’d justify walking this.  However, how can you justify walking on a 5k (nevermind it was preceded by a 800m swim and 11.2 hilly ride)?  I chugged.  And chugged.  And chugged.  I had almost convinced myself that walking would be better until I noticed that I was passing all the walkers (some in my age group) and that it was PAIN LIKE THE FIRE OF A THOUSAND SUNS but somehow I was able to take it and keep going and didn’t die.  And any minute, Joel was going to pass me anyway because he’s better at hills, so I kept working at it like a bike hill.  Walking equaled unclipping.  No unclipping here.

Somehow I emerged at the top and hit pavement…. ahhhhh, delicious pavement.  I went from the 13-14mphs I was doing up the hill to 9-10s as my feet FINALLY got some traction and I saw the finish line.  I was not going to let Joel beat me here, so I ran, then sprinted (ok, so real standalone 5k pace in the 8s, but OMG FELT LIKE SPRINT) through the finish line.

Run Time: 33:58 (10:57/mile). 30 seconds slower than last year but also WAYYYY more consistent splits (11:20, 11:09, 11:30) and also not nearly as slow, in comparison, as Pfluger this year (2 mins slower).

Total race time:  1:41:13.  All my goals for this race are met.  1.5 minutes faster than last year, and my brain was in a much better place the whole time.  The rabbit was never caught, as I cheered Joel into the finish a minute and a half after I crossed.  I’m back, baby! :)

 

(2587)

BSLT, Or How Training in Austin is Great!

lilbslticon

 

We made it!

2013-06-30 16.07.59

Here is the long recap of not just the race on Sunday, but the time leading up to and back from the race.

Thursday: We had everything packed and in the car by bedtime Thursday night. I had worked a long day and knew that I had a ton of work to squeeze in Friday. Once it was all packed and loaded in we went to bed, nothing too exciting but it is strange to get everything race ready 4 days before a race.

Friday: Work was crazy as I anticipated, I had way too much work to do, and not all of the deliverable s to me, It was also a “half day” of work and the other half was our fun day at the new driving range across the street. So for as aggravating as the first part of the day was the second part of the work day was nice. It was a catered lunch, then we sat down and played a board game with some co workers (It was Betrayal at House on the Hill), Then we went out and hit 20 or so golf balls each. It was a fun driving range, each ball was chipped and you swiped your player card at the tee, so it knew what ball belonged to what person. The monitors would show where your ball landed and score your shots.

Next we headed back to the office to get my pain killers, since I had half a root canal just a few days before. Nothing crazy just Ibuprofen and Acetaminophen over the counter.  We got in beastly hit up a gas station and filled him up, grabbed 2 big cold waters and got going. We stopped at a DQ near gold-withe and had a chocolate cherry blizzard. We stopped in Post to use the bathroom. It looked like a nice little Texas town.

Once we got to Abilene we found the hotel, checked in then went to red robin where I ate my favorite burger of all time, the banzai burger! I also might have eaten a basket and a half of fries… So fat feeling but awesome by the end. On the way back to the hotel I saw a used game store and stopped in, picked up a new dance game and a movie quote type game. Then I had us take 1 more stop at the Target right across from the hotel, to walk around and help the digestion. Thankfully we did since we found sunscreen on sale and we needed some.

Back at the hotel we dorked around a bit with the tablets and talked about going to the hot tub. When we got up the guts to go hit the hot tub it was a bunch of teenagers in it. It wasn’t the warmest and it had some sort of brown growth at the bottom. Needless to say we got out, I showered then we attempted to sleep.

2013-06-29 11.16.05

Saturday: There was breakfast included at the hotel, so I grabbed some eggs and french toast sticks of doom, loaded up Beastly again and got back on the road. I took a wrong turn and we got on the wrong highway, for about 10 minutes before we figured it out. So we went back and got going the right way. This part of the drive was very pretty, lots of clouds, some lightning and lots of rain. We stopped for a bathroom break in Post, then kept on going to Lubbock.

I was a little anxious to get to packet pickup and then go check out the course, it was about 1 when we got to the packet pickup hotel, and it wasn’t the nicest hotel, so glad we didn’t stay there. Also packet pickup was supposed to open at 11, but it got delayed until 1 so there was a good line to get everything. After getting all the stuff we walked around the expo. I found the tri top I wanted, and it was 25% off, so I bought it. The booth was from Lane 4 Swim, that is just by our house back home, but I never thought to look there for tri gear. I know for next time. We went to the official booth to look at the finisher shirts and the hats and asked if we got a hat at the end. they said no so we ended up paying way too much for the official visors. But I will wear it proudly for a long time so I guess the price is ok.

Next was driving the course, we got to the park entrance but didn’t go in yet since we didn’t want to have to pay to go in before driving the bike course. We had it printed out and I wrote out turn by turn directions for us, but that didn’t do anything to keep us from not getting lost. We got very lost, dirt roads abandoned farm houses, super steep hill that I was thankful to have the Xterra for, because I think the Prius would have just laughed as we rolled back into the ravine.  So yeah driving the bike course took almost 2 hours.

We then went down into the park to where we thought the transition was going to be, we were on the wrong side of the lake 🙂 We didn’t realize it right then so we found a parking spot, went to the porta pottys and changed into swim clothes. then walked down to the beach to get it. It was so crowded that there wasn’t any way we could get a swim in with the way they had it roped off. So we put our feet in, decided it was warm enough and headed back into town.

Stopped at a grocery store and picked up a bottle of bubbly for the next day after the race and anything that looked like it would be good for a post HIM stomach. Once we at the hotel, checked in and had all our stuff in the room we ate a big dinner of mac and cheese, then I washed and lubed up the bikes. Finally to bed, sleep didn’t come very easy to me that night, I woke up dozens of times it felt like just waiting for the alarm to go off.

Sunday: Once I finally just gave up on sleeping and got up the alarm went off and it was a nice and early 4:30 am, I used the facilities, showered, got into my clothes and sat at the couch watching bad MTV and tried to eat breakfast. Once Leah started to get ready I took the bikes and transition bags down to Beastly. It was raining good when I took the first bit down, but it lightened up to barely a drizzle by the time we left. We got on the road probably at 5:30… Way too late, but the day before it only took about 10 min to get to the hotel from the lake so at this point I wasn’t too worried.

Next was the drive to the park, from where we were yesterday to the hotel only took about 15 minutes and transition didn’t close until 6:15 so no problem getting there. As we got on the highway there were other cars with bikes on the back or trucks of the like. The sleepy town of Lubbock had not woken up yet this early on a Sunday. Once we get to the park entrance there is a small line of people having to go past the ranger station, where they are making sure to get fees from any spectators. Then they tell us how to get to where we are supposed to park. Strange to me, it wasn’t where I thought we were going from yesterday. Well there ended up being a huge long line to get into parking, it was a little bit crazy. We got parked with about 15 minutes until transition closing, but still had to put the wheels back on the bikes, air in the tires then take the bikes into transition for safety check and body marking. Where we ended up parking was all cactus and prickle bushes, so We carried our bikes about a quarter mile to the main road, along with at least 40 other people. It was a mad house. Once we got onto the road we had to walk the bikes down a very steep hill to the bike start. This was the 8.9% grade hill we bike up and down later. I was doing what I could to not run down it, and Leah was taking her time walking down it as to not injure her self. At about the time I saw the body marking people I heard the announcer say that they were closing transition in 5 minutes. I was a bit worried, but thankfully all racks had assigned areas, so I was able to find my exact spot and lay everything out. (Good thing I practice laying it all out.) The only snafu I had at transition set up was the guy next to me asked if I could turn my bike around on the rack to make more room. No biggie.

 

Swim: 51:10:00

Made it to the swim start before the first wave went off!  It was a running swim start from the shore and I haven’t ever had to do one of these before, but it sure made it more interesting. I gave Leah lots of hugs and good luck, then I got up on double deck. I talked to the guy next to me, he seemed a bit nervous, but so was I. It was his second triathlon ever, His first being a sprint the month before. I wonder how he did.

So running into the water once the horn goes off, I notice that there are a good number of older guys in the wave with me and that way too many of these people are walking in, instead of swimming in once it got deep enough. Oh well Ill swim over them and get out on the course. So swim swim swim, I figure most of the pack will leave me by the second marker, and I wasn’t far off of that since I had swam over the slow guys. There was a guy with a snorkel I had never seen before, it let him breathe with a snorkel while swimming back stroke. Very very strange looking.  He ran into me about 3 times during the swim, and each time was snorkel first.

As I rounded the 2nd turn marker, the first Ladies wave caught up. I ended up getting pushed under water as a rounded that marker with 1 lady on each side, super fun! Its OK, I got a little revenge with some elbows as they went by. The next few hundred meters was just swim, sight, swim. At the 3rd turn marker I passed one of the wheelchair racers with his life vest. He was struggling, I didn’t see that guy again until I was finishing the bike, then again when we were driving out of the venue as he was finishing his bike. Those athletes are champs!

Between the 3rd and 4th turn marker Leah ran into me, and we got about 5 seconds to say hi to each other as she swam over and past. At that point I was also getting passed by the faster people from the last wave in the water, and started to think the swim would never end. Then I took a chance to look behind me and noticed a whole bunch of other yellow caps back there and knew I wouldn’t be last in my division. At the 4th turn marker I started to feel like I was swiming strong and that I could go much further. Perfect time for that kind of feeling to kick in with the last 200m of the race to go! So up and out of the water and head into T1!

T1: 5:09:00

As I ran into T1, I saw Leah just about ready to leave so I shouted a goodby as she walked by my spot in T1. I spent longer here than I would have at any other race distance, but I knew I was going to have at least 3 hours of bike time and I wanted to make sure it was as good as I could do, so I took extra time to make sure to apply sun screen all over, since I figured most of it got washed off in the swim just prior. I also doubled up on the chamois creme, I wish I would have tripled up on it though. I put my socks on, bike shoes, helmet, gloves, sun glasses and camel back. Had a hit from my inhaler as per my doctors direction, then walked out to bike out!

 

Bike: 3:40:22

Knew I was a few minutes behind Leah, so pushed because I wanted to catch up to her by the first Big hill. I passed her on the first big hill, then only see her again on turn around. I was flying at this point, at least in my mind, we turned North Into the wind just before a old house that had a huge Domo painted on the side. It made me think about happy domo’s running in a field. Just past the Domo house was the first turn around and I got to see Leah, then we got to the next long north stretch against the wind. My average speed went from the 20mphs to 15mphs. Down the big hill and back up the other side. Some guy asked if my age was in the 300’s because apparently thats what it looked like as he flew by. A few miles later we turned right onto the chip seal road. I was still doing great at this point, I was eating a gel every 30 minutes and drinking my fluids on a regular basis. After a few miles on the chip seal, we turned down another hill, and at the bottom of this hill was a beautiful wooded road that you turn out of into a switch back hill going up.

I was quite terrified of the switch back hill, it was steep and it looked intimidating. People had written motivational messages on the road, so that part was nice. This is the spot where the title of the post comes in “Or how training in Austin is great!” because I started to pass people going up this hill. Many people, people on better bikes. I know Austin has some hills, but this really helped confirm that what I consider a hill, really is a mountain compared to some of these people I race with these days.

At the top of the switch back hill, I started to laugh UN-uncontrollably. It was just so easy and I was expecting the worst. As we hit the more flat areas and people started to pass me again, I got some strange looks for sure. Up to the next turn around I was just giddy, a great feeling to have on the bike at about 30+ miles in. There was a turn around and then I saw Leah, probably about 7 minutes behind me, I said something like “I love that hill and you and how are you doing?” and whoosh we pass. All I heard from her was “OUCH MY CROTCH!”, so I know she is doing OK if she can still talk. I rode the breaks hard going down the switchback hill and then turned into the uphill with the wooded area and the slightly steeper uphill after that. I started to sing a song. ” My crotch your crotch our crotches hurt together.” Over and over at this point. I hit a bump that had made me kinda hurt, and my chamois cream was wearing off and I was getting some unconformable rubbing in the nether regions. Going up this hill I think I was down to about 5.5 mph, I saw a scorpion on the side of the road and at that point I really thought it was going faster than me.

At the top of that hill we got back to the chip seal road, and I ate and drank more and just road out these next half dozen miles in crotch pain. About mile 47 of the 56 I ran out of fluids, but I didn’t want to stop at the rest stop to fill up, so I just kept on peddling to the finish. Once in the park itself there were 2 more hills that we had to tackle and I ended up passing at least 5 people in that area. At the very last hill there was a nice lady standing at the top yelling at us that it wasn’t that hard and we could go faster. Thanks to that lady I was flying into the bike finish.

T2: 6:39:00

Once into T2 I figured Leah was only a few  minutes behind at this point, so I took my time getting things ready. I thought it would be lots more fun to run together than have her blow by me at some point. That and well my legs didn’t quite want to get into run mode right then. So I took off the camel back, gloves and bike shoes. Switched to my running shoes, handheld and hat. I looked around for Leah and she still hadn’t gotten in yet so I grabbed the sun screen and fully re-applied everywhere I could reach. Again I looked for Leah and didn’t find her so I dug through my bag and tossed a few more gels into my handheld and number belt, ate one of them then decided to head out. As I was getting to the back end of transition I saw Leah there ahead of me, and what do you know, we got to start the run together!

Run: 3:03:41

We ran together well walked together. I had to use the bathroom, porta potty 1 2 3 4 no tp. Leah had the good idea, take the ice cold paper towels they were handing out at the water stops and improvise. So I did, at mile 4 rest stop the hula themed one. I made some loud trumpeting noises, apparently so loud that the volunteers out there started laughing. that got my spirits up even more, and got back on the run, caught back up with Leah, then we went up big hill #2 before energy lab. I couldn’t just walk it like Leah was so I jogged/ran up the rest of the hill, hit energy lab and started trudging away. Leah passed me at some point here. I started to talk to a random lady who was going to do the Tahoe IM as her first full, wished her luck and went on. Talked to 2 guys that just called me Austin, they were some Dallas tri club. I passed them and saw them again at the turn around but they had just started walking the next time I saw them. Finished up Energy lab, with Leah in my sites, I saw her slow down at one point and start an angry looking walk, but only for a few steps then she was back at it.

After Energy Lab, there was the downhill that just recently before was the uphill, and this is the only part of the race where I started getting down on myself for some reason. I could see Leah just ahead and for some reason in my head I was singing we could be hero’s. And I got all emotional, it felt like my shoes were melting (because the road tar was melting) I was very hot at this point and starting to hurt and really all I wanted to do was be running in the shade where I saw Leah running. I realized that I had not eaten in a good 3 or 4 miles and slammed down a gel, picked up in probably 2 minutes then took off down the rest of the hill to catch up to Leah just before the mile 9 stop. That stop just so happened to be the hula stop again, I got my hat filled with ice, way too much so I shared some with Leah, then I put ice down my shirt and pants and went up the next hill. staying within talking distance of Leah.  At the top of the hill I started to cramp up and realized I needed more food/salt and that with about 3.5 miles left to go I was going to be hurting bad. Leah took off and I said see you at the finish, I didn’t see a way I could keep up right then. After a few more minutes and 1 loud and obnoxious truck almost running some of us off the road, that a cop did go pull over yay. I remembered I had my emergency second surge gel, its a chocolate gel with 100mg of caf, and that is a lot for me. I ate it and drank the rest of my water on the way down the mile 3 hill.

Next water stop I filled up with what ever sports drink they had and was thankful for every shady bit I could get to and the caf started to kick in. Once we got to 2 miles left I caught up to Leah again, she had been run walking, and I was just jogging slowly. Once I passed her I didn’t stop, I couldn’t I didn’t think my legs would work again if I walked, so I just kept my super slow jog. I passed probably 10 people in this last stretch, people that obviously were in more pain than I was. But the best pass of the day was about 200 feet in front of the finish, the guy was in my age group and he just stopped when I went by. I saw him finish a few minutes after me, but I guaranteed that I didn’t DFL there.

Finish: 7:46:59

A minute or two after I finished Leah crossed the finish line, then I walked up to the med tent so I could get some ice. My leg was twitching something crazy and I wanted to ice it down. I asked if I could get in the ice bath, but they said that was only for people with heat sickness, so instead I reclined on a cot and they brought me an ice pack and a few cold towels. It felt wonderful. They did the same for Leah and it was a great way to cool down and relax a bit after the race. We were surrounded by people hooked up to IV’s getting some quick hydration back. But really it was in the 80’s maybe low 90’s not bad at all. We had come out to this race expecting to end the run in the 100’s.

Post Finish:

We went to get Leah’s shoes from the waters edge at swim start then to the transition area to pack up the stuff, slowly. We trudged the bikes up the hill. Then I left my bike with Leah at the top and went and got get Beastly and drove back to where Leah and the bikes are. We took the 10 minutes or so to pack it all up and headed out. On the way out of the park we passed the last wheel chair contestant who was just finishing his bike portion. I still wonder if they let him do the run portion.

Drive back to hotel:

Sonic, burger tots and cherry lime aide and cheese sticks. Had 2 cheese sticks, and it hurt my mouth, so I just drank the lime aide. About an hour or two later I ate the burger, but I couldn’t do the tots, fried food was hurting my mouth.

Recovery:

Once back at the hotel we hauled everything back up to the room, then I took the cooler of ice I had filled the night before and made myself an ice bath. Seriously cold, but at the same time it felt great. This is going to be part of my post long race recovery from now on.

I ate the burger from sonic here and had a beer, then laid down for a nap. I might have dozed off, not too sure I was so sore I don’t think I really slept much. When I decided to be conscious again I put on cartoon network and played my game-boy in the hotel bed for a few hours. Oh yeah I also made some mac and cheese and ate that.

Drive home:

We got everything packed up and in the car by about 10am Monday morning, and we were on the road by about 11. The drive was ok, I had us stop in post again for some drinks and snacks, then we stopped at some old BBQ place that served me up 2 lbs of meat for their lunch special. It was great. We got home earlier than I expected, and we had time to un-pack, then head out for El Mercado since that is what Leah was craving. Once we finally went to bed that night I slept amazingly.

(12173)