Niantic Bay Triathlon- Surprising Myself

I warmed up for about 15-20 minutes. The water was almost flat. It was low tide, but slack. That was until about 10 minutes before the race started. While the tide had come in a little during the warm-up it was calm water.

By the time the race started, however, the tide was coming in and we were swimming right into it. Nevertheless, it was still out, meaning that we had to wade about 75 yards into the water. It was a weird combination. I wanted to start swimming immediately because when you run in the water your heart rate goes up. But with so many people around me walking, I was worried about the people behind me diving on top of me (happens) and the people in front of me diving and kicking me with their heels (happens).

The end result of being the third wave in a fast incoming tide swimming straight out is predictable. Chop, big, chop. No big story here. It was a mess. People who are better swimmers than I am agreed it was a mess.

Mark Satran and I swam the exact same time. We went into transition together and I came out slightly ahead.

The bike starts up a hill. Rather than mount and climb I ran up the hill in my bike shoes, passing people. I stopped to mount and @poycc passed me. I quickly passed him back, hit the first big left hand turn onto the main road and started bombing.

For the first time all year, I felt good out of the water. My back wasn't bothering me as it had been for the last 24 hours, I wasn't hyperventilating and the rolling terrain is exactly what I train on. Usually I'm pretty low-key about how I'm performing, but I was really cranking the bike, and with two waves plus the elites in front of me I had to give it everything I had. I felt like all the training I'd done on the bike this year, especially the time trialing, paid off.

I was up on my bars maybe 2-3 times the whole ride, once on the flats late in the race when I was trying to drop someone from another local tri club who decided not to drop back after I passed. I just stayed in my aerobars and kept up a high cadence of around 90. I didn't shy away from the small gear either on the hills.

I don't think I've had too many bikes as good as this one. It's just too bad that I didn't listen to the advice to take my shoes off before going down the long steep hill into transition after the dismount. Well, actually, I undid the strap on my left shoe, only to find out that I do not, in fact, like the pros, know how to take my foot out of my shoe.

I lost time going down the hill and Mark passed me. He also got out of transition with me.

He's three weeks off an Ironman (Canada) and he really made me work on the first mile of the run. I tried to pass him, and he wouldn't let me. I felt like he was turning it up a notch, but I also knew I might just not be strong on the run today. I pushed a second time. No dice. But I noticed I had a little advantage on the uphills and finally managed a pass on a hill and then hit a quick left and tried to open a gap. For a guy who's doing the big final week of training (and has another ride he had to do later in the day) he really made it hard to pass him and he looks like he's in great shape for an awesome IM Canada- good luck.

I was now running down exclusively men in their 30s. Since I was putting a big chunk of time on these guys (7 minutes ?) that was great, but I knew there must be 1-2 40-44s in front of me.

I ran well, but it was not my absolute best stuff. When I hit the two mile mark, I was very glad, and I should have but didn't take a second Cliff Shot (I had one on the bike).

When we got near the beach I saw I had three guys right in front of me, about 15 seconds. But I didn't have the acceleration to run them down, and sure enough the guy that finished ahead of me in ninth was 41.

I was unhappy with myself, however, I had no idea I'd finished 10th overall.

This was a good race for me, no question, and with room to improve on the swim (102 out of 495) and run (just 5th). The 3rd overall bike I'll take.

Shout out to Charlie Hornak, who survived a pretty rough swim and finished his first tri in who knows how long and also @poycc and all the rest of the Force 5 crew who showed up and raced well.

Some Disasters are Good for You

I did not post anything about my last race. It was a little dishonest of me, because I usually do race reports on every race, but the truth is, I was embarrassed about it. Long story short, I panicked in the water. I would not exactly call it a panic attack, but after side-stroking the whole swim, I was wasted and to be honest I still haven't looked at the results, but it was ugly.

It was the mini-tri at Lake Placid the day after the Ironman. Talk about stupid. There's no other word for it. But it taught me something valuable. I panic when I can see that I'm losing ground to the people around me. So it's a for-fun mini triathlon on a Monday night and I shouldn't care about how I do. Doesn't matter. I And that's what I ultimately decided- I'll be fine in the water as long as I can submerge my head and my ego.

Fast forward. Friday Night we went to the North Branford Potato festival. Ian struggled a bit- all he wanted to do was the bouncy house, so there was a good deal of me carrying him on my shoulders. When I got up Saturday morning the muscles behind my rib cage in the back, or above the hip (lower back) hurt on the left side. I did a 40 mile in the morning, but easy, then we went to a pool party where I was the one in the water with Ian. By the time we got home at 5PM. I knew there was something wrong with my 'back', just not what. I decided to go to bed at 10PM, which is insanely early by my standards.

I got up just before 5AM and my back was either worse, or the same. I could not tell.

Lot of backstory here. (Sorry)

@poycc gave me a ride to the race. Once there, I knew that I needed to run. Usually, I set myself up in transition and head straight for the water, but not today. I didn't think I could run at all, so I needed to test myself. It hurt a lot at first, but I was able to get in a mile, then still be the first person in the water 45 minutes before race start.

After 20 minutes of warming up, I realised I was still trying to decide if I thought I could race. And the funny thing is, if I hadn't had a disaster in Lake Placid, I might not have. What if my back spasmed during the swim ? I hear they do that. I might get so freaked that I'd be afraid to ever get in the water again. I might get out on the bike or run and really hurt myself...

Then I thought about Eric's latest blog post, Hedging. Great post, better than this one, trust me. That post made me realise even he isn't always 100% sure about what he's doing, and more importantly, as he often says, it's not that hard. You swim, you bike, you run. Game on, then you're done, game over. This isn't hard.

I went positive- not really my style. I decided the swim would make my back feel better. And it did.

End of that story. Now back to the race in my next post.