The numbers:
Race: Vineman Ironman 70.3
Course: 1.2mi swim, 56mi bike, 13.1mi run
Overall: 05:09:17, 344th/2094 racers (84th percentile)
Age group: 74st/213 in age group (70th percentile)
Swim: 35:03, 1:40 min/100y, 707th place (66th percentile)
T1: 3:46
Bike: 2:36:03, 21.5 mph, 214th place (90th percentile)
T2: 3:39
Run: 1:50:46, 8:27 min/mi, 498th place (76th percentile)

The Vineman is right in our back yard; Guerneville is a 30-minute drive from our place. It was really awesome to be so close, especially since Vineman requires participants to check in the day before for a briefing and to setup T2 a day early. The race doesn’t start and finish from the same location, the swim and T1 at Johnson’s Beach in Guerneville are about 17 miles from T2 and the run start/finish, so you gotta set up T2 the day before and bring stuff to T1 the next morning (like we usually do). The setup is fine but the briefing was a little annoying, no info you wouldn’t already know from reading the race package, but I guess enough people don’t read the race package that it was necessary.

Sara and Charlie left for a family vacation a few days before the race, which sucked, and Bingels had a supermoto trackday planned, which sucked, but our good friend Briana agreed to come and take photos and cheer for me. She did a fantastic job and I need to give her a shout-out for all her awesomeness. Thanks, B-dog. You rule.

I drove out to Guerneville and setup T1 solo. It was a little strange doing that, I don’t think I’ve ever started a race without someone there helping or advising or whatever. The organization was good but parking was pretty much nonexistent and the pits were PACKED. There was barely room to walk between the porta potties and the pit fence, so of course that area turned into a monster choke point with people trying to walk around. The organizers had just bought new bike racks which was very nice.

The swim was awesome. The water was 70-degrees, warmer than the pool I swim in, and apart from a sudden realization that I had forgotten to remove my engineering and wedding rings – Brad and Sara usually take these from me when I get into the water and still have them on – the warmup was awesome. I got a second-row position in the open-water start and settled into a rhythm quickly. The start wasn’t crazy, no elbowing or kicking. Twenty minutes later I’m swimming along and I feel rocks and gravel with my fingertips! Huh, I guess it’s kinda shallow in some spots. The next thing I know I swam into some dude’s legs. He was standing and walking.

I swam as much as I could and only walked a few times. The water in some spots was so shallow you couldn’t do a regular swim stroke, you’d mash your hand into the sand and rocks. I tried to draft a little, which didn’t work out because the guys I picked couldn’t swim in a straight line, and I changed my breathing which totally helped. I was breathing on a three-stroke count, which means I would breathe on the right, stroke stroke stroke, breathe on the left. This race I only did that to switch sides and mostly just breathed on the right. I felt faster and my swim time got way better: before this I’ve swam around 1:50 per 100-yards, and this time I averaged 1:40/100y.

Swim: 35:03
Rank: 707/2094
Percentile: 66th
Pace: 1:40 min/100y

T1 was strange. We had to pack up our gear into a plastic bag and leave it for volunteers to transport to Windsor High School. A lot of people hadn’t thought about this so they had a huge amount of stuff, shoes, backpack, drink, etc, that they had to jam into a bag with their wetsuit and towel and goggles. My T1 time was 3:46 and probably a minute of that was packing the bag! Once it was packed I grabbed the bike and was off. Funny but some people were slowly walking their bikes to the T1 bike out spot and I had to thread a needle to get past them. Seriously dudes, it’s a race, move it.

T1: 3:46

The bike started out like it always does: with my heart-rate alert on the watch beeping at me like mad. I just can’t calm down for the first part, I made a huge effort and kept my HR at 175, but the target is 167 and the damn thing just wouldn’t give me a break. I think I just get so excited to pass people I don’t care what the watch is saying. The cops had blocked all the major intersections which was awesome. The signage was great and the first 5 miles clicked by in an instant.

There’s a tight greater-than-90-degree turn when the course leaves River Rd before starting up Westside Rd. It was mentioned in Saturday’s briefing but not in the race handbook. I’d looked at it on Google Maps after they warned us about it and it really is sharp, plus it’s downhill. So when we got there everyone was basically parking it to get around safely. Only I don’t park it. Ever. So I raced right up to the corner, mashed the breaks and dodged around some people who had almost stopped in the corner. Some guy yelled at me that I was supposed to pass on the left. I dunno, I guess I was flustered or annoyed or whatever, so I yelled “well get out of my way then!” and took off. Sorry. When I bike all I see is red. You are the enemy. Love to stop and chat but there are other people to pass.

By mile 20 I had calmed down and was keeping a steady 167 HR. For some reason the ultra-competitive Men’s 33-34 group had been started almost an hour after the pros, which is totally different from all the other tris I’ve done. Usually the only peeps on the road are pros and maybe the younger guys and girls, which are usually fast, so usually there isn’t a butt-load of passing. Well I guess they randomize the starts at the Vineman and I guess Men 33-34 got picked late in the race. So not only was I passing people, but I was passing a lot of people. Sometimes with 15mph closing speeds. Even while holding a nice steady HR. It’s a cheap way to feel like a superstar, I know, but I still feel like a superstar.

Halfway through the race I met up with Briana. Well, I zoomed past her.

I stayed with the nutrition strategy from the Wildflower: one bottle of 6-scoop Perpeteum that I tried to drink slowly over the 56-miles (I only drank 75% of it) and the aero bottle I filled with water or Gatorade from the aid stations. I didn’t take many salt tabs, maybe only 3 or 4. The weather was awesome, no sun until the end and even a little drizzle to keep us cool. The course is bumpy but if you looked for bottles strewn about the road you could figure out where the worst bumps were.

Only three people passed me. The first was some super-fit 46yo woman. I wasn’t about to get chicked and goosed it to re-pass her, but I couldn’t stay with her without blowing up my HR so I reluctantly let her go. Maybe I’m getting old, but I seem to have discovered patience and discipline. The other two guys came by fast enough that I wasn’t tempted to try to stay with them. At some point I came up on an older dude, maybe mid-50s, with massive legs who was powering a shitty old bike with clunky wheels. He was really motoring and as I came by I told him he should get an upgrade. I guess he saw that as a personal challenge because he passed me back. I was wondering if I could afford a short burst to drop him when he grabbed his quad and pulled off the road. I felt a little bad I guess.

Chalk Hill was great. I wasn’t even in my granny gear and motored up sitting in the saddle quite comfortably. Lots of pain and suffering but pre-riding the course with Brad a few weeks ago really helped. Top speed from the Garmin 310XT was 43mph but I think that must be averaged because I’m pretty sure I touched 53mph on the downhill before Chalk Hill.

Bike: 2:36:03
Rank: 214/2094
Percentile: 90th
Avg Speed: 21.5mph
Elevation: 1707ft

T2 was very well setup. I came in and there are people walking their bikes like they’re crossing the street! Not for me. I charged the line, locked front and rear just before and unclipped as the bike was doing a nice little stoppie. I was running before the back tire had come back down. Outta my way sheeple, I’ve got a half-marathon to run.

I felt good. Quads were a bit tight and I spent a few seconds stretching as I put on my shoes.

T2: 3:39

I zoomed outta T2 and was running a 7:30 pace before reality set in and I throttled back. Sure I felt good but we all know that wasn’t going to last.

I think I love starting in a later wave. I passed people on the run! I passed a bunch of people! Sure they started half an hour or 45-minutes before me, but I was still passing them! It took me about 10 minutes before I realized what was going on and I came back down to earth, but this is a huge improvement on my win-the-bike-and-lose-the-run normal method of racing. I may still have been giving up time on the run, but while doing so I was still passing other people.

The first half of the run felt great. I banged out four miles pretty easily before my quads started to let me know it wasn’t going to be this much fun for the rest of the race. I was definitely feeling it by the time we got to the halfway point and the mile-long run around La Crema’s vineyard. I know it was just one mile, the watch and course website and maps.google.com all agree, but damn that was the longest f-ing mile ever. It took a lot out of me. By the time we were back on asphalt running reverse direction I was hurting and starting to lag. I couldn’t keep up the pace and a guy in an Echelon shirt in my age group who I’d been keeping an eye on had just walked away from me.

I tried to increase my speed when people came past and I could keep up for a hundred feet or so, but eventually I’d have to let them go. I was starting to hate life when some big dude came past me at just the right speed. And he was in my age group. I turned on the tractor beam and stayed behind him for the next six miles. Right behind him. Like 18-inches behind him. He had something like 20lbs on me and was just banging out a nice 8 min/mile pace happy as can be.

I didn’t want to talk to him. I was hoping he wouldn’t know I was there (impossible, I know, but I was in a pain fog). I really hoped he hadn’t noticed that we were in the same age group. Damn if he wasn’t a nice guy. He had words of encouragement for everyone. “Keep it up!”, “You can do it!”, “Looking good!”. It was enough to make you sick, but it was enough to get a few words from me when he started to talk to me. I never talk to people while running. I steal their power. When someone in front of me slows down and grabs their quads I get faster. When I see someone walking an aid station my legs snap back/forth just a tiny bit quicker. Vomit is like rocket fuel. If someone else hurts I am stronger and faster and better. But this dude was nice. And he didn’t seem tired. And he was nice.

Anyway, so we talked and he said “20 more minutes” and I thought that was a hell of a long time. My HR was up around 175 by now. I was hurting but I kept the beams locked and he didn’t get more than five paces from me. We past the 11-mile marker. We past the 12-mile marker. The final mile. My plan, of course, was to shadow this poor dude right until the finish chute and then hammer past him and steal the win. It doesn’t matter that he kept me going, pushed me ever so gently, and paced me back into the race. Don’t care. My MO is to steal the win right at the end. I find the energy and leave it all out there on the course.

I was hurting enough to question the morality of my plan. Maybe I should let him go and finish just behind him. We’re not racing, Triathlon is a personal sport, you race yourself and you race the clock. Only I don’t work like that. I don’t care what Triathlon is. If you’re next to me in the last mile you’d better have a jetpack.

So the last mile is ticking away and two things happen. Off in the distance I see the Echelon age grouper who dropped me seven miles ago. He’s far away but within sight. The second thing is that some mid-40s woman (with some junk in the trunk) who had no right to be passing us passed us. She had been catching up previously but that was a fluke. This was the last mile. She pulled a gap but me and my pacer pulled her back. We were about half a mile from the finish now and it was waaaay too soon to be making a move. My pacer might react. I might not have the juice.

So when this woman who had no right to be in front of me turned, looked at us, and stomped on the gas, I don’t know what happened but I followed. I dropped my pacer (should have said something) and latched on to her. We got a tenth of a mile and she turned her head a little and gave me the hairy eyeball. Sorry lady, I don’t care what age group you’re in, there’s no way you and that big ole butt are leaving me behind. I pulled up beside her and moved just enough into the lead that I couldn’t see her ugly mug.

We were coming up on the Echelon age-grouper. She was right behind me. A few hundred yards before the 13th mile marker I dropped the hammer, fired the afterburners, dropped her and sprinted past him. I guess I got another age-grouper coming down the chute. People were turning and yelling. Small children were wondering why the ground was shaking. The announcer said something. I crossed the finish line into the helpful waiting arms of the medical crew.

I felt pretty strange. My HR peaked at 195. I sprinted at 6min/mile. I wasn’t hurting like in the Wildflower, I was just really spent. They helped me sit down in the shade and brought me some water. One of the guys I passed in the chute came over and congratulated me. I was in a bit of a daze for a few minutes.

Then it all wore off. CHAMPION OF THE WORLD!

Run: 1:50:46
Rank: 498/2094
Percentile: 76th
Avg Pace: 8:27 min/mile
Elevation: 380ft

After cooling (and calming) down I found Briana and we retrieved bike and gear and cars. This was my best triathlon so far and I really felt like I’m getting the hang of it. The run was fantastic, I’ve never done so well versus the rest of the field. I was a minute faster per mile than at the Wildflower (although perhaps the 1725 additional feet of elevation had something to do with that).

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The numbers:
Race: Avia Wildflower Long Course
Course: 1.2mi swim, 56mi bike, 13.1mi run
Overall: 05:44:51, 367th/1813 racers (80th percentile), 74st/242 in age group
Swim: 38:56, 1:51 min/100y, 885th place
T1: 3:34
Bike: 2:55:33, 19.10 mph, 167th place
T2: 3:20
Run: 2:03:28, 9:25 min/mi, 628th place

2010 was my first year with triathlons. I did the Wildflower Olympic, Silicon Valley International, Ukiah Sprint, and Marin County Olympic races. I improved at each race and for 2011 I decided to move up to half-Ironman distance races. The Wildflower Long Course is the season opener and my “A” race for the year will be the Vineman Ironman 70.3 here in Sonoma County.

In an Olympic length course I would swim around trying not to drown, bike like mad, and use whatever energy I had left to stagger around the run being re-passed by everyone I dominated on the bike. The race is only two and a half hours long so I didn’t really bother with a nutrition plan, pacing myself, or doing anything but hammering as hard as I could at each moment. I would eat or drink whatever I found at the aid stations, didn’t bring anything special with me on the bike, and apart from some crappy runs I guess I did okay.

The difference between an Olympic length and a half-Ironman length triathlon is more than just twice the distance. Olympics are 0.93mi swim, 24.9mi bike, and 6.2mi run. Half-Ironman (HIM) races are 1.2mi swim, 56mi bike, and 13.1mi run (which adds up to 70.3, which is why the Vineman Ironman 70.3 is actually a 70.3-mile half-Ironman, not a full 140.6-mile Ironman, but who’s counting?). The longer distance changes everything. You can’t maintain a 180 heartrate for five and a half hours! I guess I kinda knew this before stumbling around the Wildflower course but I didn’t change my training – at least in a positive way. After Charlie was born I found my legs would take an extra day to recover without as much sleep, so I exercised less, and oh yeah, Sara and I took up drinking again which explains why I still weigh 190lbs.

I did change a few things on this HIM-distance race: I set an alarm on my watch to beep when my heartrate went higher than 170, I brought a zip-lock bag with me on the bike and run with a bunch of Endurolyte pills (for electrolyte replenishment) and some Ibuprofin, and filled a water bottle on my bike with six scoops of Perpetuem as my sole calorie source. You’re probably thinking to yourself that these sound like smart things to do when preparing for a longer period of effort at a lower heartrate, and that I’m sandbagging you when I tell you how unprepared I was, but you’re not taking into account that I made all those changes at the last minute. Yes, I raced with a nutrition plan I had never used before using supplements I bought two days before the race.

Oh it gets better. Three days before the race I realized my wetsuit is too big for me, so I brought Brad’s size-smaller suit and raced in that instead. I had never swam in that suit before. Plus I was riding my new awesome incredible superbike Felt B2Pro that I hadn’t raced on before. Plus I was using a disc rear for the first time. With aerobar-mounted shifters. Oh and I was using new bike shoes with a new style of clip-in pedals. And this was the first race I’ve worn a heartrate monitor and used the Garmin 310XT watch to track my performance.

So pretty much I changed absolutely everything the day before the hardest race I’ll do this year. It wasn’t an awesome plan, I don’t even think it was a very good plan, but it kinda worked out. I mean, I finished, right?

Brad and I drove down to Lake San Antonio the day before the race. He isn’t racing this year, he’s hurt his knee and is focusing on supermoto racing, but he volunteered to be my pit crew and captain of my cheerleader squad. Amelia and Andy are getting married and wanted to spend the day doing something wedding-related. Sara and Charlie weren’t really up to spending six or seven hours out in the sun. No one else loves me, so it was me and Brad.

I had a little bit of drama the day before the race. I forgot which hotel I had reserved in King City. This shouldn’t have been dramatic but I had recently – and ruthlessly – cleared out my inbox and had deleted the confirmation email. I called each of the hotels in King City, there are only five so this isn’t a big deal, but each one said they didn’t have my reservation. Oh, plus they’re all booked full. I was freaking out and wondering about sleeping in the car when Brad found the email I sent to him and all was well. If you’re trying to call the Quality Inn in King City, CA, beware that the number that Google Maps suggests is not the number for that hotel.

We had a good drive down, about five hours from Santa Rosa, and spent the evening scraping the decals off my new full disc rear wheel. Kevin at Echelon sold it to me for just $200. Sure it has a section of delaminating carbon, but how bad would it be for the rear wheel to fail while biking along at 25mph? No big deal I say, and besides, think of the $400 I saved over getting an undamaged wheel! I had the usual nervous night’s sleep, eventually waking at 3AM and going over all the changes I had made and wondering if I had forgotten anything. I remembered that the bike was in the highest gear and that I should change it. Two hours later I gave up trying to sleep, woke up Brad and we got going.

Just like last year there was no one on the road from King City to Lake San Antonio. For a weekend with 8000 people racing and 20000 people in attendance it was eerily spooky. We would have been concerned about being lost but I printed out turn-by-turn Google street-view pictures on the map. We got the exact same parking spot that we had last year and didn’t even have to pay the access fee to the park! w00t

We walked my gear down the steep dirt pedestrian trail to the pits, picked up all the registration gear, setup the pit, and it was time to go. I was in the fourth wave at 8:20AM so when the pro women left it was time to get to the swim start. Brad’s suit is definitely tighter than mine so I didn’t skimp on the wetsuit lube. You spray this stuff on your legs and arms to make it easier to pull off the wetsuit after the swim. This worked like a charm. I won’t try to conserve the spray anymore.

I didn’t do any warmup for the swim, just got in the water, peed in Brad’s wetsuit, and splashed around with the other guys in my start. The water was 65-68 degrees. It was nuts how fast I went from setting up the pit to waiting for the buzzer to sound, but it didn’t give me any time to get nervous. I lined up on the second row on the far inside and did the mad dash into the water with everyone else.

I swam right next to the dock in the chute into the lake and only had to deter one dude from swimming inside me. Sorry dude, but I’m swimming here.

This start was much tamer than some of the Olympics I did last year: no kicking, no elbowing, less drama. I did the same hyperventilate-while-thrashing-and-swimming-without-any-form trick to the first buoy and then settled down and tried to remember what Coach Hermine had been teaching me for the last month.

The first half of the swim my form sucked. My irregular breathing and hard exertion from the sprint to the first buoy messed everything up. I had no problems sighting, I guess I’m good at swimming in a straight line, I just felt “meh”. You know what it is? I didn’t feel the burning drive to push harder that I feel when I’m on the bike. I was thinking about all the things I should be doing and worrying about my breathing too much. I passed my first yellow-cap swimmer from the previous wave maybe a quarter mile into the swim, which was a nice feeling because they started 5 minutes before our wave, and I spent the rest of the race passing yellow cappers and the occasional green capper from my start.

I didn’t get my stroke down and pull with my forearms until past the halfway point. I tried to kick-hook-glide with my feet but it was taking too much mental energy and I reverted to my frantic constant kicking method, which Hermine says is way too fast and way too big. After we turned around and started swimming back up the lake I focused more on swimming on my side and gliding with one arm out while bringing my other arm around. Of course as soon as I started doing this, which definitely was helping me cut through the water faster, the waves – which had been with me before but were now against me – started slowing me down. I would ride over one wave and slam into the next. Maybe both my shoulders were down and I wasn’t on my side enough. Hermine calls this “barging”. I’m a good barger.

The swim was long, 1.2 miles is the furthest I’ve ever swam, but I felt comfortable. I didn’t think about drowning like I did last year. There was never any concern about finishing. My goggles slowly fogged but I was swimming such straight lines that didn’t bother me. I don’t think I was executing very well, but by the time I passed the last buoy and was coming back into the start/finish area I was feeling really good. I don’t know how fast I was moving but I know that I could have turned around and swam the same course again. I guess that’s a good feeling for the 2.4 mile swim I’ll face if I ever do a full Ironman. I finished the swim just shy of 39 minutes, which is a pace of 2:01 per 100m or 1:51 per 100 yards.

Swim: 38:56
Rank: 885/1813
Percentile: 51st
Pace: 1:51 min/100y

So how does that compare? Well, in the pool with no waves I swim 100 yards in 1:45 after a full workout (no wetsuit). Last year’s swim times at the 0.93-mile length were 1:59/100y in the Wildflower, 1:49/100y in the SVIT, and 1:46/100y in the Marin Tri (in 55-degree bay water). So I’m about the same speed I was last year over a longer distance. I’ll take that, but given that I’m in the 51st percentile for swim times, there’s clearly a lot of room for improvement.

I ran up the ramp into T1, didn’t notice any pain from pebbles or rough pavement like usual (numb feet? adrenaline?), and ripped the wetsuit off quickly. The spray works. Why was I trying to conserve the spray? Stupid stupid stupid. Plus it totally helps to have a wetsuit that doesn’t belong to you. Removal is very quick when it’s not your wetsuit. Socks and shoes went on fast. Grabbed my baggie of pills, helmet, bike, glasses, and I was off. T1 time was a full minute faster than my transition time from last year. Sweet, that’s free time!

T1: 3:34

I ran the bike to the start and hopped on. Brad was there yelling encouragement as I clipped in and started up the hill.

He was also there to witness my almost-crash as I couldn’t get my second shoe clipped in and discovered the bike was in the highest gear.

He says I came a few inches from clipping a curb, but I didn’t notice.

I love the bike section. I was ready to turn on the tractor beams and pass some folks.

The bike is 56 miles long and is “considered relatively difficult”. There’s a 400ft hill right out of transition and a 4-mile 900ft climb called “Nasty Grade” at mile 41. There’s another 2200ft of climbing with the rolling hills and other smaller peaks. I’m a strong biker but I knew I needed to save energy for the run, so I programmed my watch to beep at me if my heartrate went over 170bpm. Right from the get go the damn thing was beeping constantly.

The ride around the campgrounds and up the first hill were all a blur, crazy sharp turns at 28mph, my heartrate was pegged at 190bpm and I was out of the saddle on every little hill passing people left and right. The watch beeping was driving me crazy so I turned it off. Hahaha. I was having fun.

At the top of the first hill at mile 4 I tried to calm down. I remembered the Endurance Nation Long Course training video, and how they recommended you write “patience” and “discipline” on your forearms if you have problems controlling yourself. I didn’t bother with the body marking, but I knew I couldn’t maintain my pace and still do anything useful on the run course afterward, so I turned the watch back on and slowed until my heartrate dropped. I was still flying, averaging 24mph on the flats but slowing down considerably on the hills. I don’t know if others were using the heartrate monitor as a pacing tool, but a few would pass me back as I slowed down to keep my HR right at 170 on the uphills.

Around mile 10 the headwind started picking up and started slowing me down. I didn’t care, others were suffering more. The tractor beam was in full effect. I stayed tucked into the aero position and kept my cadence between 85-90rpm, shifting down as necessary to avoid the annoying beeping. Miles 19-21 my average speed was down at 16mph with no elevation gain! As the course curved around the lake the wind direction shifted, coming first from the side, which made for some exciting handling with the deep-dish front wheel and full disc rear, and then at mile 28 it started coming from a rear quartering position. My speeds spiked up to an average 28mph for five miles and my heartrates dropped to the low 160s. It felt awesome.

Miles 30-40 were great. I dropped and gapped the small group of riders who had been passing me back on the hills and settled into a groove. My hydration plan was working well – a sip from a bottle with six scoops of Perpeteum every few miles, one Endurolyte pill every 20 minutes, water to wash each down – and my legs were feeling good. I could tell that I didn’t train enough because my crotch was getting a bit numb from the rough road. More training calluses that area up. My quads were good and my back/neck felt fine.

Nasty Grade starts at mile 41. It’s a four-mile climb that rises almost 1000 feet. My average speeds for the four miles were 11.6, 7.5, 10.4, and 14.6mph, which felt super slow compared to the first 40 miles of the course. It’s clear that my 190lbs will never be competitive climbing hills. Kevin from Echelon caught me at mile 42 and squirted past me without much effort.

I pushed on and was surprised to only be passed by four or five riders. The guy dressed up as the energizer bunny was banging his drum just before the false peak of Nasty. I gave him a cheer as I went by. The spectators and aid-station workers are what sets Wildflower apart. This race is so well staffed and has so many people out on the course cheering it’s hard not to feel like a pro competing in some world-class race.

The downhill was awesome. I topped out around 48mph and went back around two guys who got me on the uphill. The carbon SRAM S80 front wheel and carbon HED disc make such an amazing noise at these speeds it’s hard not to wish for drops on the handlebars. As soon as you hit the bottom of the downhill there’s another uphill waiting, and after that, another. The course doesn’t stop rolling up/down at all.

As I came into the transition I knew I was getting tired, but my quads felt much better than they usually do after I go crazy on a long ride, and my stomach was awesome, so maybe the nutrition and pacing plan were good ideas.

Bike: 2:55:33
Rank: 167/1813
Percentile: 91st
Avg Speed: 19.1mph
Elevation: 3506ft

Comparisons are hard because I’ve never raced with so much elevation. The 2010 Olympic-distance Wildflower has 1000ft of elevation and is only 24.9 miles long and I averaged 18.3mph on that race, so that’s a dramatic increase. I had a faster average speed at the SVIT and Marin Tris, but those only have 500ft elevation and are half the distance. I think the biggest datapoint is my position relative to everyone else: 91st percentile baby! That’s my best bike performance to date.

I ran my bike into the pits and felt the familiar heavy feeling in my legs. Switching bike for running shoes and getting out onto the run course took 50 seconds longer than last year. Damn, the minute I saved in T1 was pretty much lost in T2. Oh man it was going to be a tough run.

T2: 3:20

I staggered out of the transition area and started on the run course. Right after the timing mats there’s a short ten-step staircase. I had to use the handrails. Oh man it was going to be a tough run. No problems though, I’m a tough guy.

The first two miles were mostly flat. With a bathroom break stop I averaged 9:15min/mile. That sucks. My quads were hurting, my legs felt like lead, and I just couldn’t find my rhythm. At mile 2 I had to walk a short 100ft hill. Oh man it was going to be a tough run.

The course goes uphill for 300ft at mile 4 and I was reduced to walking again at the steepest part. I “ran” a 12:34 mile. This was my low point. The hills were painful and the dirt trails weren’t helping. I wasn’t prepared for how much energy the dirt saps from you. There’s no solid push available, just a springy surface absorbing whatever I had left in my legs. I hurt. I can’t use enough adjectives to describe this part of the run, but here’s a noble attempt: difficult, hard, tough, challenging, frustrating, painful, scary, overwhelming, hurtful, degrading, brutal.

After the crest of the hill I forced my legs to start moving again. I didn’t walk the rest of the run. There must have been some downhills but the only ones I can recall were steep and more painful than the uphills. It seemed like the whole damn thing was uphill. According to the 310xt I had fast moments every mile, logging top paces in the low 7 min/mile range to my finish-line 6:48 min/mile sprint, but I don’t remember feeling fast at all and my average times were 9-10 minutes/mile.

What I remember vividly was the aid stations. A dozen or more people at each one, spaced about a mile apart. I spent the first half of the race just thinking about the next aid station. The crowds were awesome, yelling, cheering, offering Gatorade and water, even splashing you if desired. I didn’t find the promised topless aid station, but that actually kept me pushing to run one more mile. The energy these spectators had was infectious. It really helped and I said thanks to folks at every station.

I came up on a very fit looking guy around mile 5 who was wobbling so badly he could barely walk. He had 47 written on his leg, so he had made up 35 minutes on me because his wave started that long after mine. He had obviously bonked pretty hard. We chatted a bit and I gave him some Endurolytes before pushing on. I hope he finished.

Miles 6-8 were okay. They were mostly flat but on dirt, so not as good as the paved opening section. The 9-mile marker is at the top of a 100ft hill and I mistakenly thought the aid station was a turn-around point. Nope, it’s the lip of a bowl that drops 150ft to the turn-around point. It was nice to run down the hill, but only if you ignored the pained looks on everyone’s faces as they ran (or walked) back up. To add insult to injury, I didn’t realize the wind was blowing straight down into the pit until I turned around and felt like a parachute had opened up behind me.

By mile 11 I was hurting. Something was wrong with my left leg and it hurt every step. I developed a stitch that wouldn’t go away, just moderated some when I changed my breathing. The last 100ft hill to mile 12 was a challenge, but I was so close and there’s no way I wasn’t going to finish.

The last mile is a 300ft downhill that should have felt nice, but I was now in serious pain.

The finish was magical in that it signified the race was over.

Unlike the swim, I didn’t think I could run another half marathon. I wasn’t sure I would be able to walk back to the car.

Run: 2:03:28
Rank: 628/1813
Percentile: 65th
Avg Pace: 9:25 min/mile
Elevation: 2105ft

The comparison to my prior performances isn’t good. My run pace steadily dropped last year from an average 9:02 at the 6.21-mile Wildflower Olympic (with 518ft elevation) to 7:45 at the 6.21-mile Marin Tri (with 236ft elevation). I average 7:30 over the mostly-flat 8-mile run to work. Still, despite walking and the pain and suffering, I ranked in the 65th percentile for finishers. Not as bad as my swim!

Overall: 05:44:51
Rank: 367/1813
Percentile: 80th

My stretch goal for the race was 5:30, and my soft goal for the race was sub-6hrs, so I suppose I succeeded. I wanted to have a stronger run, but I only have myself to blame for not training hills (seriously, what was I thinking?), not running after biking (I mean, how dumb can I be?), and going too hard on the bike (duh). Unless I seriously hurt my leg I know I’ll do better at the Vineman 70.3 and maybe even have a shot at finishing under 5 hours.

I want to come back and do this race again. I’m sure I can find 15 minutes and get under 5:30.

The numbers:
Race: 2010 Marin County Triathlon
Course: 1.5km/0.93mi swim, 22mi bike, 10k/6.2mi run
Overall: 2:28:59
Rank: 41st/386 racers (89th percentile)
Age Group: 3rd/26 racers (88th percentile)
Swim: 28:47
T1: 2:35
Bike: 1:07:51
T2: 1:39
Run: 48:07

Bingles hurt his knee recently and didn’t join me for the race, so Sara and I packed up and drove down to China Camp. It’s a nice park on San Pablo Bay, just a few miles beyond Loch Lomond Yacht Club where we docked our boats. It had been a really cold and rainy week and I wasn’t looking forward to a cold rainy race. The weather broke the night before and it was almost 10-degrees warmer on raceday. The weather was just perfect.

I racked the bike and prepped my pit area. The Marin County Triathlon organizers really did a great job arranging the event, the pits were on nice soft grass and were well laid-out for such a cramped area. The pit arrangement was probably the best I’ve seen so far.

It was awesome having Sara right there because I wore my sandals from the pits over to the start. It was warmer than the previous few days, but it was still 55-degrees! I wanted to make sure that I didn’t freeze up on the swim (like I did in the Wildflower tri, where I could barely put my face in the water), so I pulled my swim cap right down over my eyebrows and swam around a lot before the race started.

I got an okay start, lost my rhythm a little at the crowded first buoy, but didn’t get elbowed in the face and started clean.

I’d guess that it wasn’t until 5 minutes into the 28-minute swim that I settled down and really started working on swimming efficiently. Stroke, twist & stretch, stroke, twist & stretch, stroke, twist & stretch & breathe. Rotate your hips. Bend hands at the wrist and pull through the stroke. I felt good through the rest of the swim, but got a little discouraged when some guys with white swim caps zoomed past – their wave started 5 minutes after ours did.

I came out of the swim looking as graceful as I always do: like someone’s been trying to drown me and I’m finally able to breathe freely. T1 was a good transition. I remembered where my spot was, I found the zipper on the wetsuit, and my calves didn’t cramp when I was wriggling out of the suit: success! I gulped half a lightly-sugared drink and ran out onto the bike course.

I was nervous about the bike. I drove the course the day before when I picked up my race packet and couldn’t help but notice that there was a fairly steep hill and some seriously winding roads. I couldn’t drive the twisties much faster than 25-30mph, so I was concerned about navigating them on a bike while trying to pass people. Plus I’ve been trying to race a little smarter: hammer less on the bike and save a little energy for the run. Unfortunately I’m too impulsive to really follow through with this plan, and the bike course was hilly enough that I had the opportunity to push too hard and hurt my run.

I went out HARD. I tried not to, but I couldn’t help it. All thoughts of riding at a higher cadence or backing off or whatever went out the window. It was like the other riders had done something to piss me off. I spun up the uphills and roared down the downhills. I’m guessing I topped out around 50mph on the main downhill.

I was out of the saddle on the uphills.

I passed everyone. I saw them, I put the tractor beams on, and I passed them. I passed some peeps with 10-20mph differential on the downhills. I paced no one. ONE guy passed me on a nice aero bike. I heard him coming and when he pulled up beside me I said “shit”. He said “what?” I replied “you’re the only guy who’s passed me,” to which he responded in grunts (we were going uphill and I picked up the pace when I heard him coming) “haven’t …. passed…. you yet…” Pretty funny. He got away a few minutes later.

A girl went past me on the last uphill of the last lap. I passed her on the downhill after that and said “you gotta get faster on the downs!”. She came past on the next little up and said “you’ve gotta get faster on the ups”. Damn. I wasn’t going to get chicked. At least not on the bike. I aborted the plan to ride the last bit slowly to prep for the run. I dropped the hammer and rode down into the parking lot all out, jumping the speedbumps and riding like a fool. Kept her behind me though!

I rode the 22 miles in 1:07:51, which was an average of 19.5mph. Not super fast, but I guess it was fast enough.

T2 was good. I remembered where my spot was, didn’t feel like someone had punched me in the gut, and got out pretty quickly. I had the best run I’ve ever had in a triathlon. I ran the 10k in 48:07.3, which is a pace of 7:45. I don’t track my training times very well, but one of my best 10k times has been ~45 minutes when I’m fresh!

The run isn’t like the bike for me though. On the bike I’m a monster. I see another rider and I pass them. On the run I hear people coming, watch as they slowly (or sometimes quickly) pass me, and try to hang onto their heels for a minute or two. I’m definitely not a good runner, but on this last tri of the season I had my best run yet.

I was watching the numbers on the calves of everyone who went by. I don’t know why, it’s not like I had any additional juice I could have burned if someone in my age group passed me, but I kept a close eye out. It sucked losing second place in the Ukiah triathlon by 10 seconds to someone who ran past pretty fast but then slowed down before the finish. It turns out I was right to be nervous! The next guy was only 45 seconds behind me, and he was in my age group!

I went hard on the last half mile. I sprinted the finishing chute. I was pretty happy to finish. I knew I had put in a good performance on the run. Plus the announcer got my name right!

Amazingly I didn’t have any cramping. I think I’ve nailed my nutrition strategy: two ensures early in the morning, a bottle of gatorade in the parking lot, 1.5 bottles of lightly-mixed cytomax and 2 gels on the bike, and water as needed on the run. It helped that the weather was so cool, but I think I’ve been over-eating and over-drinking immediately before and during the race. Usually coming out of T2 my stomach feels full and crampy, but this time it was awesome, I just felt some tightness in my legs.

I felt great. I think I could have run another 10k, but probably not at that blistering 7:45 pace. I had WAY more energy after the race than I normally do.

Sara met me after the finish and we went over to the timing tent to see the results. We knew the finishing time put me close regarding my season-long goal, but I couldn’t remember how many starting waves there were (if you start 20 mins after the first start, then you subtract 20 mins from the time shown at the finish). Was I in the fourth or fifth wave?

The computer showed 2:28:59.1 and I just started yelling and hopping around. I’d been working towards this all year!

Click here for the photo gallery.

The numbers:
Race: 2010 Ukiah Triathlon
Course: 0.5mi swim, 21.7mi bike, 3mi run
Overall: 1:43:20, 28th/370 racers (92nd percentile), 3rd/19 racers in age group!
Swim: 14:28, 55th place (85th percentile)
T1: 2:15
Bike: 1:00:26, 24th place (94th percentile)
T2: 1:37
Run: 24:12, 61st place (83rd percentile)

Sara and I drove up at 5:30AM on the morning of the tri, which was a good call. We met Brad in the college parking lot (the T2 transition) and setup our bike-to-run area. We weren’t hustling or anything ’cause the spots were reserved by number, so imagine our surprise after we drove over to Lake Mendocino (T1 transition) and found that it was first-come first-served. Bummer, we got really shitty transition spots right at the bottom of the hill. Oh well.

We went for a quick swim to warm up and massed at the bottom of the boat ramp waiting for the first wave start.

A little bit of minor chaos ensued as the organizers clearly weren’t prepared for the 500 people who showed up. No one could hear the announcers, I couldn’t find Sara, and because they had run out of the correct colour swim caps it looked like a mob scene for the first wave. Peeps were still swimming back/forth as the announcer was giving us the countdown to the start. It didn’t help that the announcer was competing with some music being played through the same PA system.

I got a good start and didn’t hyperventilate. Breathing was good and my pacing was good, I was trying to find some clean water when I got elbowed hard in the face. I was wearing new goggles for this tri, smaller ones that fit very tightly over my eyes. When I got clonked the left eye cover kinda pushed into my eye socket. It wasn’t terribly comfortable, but it wasn’t leaking and I could kinda still see, so I kept swimming. The short half-mile swim felt really super easy, it was over before I knew it.

The gravel in T1 really worried me before the race started, but I had so much adrenaline pumping as I came out of the swim I didn’t feel a thing. Maybe my feet were numb. T1 was okay, 2:15, not very good.

I hopped on the bike and went hard. Bunny-hopping the off-camber speedbumps on the way down from the lake, staying in full tuck on the few small hills early in the ride, I pushed as much as I could and passed a whole ton of folks who finished the swim before me. It feels great to zoom past other racers but each one is a small reminder of how much I suck at swimming. Only three guys passed me, each on dedicated tri bikes with cool wheels. Man I wish I had a full disk wheel, the *whoom* *whoom* *whoom* noise they make is incredible.

The course was pretty good except for one rough patch. It was really rough. Not bumpy, just rough. Rough enough to numb the crotch area. That’s not so good. I saw Kevin Buchholz (of Echelon in Santa Rosa) coming back along the course at the 7-mile mark, and Brad at the 12-mile mark after I turned around. I jumped off the bike and ran it into T2, later I guess the guys at the entrance were letting people ride into the pits and someone in the crowd started yelling, hahaha. The bike was good, just 12 seconds longer than an hour, which puts my pace at 21.7mph, not bad!

T2 was faster than T1, just 1:37.

The run was hard. I didn’t keep anything in reserve through the bike and I struggled to find my pace. The course was cross-country, lots of up/down/left/right on a dirt path through a sun-baked hill. Surprisingly harder than just plodding along a straight bikepath or road! I ran three miles in 24:12, or a 7:48/mile pace. Not good, I should have been about a minute/mile faster. I saw Brad coming into T2 as I was finishing the run and I guess I beat the girls to the finish line.

Turns out I won a medal! I came in third in the 30-34 age range!

Fun race! Organization was only okay – I’m realizing that the Wildflower was absolute tops for course organization, crowd control, spectator enthusiasm, etc.

Click here for the photo gallery

The numbers:
Race: Silicon Valley International Triathlon
Course: 1.5km (0.93mi) swim, 40km (24.9mi) bike, 10km (6.2mi) run
Overall: 2:41:21, 261st/726 racers (64th percentile)
Swim: 29:42, 287th place (60th percentile)
T1: 2:41, 335th place (54th percentile)
Bike: 1:12:29, 142nd place (80th percentile)
T2: 1:43, 288th place (60th percentile)
Run: 54:47, 424th place (42nd percentile)

After the Wildflower I was totally psyched about my next triathlon. I had suffered a number of setbacks like not defogging my goggles and swimming around like a drunk trying to stumble a straight line, not drinking enough before the start and cramping my left leg in the swim, and sucking pretty hard on the run. Even with these challenges I finished in 2:57, just under my three-hour goal.

The Silicon Valley course is supposed to be super fast, so I set an aggressive 2:30 goal. I figured if I could improve my swim by five minutes, my bike by 10 minutes, and my run by 10 minutes, while also shaving off some time in the transitions, I might be able to break 2:30. It sounded like a good plan: get faster in all disciplines and generally perform at a higher level. Awesomeness here I come! The bike was advertised as “one of the fastest courses available”, so sure, no problem, sign me up for a 29-minute reduction in my times.

I met Bingels and Jingels in San Jose and we drove the bike section of the course and it looked pretty flat. I mean, the Prius had no problems with any of the hills. Even with three people inside! We ignored the one monster hill and the long gently-upward-sloping 10 miles before the hill. Lots of nice downhill to finish up the ride. Funny how there seemed to be more downhill than uphill.

We had a great homemade dinner with the Ingel’s friends Kevin and Shannon. It was so yummy I had two gigantic plates of pasta. Brad was drinking a whole bunch of beer and I was so totally enjoying the thought of him throwing it up the next day that I forgot that I shouldn’t be jamming as much pasta down my gullet as possible. I didn’t get the memo until later, but it turns out that scientific research has totally debunked the awesomeness of the carbo-loading process. It turns out eating 3.5lbs of pasta isn’t necessary for a short little Olympic tri. It’s not necessary for anything. It just makes you fatter and heavier and slower and crampier.

Bingels insisted on getting up at like 4AM. For a 7AM start. When we were staying only 15 minutes from the start. Jenni agreed to the plan but then refused to get up, so I tormented her by going in and out of the hotel room about a million times while we loaded Brad’s truck. I didn’t bring a room key with me so I would bang on the door each time. Hahaha. Even with an hour of dilly-dallying we were fifth or sixth in line at the pits when they opened at 5:30AM.

We setup our pits and I need put in a shout-out to my awesome teammate who had totally scoped out the situation the day before and figured out the ideal pit location that would minimize unnecessary running back-and-forth. The SVIT pit arrangement includes one-way sections that are a little confusing. We racked up our bikes, laid out our shoes, and chilled for another hour and a half. I’m not so pleased at my over-eager teammate who had us getting ready so early.

Bingels also convinced me to have a caffeine pill. I think the only reason he succeeded in getting me to try something new – ON RACE DAY – is because I was totally tired and full of pasta. Trying a new fueling strategy on race day is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard of. It’s something that everyone knows not to do. Why would you change your routine on the day your performance will be tested? Dumb dumb dumb.

Making matters worse is that I don’t drink coffee or tea and rarely drink caffeinated pop drinks. Oh, plus Bingels took all my non-caffeinated Gu and left me eating more and more caffeine. So I’m pretty sure the nervous eye twitch and uncontrollably-racing heart-rate may have negatively affected my performance.

Eventually the sun came up and we meandered down to the Lake Almaden beach-front start. It’s a beautiful place, wonderful golf-course-like grass with smooth fine sand leading to the crap-filled Mercury-laden soupy water. I didn’t realize the water was so bad until everyone in my start was talking about Mercury poisoning and goose poo.

The pros set off and were already around the first buoy before Brad’s second wave started. They got the gun and were off. Well, most of them were off. Bingels didn’t want to get punched or kicked so waited a minute for everyone else to swim off ahead of him. Interesting strategy in a race. I was hoping to bump into him on the swim so I could give him a good luck punch or kick.

I positioned myself at the right pin end and got a good start, much less panicky than my performance at Wildflower. I was bumped, punched and kicked a few times, but I held my rhythm and managed to get through the worst of it without freaking out. I settled down and started working on twisting my hips, reaching further forward, and bending my wrists sharply to propel myself through the water faster. I think I need to keep working on this because whenever my mind would wander, which, frankly, is often, I would find myself flapping around ineffectually.

I think I’m getting better at swimming in a straight line. I used the same sun-angle-on-my-goggles trick I discovered at the Wildflower, but I noticed I was making fewer course corrections. I even cut back on spending time looking where I was going and spent more time just swimming away.

I had fewer ‘oh crap I’m never going to finish’ thoughts and I have to say that I felt pretty good. I had enough left in the tank on the final leg of the swim to dig a little deeper and push hard to the finish. I don’t know if it helped me go any faster, but it sure helped me get my I’m-in-pain face on. Check it out.

I was in and out of T1 in 2:41. It felt like a long time. I think I need to investigate a sock-less bike shoe strategy. Except my feet get cold, so maybe I’ll just train putting socks on faster. I just bought an awesome new aero helmet, you can kinda see it in this picture.

I came out of the pits FAST. I looked down half a mile into the ride and was riding at 28mph with a 26mph average! Uhoh, that’s not sustainable. I backed off a little and tried to pace myself at 25mph on the flat section. I found myself passing other riders with an awesome regularity.

Opponents would appear on the horizon and I would hit them with the tractor beam, eat up the distance between us, and hit them with a decisive pass. I always like to push a little extra hard during a pass to break the will of anyone who might want to keep up. I was passed by two or three guys on the 15 miles before Bailey Hill. In each case I tried to stick with them for a while (outside the draft zone, of course) but was eventually unsuccessful.

Bailey Hill started very quickly. Maybe riding it beforehand had psyched me out, but I found myself spinning my granny gear right away and was passed by four guys who booted it uphill like they were on fire. They were hopping in and out of the saddle and were quickly out of sight. I kept my cadence up and slowly but surely spun my way up the hill. It wasn’t too steep or too long, maybe I could have pushed a lot harder here.

At the top of the hill was the SVIT-advertised water station. Whew, I was looking forward to getting some water! But wait. It wasn’t a water station. It was a table with several hundred Aquafina water bottles on it. There was no one there. Water bottles had been knocked off the table and littered the ground around the table. I tried to thread the dangerous landmine bottles and grab some water at the same time but at the last minute chose to abort my grab rather than crash and eat asphalt.

It kinda sucked. Come on, SVIT couldn’t get one wonderful volunteer to work the ONLY water station on the course? With the $160 fees we’re paying to race I want some well-paid scantily-clad coed handing me ice cold pre-opened water bottles! Self-serve water? On a 25-mile all-out bike race? Crazy.

I hammered the downhill and saw speeds up to 40mph on some sections. It took me almost 15 minutes of tractor beaming but I caught and passed one of the guys who had passed me earlier in the race, which I felt good about, and I rocketed into T2 on totally worn-out legs. I finished the 24.9 mile course in 1 hour, 12 minutes, and 29 seconds, which puts me at an average pace of 20.63m/h. Yes, I suppose this is a little faster than Wildflower, but I would not characterize this as a super fast course. There’s gotta be something flatter.

Time to run, bitches! Despite my mental commands I knew I was in for a world of hurt when my legs refused to obey my orders and I barely managed to unclip from the bike. I almost fell into the dude working the bike in section. I hobbled back to the pit.

My T2 time was okay but I wasn’t feeling great. I had eaten another caffeinated Gu just before coming into the transition and it was sitting in my stomach funny. I drank some sugar-water and tried to stretch my feet apart as I ran out of the pits. Amelia and Andy were there cheering me on with cowbells as I went out the chute. I can’t tell you how awesome it is to have someone cheering for you – especially when they’ve also got cowbells!

I made it around the next corner and my stomach shut me down. I was cramping and hurting pretty badly. I’m not sure if I could have pushed through it if I had dug deeper, but it doesn’t matter because I didn’t dig deeper, I gave up and started walking.

I hate walking. As soon as you walk once you’re screwed. Your brain figures out it can make the hurt stop, and so it then becomes harder and harder to run without walking. I try to force myself to walk for only ten paces before starting to run again, or I’ll do little tricks like trying to jog-walk instead of just walking.

The hurt was definitely in my gut. My legs weren’t feeling great but they had something left. I didn’t have a stitch, I felt bloated and crampy. It sucked. I started running again but I was super slow and totally discouraged.

The mental aspect of defeat was eating at me and I was in a pretty miserable place. Other racers were streaming past me, probably laughing to themselves about how the fast bike guy bonked on the run. I was passed by fast guys and girls, medium guys and girls, and one or two really slowpokes lumbered by me. It sucked. It wasn’t until the third mile that I started to recover. By this point I had walked three times, once for almost a minute.

I dunno but suddenly something good happened. I just started running faster and my stomach stopped bothering me. Let’s be serious here, I was still running pretty slowly, but I was feeling soooo much better. I was powerful. Invincible, maybe.

The heat was also starting to affect me. I was now splashing more water than drinking it in the excellent aid stations. I pushed on.

The last few miles felt pretty good. My legs were feeling better and my gut was pain-free. I finished with a nice sprint.

My run time was 54:47, which really sucked. I can run a 10k ten minutes faster without trying too hard! My time works out just faster than 9-minute miles! If we assume that I was running super-sucky 10-minute miles for the first three miles, my comeback in the second half would be something like 7.5-minute miles. Now that’s not good, but it’s better.

I finished the triathlon in 2:41:21, which was 11 minutes and 21 seconds slower than my goal of 2:30. I know what I need to do before the next race: get faster. I’m going to work the run, this is clearly where I am weakest and I have the most to gain. Plus this is where Bingels says he’s eventually going to beat me (he didn’t meet his 3:00 goal either, but he improved much more than I did versus the Wildflower).

My next race is USA Productions’ Olympic length Silicon Valley International Triathlon on June 13. Olympic length courses consist of a 0.93mi swim, 24.9mi bike, and 6.2mi run.

Even though I weigh right around 200lbs I’m not going to degrade my honour by registering for the over-200lb Clydesdale class. I’ll race with all the skinny minis in the Male 30-34 class instead. To be honest, I was a little tempted by the promise of a podium opportunity, but after I heard that the Clydesdale class isn’t officially sanctioned by professional or Olympic class rules, I didn’t want to tarnish my future induction into the Triathlon Hall of Fame. No asterisks, that’s how I roll.

The course is pretty flat with only one 400ft mile-long climb on the bike section and basically no elevation change during the run. It should be fast!

Brad will be joining me on the Olympic course and his wife Jenni is going to try the Sprint course on Saturday the 12th. Hopefully my wonderful wife Sara and her wonderful sister Amelia will be cheering us on as well.

The numbers:
Race: Avia Wildflower Olympic Triathlon
Course: 1.5km (0.93mi) swim, 40km (24.9mi) bike, 10km (6.2mi) run
Overall: 2:57:09, 460th/2363 racers (80th percentile), 71st/224 in age group
Swim: 32:25, 1113th place
T1: 4:35
Bike: 1:21:30, 299th place
T2: 2:31
Run: 56:08, 926th place

I’ve been training three or four days a week for the last three months in preparation for the Wildflower. It’s one of the hilliest triathlon courses – the Wildflower website describes it as ‘brutal’ – and I wanted to be ready. I’ve been swimming at the gym, running mostly at the gym, and biking to work. My post-race hindsight says that I probably need to step up the training and take it outside, especially for the swim. I’m still fast on the bike and slow everywhere else, but at least my transition times are getting better!

The Wildflower triathlon is held at Lake San Antonio, halfway between San Francisco and Los Angeles. The lake and surrounding countryside is beautiful at this time of year, green rolling hills and lush vegetation that haven’t yet been burnt by the summer sun. I had my UC Davis MBA class in San Ramon on Friday and Saturday, did some homework for a few hours after class, picked up my parents from SFO that evening, and drove us all south two and a half hours to King City. Sara and her sister Amelia and my training partner Brad and his wife Jenni met us there at the hotel. We chatted a bit and hit the sheets around 11PM.

We got an early start and headed out for the hour-long drive to the lake. Brad used directions the hotel people gave to him and started to freak out a little when they didn’t match the directions his Droid was supplying. I must confess that I fanned the flames of confusion a little. Hahaha. It was strange that the road we came in on was totally empty, but we made it to the park with lots of time to spare, parked, and started heading down to the main race area.

There are a LOT of people at the Avia Wildflower! 2363 people finished the Olympic length triathlon. 1860 finished the Long course on Saturday and 998 finished the Mountain Bike course. Something like 20,000 people camp at the park during the week leading up to the races. It was crazy, but I have to say the organizers were really good about managing the huge numbers of competitors. The pits were carefully guarded, the swim start was managed carefully to separate the different waves of competitors, and even parking was surprisingly easy.

Brad and I left our cheering squad and setup our pit area, put numbers on our bikes, and had our numbers and ages written on our legs and arms. I was starting to get anxious butterflies and couldn’t wait to get started. I must have checked my gear setup four or five times, making sure the cytomax was premixed, shoes were open, socks were waiting nearby, gels and drinks were neatly arranged at the back.

Of course I missed a bunch of stuff: I had only mixed drinks prepped, no water, which sucked when I came off the bike. I didn’t use any anti-fog or spit in my goggles, which sucked during the swim. I didn’t reset my bike computer, so I had no idea how far I had ridden halfway into the bike. I also didn’t drink enough in the hike down to the pits from the car and while waiting around. Dumb dumb dumb.

We grabbed our wetsuits and headed down to the start. The lake was wavy and the course looked really long. Man what were we doing?! I started trying to get into the zone, repeating my swim mantra “just keep swimming, just keep swimming” from Finding Nemo. Brad and I took a quick dip before the first wave started, had an energy gel (no water, dumb!), and settled in to watch the first start.

With a huge cheer from the crowd the white-capped pros shot into the water and started swimming off in the wrong direction! Everyone was asking “uh, do they know something we don’t?”. All those pros must have been following the one fast swimmer in front who wasn’t looking, and it was a long long time before the group abruptly turned 60-degrees and started heading for the buoy. Wow, for professional athletes that must have been a really crappy way to start a race.

Brad was in the fifth group, starting 20 minutes after the pros left. It was insane but the first swimmers were coming back in to shore before Brad even left! I guess the little detour wasn’t a big deal. I was two waves behind Brad, so he got a nice 10-minute head start. His group started, then the group ahead of me started, and finally it was my turn. I took another quick swim in the five minutes between starts and lined up on the front line on the inside.

My strategy was to go hard from the start to get some separation, stay on the inside line right beside the kayakers to minimize the distance swam, and sight the first buoy fairly often until I could get into a rhythm. At the horn I charged into the water and started ‘swimming’. I use quotes because I wasn’t swimming. I have no idea what I was doing, but I wasn’t doing it right. I was breathing every stroke, my head was all the way out of the water, and my careful training had degenerated into wild flailing. I was doing my best impression of drowning.

Everyone passed me. I was making very little forward progress, but it wasn’t for lack of effort! I guess I started to panic at how shitty things were going and I thrashed more wildly. Kinda dumb I guess. I kept trying to calm down but someone would kick me or grab my leg and I would bob up and look around. My goggles fogged and then I couldn’t see anything either. The waves weren’t very big, but they were choppy enough that I was occasionally sucking water while trying to breathe.

It wasn’t until I was well past the first buoy that I was able to force myself to calm down. I was freaking out and I needed to focus. I gave myself a stern talking to. I pushed my head and chest further down into the water. I started breathing every third stroke, and I focused on stabbing my hands forward and gliding. Stab and glide, stab and glide, stab and glide, breathe. Suddenly it all came back to me. I turned my head further towards the sky with each breath and started to get away from the waves. I could breathe again!

My goggles were driving me nuts, so I paused long enough to spit into one eye cover and wipe it clean. I don’t know why I didn’t do the other eye, that drove me nuts the rest of the swim. I also figured out that I could use the angle of the sun on my goggles to keep me pointed in basically the right direction, so I sighted the next buoy carefully, mentally marked the angle of the sun, and settled down into a rhythm.

The second and third buoys came and went quickly. I was back in a groove and was passing people. After the third buoy I started to see other colour caps, which meant I was passing earlier waves of swimmers! The last few legs of the swim was hard. My right leg had started cramping when I pointed my toes, so I stopped kicking. That slowed me down but also was super frustrating. Why was my leg cramping? Would I be able to bike? Probably, but what about the run? Had I hurt my soleus again? Mentally this was tough. I promised myself I would finish no matter what, even if I had to walk the run portion.

In hindsight I think the cramp was brought on my lack of water in the morning. I hadn’t drank anything since getting up four hours earlier, and with all the walking and prep I’m sure I was a little dehydrated.

At the last buoy I was starting to feel better and was eating up the arm and shoulder strength I had left. I swam into someone and he yelled “Hey!” It was Brad! He was swimming side-stroke to keep his face out of the waves and looked like he was hurting. “Dude, we’re almost there! Keep it up!” I yelled as I powered off. He looked like he might have grabbed me and pulled me under if I had stuck around. No one likes a drowner, Brad, cut it out.

My swim time was 32:25, which kinda sucked. I’m betting at least 3 minutes was due to my frantic panic from the start and another two or three minutes was due to my cramping leg.

I knew that getting out of the water and running into T1 would tell me if the rest of the race was going to suck. As soon as I stepped up and started running I knew it was okay. Phew! I pulled off the top half of the wetsuit and ran into the transition area. Oh man I was happy my leg was working. I think I had a pretty big smile on my face, especially when I ran by Sara, Amelia, Bekks, John, and Brad’s wife Jenni cheering me on.

My T1 time was 4:35. The pros were in and out in 2-3 minutes, so there are obviously precious seconds being wasted here. I know several of those seconds were spent carefully pulling the wetsuit off my right leg, I always feel a cramp when doing this so I took extra care not to pull anything. I decided to also invest a few seconds in putting on socks; I’ve never biked or ran without them and I don’t know how the pros do it. I need my socks!

Wetsuit off; socks, cycling shoes, helmet, glasses, and gloves on; gulp half a bottle of cytomax; grab the bike; run! At the “Bike Out” gate I jumped on the bike, clicked in, and started powering up Lynch Hill Road. Man, people were riding slowly. Why weren’t they going faster? Why was that guy pushing his bike? Honestly I felt awesome, I powered up the ‘brutal’ hill like it wasn’t even a hill. I was on fire. I had to check myself and dial it back a little, I didn’t want to hit a wall or totally torpedo my run attempt.

I felt great and was powering along in the aero position when I heard a “whum-whum-whum” noise coming from behind me. I didn’t think it was my bike. I also had no idea how I was going to be passed, I was pedaling at 27mph on a flat! I concluded it must be a motorcycle when some uber-fast dude with an all-carbon solid rear wheel flew by me, maybe going 5mph faster. This guy’s legs were gigantic and he must have weighed 40lbs less than me. Damn, I guess I’m not going to win the bike stage.

The rolling hills on the course were starting to take their toll and I was slowing down a little on the uphills, but I was spinning out on every downhill. I need better gearing! My fastest speed was 50-something-mph, which I feel pretty good about. My right leg was fine and apart from a slow burn in my quads I was feeling great. I had mixed the drinks on the bike too strong and my mouth was feeling like it was coated with sugar, at the aid station I grabbed a water bottle and chugged it, but next time I’m going with a weaker mix.

At one point in the ride I was passing another rider uphill and asked him “Hey, how far have we ridden?”. I didn’t look at the rider before asking, I just gasped it as I rolled by. He yelled “Will!”, and I swear I thought Brad had somehow passed me in the pits or something. I almost fell off my bike. It wasn’t Brad, thank goodness, the second guy I randomly ran into on the tri was the only other person I knew who was doing the tri: Mark J, a friend from b-skool. I slowed down and we chatted for a few minutes before the motorcycle police pulled up and I took off trying to avoid a penalty. Little did I know that these few minutes would come back to haunt me.

With one exception, the only dudes passing me were super fit and were riding awesome bikes. I didn’t get his number, but there was one guy on a total rat bike that was stalking me and just floated past uphill. It was funny because I would shoot back past him on the downs and flats, but I couldn’t make it stick. Clearly I need a better bike!

I struggled to stay with Mr. Rat Biker on the last uphill and hammered down the other side. Sorry to everyone who was coasting down into the pits, but come on slowpokes, this is a race, coasting is not kosher! Plus, if you are going to coast and ‘rest your legs’, get out of the way! Steer your stupid coasting bike over on the far right side of the road. Unless, of course, you’re a big fan of a 50mph enema.

I finished the bike section in 1:21:30, which I think is pretty good. It puts my average speed at 18.3mph over a course with 4438ft of elevation change (2219ft up, and 2219ft down). I think I did enough hill training, but just imagine how fast I would have been with a better bike!

I rocketed into the pits and quickly changed into running shoes. My T2 transition time was 2:31; the pros were in and out in 0:50-1:30. Not good, not bad.

Just like in the Pacific Grove sprint triathlon I did in Monterey, when I got off the bike and started running it felt like my shoelaces were tied together with bungee cords. I was slow. Really slow. The only good thing was that everyone else around me was slow too.

I was passed by some fast guys, and then a guy named Giovanni slowly ran by and I decided to try to hang with him. I picked up the pace and turned into his shadow. After ten minutes of drafting I thought it would be a good idea to introduce myself and make friends. We chatted between gasped breaths and soon added another to our posse, a girl named Erin racing in the collegiate class from Oregon. The three of us ran together for a good twenty minutes, we even decided to form a team and came up with a name “Team What Are We Doing?”, but when I hit my second wind on one of the long uphills I split and focused on my own race.

I’m very proud that I was able to maintain a constant (but slow) pace and that I didn’t need to stop. There were a lot of casualties resting at the side of the road squeezing their calves and quads. It was a total bummer that the topless aid station is only for the long course! The girls with garden hoses spraying us down were probably better for our survival though.

On the long downhill back into the transition zone (and to the finish) I was stretching out the length of my steps and trying not to fight the motion with my knees when someone in my age group passed me. Getting passed is a fact of life, especially when you run as slowly as I do, but being passed by others from other age groups is much less meaningful: they’re either much faster than me and they technically passed me a long time ago, or I previously passed them on the bike or swim and I probably have them beat unless they horizon me.

But when someone in your age group passes you, it’s a real pass. They started at the same time you did and if they beat you to the finish line they beat you. So when this dude ran past me on the downhill with a “33″ written on his leg, I was being pushed back a spot. I called him a mother-f’er and he laughed and said “see ya later” and ran faster. I dug deep but just couldn’t hang with him. Downhill just isn’t my forte.

I let him go but kept beating myself up about it. When we hit the short section of flat before the finish line I noticed he was slowing down. Oh it was on! I poured it on and caught up to him with a tenth of a mile to go. Instead of tipping my hand and starting a footrace, I drafted as quietly as I could and hoped he didn’t look back.

A hundred yards from the finish I gave it everything I had, applied a decisive pass, and had a nice cushion on him by the time I hit the finish. It was awesome to hear the cheering squad yelling my name as I finished.

My run time was 56:08 (9:02 pace), which sucks. Even for a hilly course I should be something like six minutes faster over the 10k. I definitely need to focus some of my training on the bike-run together as a pair. The run section is probably the area where I could make the biggest gains.

My finish time was 3:27:09, which when you subtract the 30 minutes to account for my starting time, means I finished in less than three hours! 2:57:09! That was good enough for a 460th place finish out of 2363 other finishers; top 20th percentile baby! w00t!

I took my time eating in the recovery area and met up with everyone in the stands waiting for Brad. He had looked pretty rough coming in from the bike section and everyone was a little concerned he wasn’t going to be able to finish. He came running in looking good and finished with a time of 3:55:37. Not bad for his first attempt, and we’re already planning our next race.

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