Raleigh 70.3 Race Recap!

Late last summer, my coach emailed our team and asked if anyone would be interested in racing in IM 70.3 Raleigh. I was excited at the prospect of racing a new venue for a 70.3 after racing Syracuse the past two years and jumped on-board. Then, I promptly put this race on the back burner in my mind – my focus has really been on getting myself to a point physically and mentally where I can successfully swim 2.4 miles, bike 112 miles and run 26.2 miles without having a break down.

I have to admit it was a strange experience to throw a 70.3 race in the middle of my Ironman training. I’ve been so focused on training for the 140.6 miles at the end of July, this race crept up on me. I had my first realization that the race was coming up quick a couple of weeks ago and had a mini freak-out session with my coach. I just felt like the winter was so cold, that I hadn’t had the chance to get where I wanted to be before this race. My swimming has gained a lot of strength in the pool, but my biking and running has been much slower than last year since the focus of my training has been endurance and building distance rather than working on any speed.

Luckily, my coach did a good job of talking me off the ledge (while also admitting she was having similar feelings about her own training… she raced with us Sunday and took 3rd in her age group!) and we threw in some speed work during the past 2 weeks. The workouts leading up to the race built up a bit of my confidence with some really strong (and fast) swims, a couple stronger bike rides, my solo century ride, and my half mile repeats that were at last year’s fast(er) pace. It seemed like everything fell into place the week before I started my taper – it was amazing!

Last week was taper week – i.e. low volume of workouts, focus on nutrition, and trying to rest up prior to the event. Starting on Monday, my coach had us cut out all veggies and almost all fruit from our diet. Also, we had to avoid fiber sources and whole grains. The focus was to eat simple carbs and increase healthy fats in our diets to help build up energy stores in our bodies for race day. Turns out, it’s really hard to eat in this manner – I think this was the most difficult part of preparing for the race… by Saturday I was crying for a salad. (And all I wanted post-race was a giant salad!!)

Anyhow… on Friday my coach and a couple of the other T2 athletes met up at my coaches house, packed up the car and started our trek from Syracuse to Raleigh. After an entertaining 12 hours in the car (traffic held us up in DC a bit…) we made it to Raleigh just in time for packet pick up. We had a blast driving down south, I was amazed at how quickly the ride went! We may or may not have raced a couple of guys in their little Subaru with bikes on top, found inspiration for packing our next road trip, missed taking pictures of almost every state sign, and were in awe of some things that could be purchased in c-stores in the south. It was a good day. (see pictures below…)

Saturday was hectic for us, turns out that competing in a race that was a point to point race (verses a closed loop) that has 2 transitions makes for a busy day. For IM Raleigh, the start and finish line are about 40 or so miles apart which made for a lot of time running around back and forth between the two transition areas. After we did our final workout near transition 1, headed back to Raleigh to check in some more of our teammates, drove back to transition area 1 to drop our bikes, grabbed food for the evening and got back to the hotel we had spent a solid 10 hours running around. Once at the hotel, we had the fun task of sorting out our transition bags – we had to figure out what to pack for each site.

The way the course was set up, we started in Jordan Lake which was located west of Raleigh, after swimming we would come out of the water and get our bikes. Then you biked the 56 miles from the site at Jordan Lake into downtown Raleigh to a second transition area where you would leave your bike and grab your running gear to start the 13.1 mile run. This means you had a bag in T1 with your bike gear (helmet, shoes, sunglasses, food, etc.), and a bag in T2 with all your run gear (sneakers, visor, food, etc.). Also, unlike Syracuse 70.3, you were not allowed to lay out your gear – everything had to be contained inside the bags – if you left anything outside of you bag it was an automatic 5 minute penalty for each transition area. This type of transition and course definitely took some planning and thought – I have to admit, I struggled with it a bit!

Alright, I’ve definitely gone on enough about the preparation leading up to the race, so let’s get down to the ACTUAL race recap…

Sunday morning, our alarms went off at 3:30 am so that we could leave the hotel by 4 am and head into Raleigh to park and drop off our T2 bags with our run gear. Transition in Raleigh was only open until 5:15. After we parked, unloaded our stuff and found the rest of our team, we got in line for the shuttle bus to take us out to Jordan Lake. That whole process took a little bit of time but we were at T1 by about 6 am. Then we set up our T1 gear (bike gear, including any water we needed for our bikes). T1 closed at 6:45 am – by the time I had filled my water bottles, found a bike pump to borrow, and had things set it was time to get out of transition.

During this time, we found out that the swim would not be a wetsuit legal swim. Whomp, whomp… total bummer but the water was extremely warm, so I almost can’t imagine how HOT it would have been with a wetsuit! I also was a little bummed because while the race started at 7 am, I did not start my race until 8:16 when my wave went off. However, this did give me time to meet the other Betty’s racing from Team Betty which was nice.

After waiting around with my teammates, watching them all take off on their waves, I warmed up for my swim and felt good! I was excited to tackle the swim course with how strong my swimming has been this year. The unfortunate part about Sunday’s race was that IM Raleigh was my first open water swim of the year – with the weather being so cold in NY this winter, the open water swimming opportunities in NY are JUST starting to become available but most of the water options are still quite cold (high 50s and low 60s for water temps) – and I had not had an opportunity to swim and practice sighting this year.

Before the race started, I was thinking I would nail the swim, hang on for dear life with the bike since I’ve not really rode very fast this spring, and then finish out my run at an easy pace considering the fact that the weather was supposed to be in the 90s by the time I would be running.

In reality, despite feeling confident when I entered the water, my confidence quickly faded after the first 500 yards of the swim. I think I got a little caught up in the front of the swim pack, and had a successful start but it was a little too quick. As soon as I realized this I slowed up a bit to pace myself – then I  started to run into the prior waves. I think my wave was number 20 of 22 prior waves so there were quite a few people in the water, and a LOT of people struggling with the fact that it was a non-wetsuit legal swim. A LOT. I spent the rest of the course trying to avoid people that were struggling from the previous waves and I had a difficult time staying on course and sighting. Additionally, on the long edge of the course, away from the shore we ran into some rolling waves which was a bummer. For much of the midsection of the course you were fighting against the rollers that were coming at us and getting pushed backward/sideways a bit. When I hit the halfway mark on the course my watch said 26 minutes and I was bummed. My coach and I had thought I would have nailed the swim in about 32-33 minutes with how strong I had been swimming. Mentally this was a bit of a blow, but with triathlon training, I’ve learned to never give up, and never give in. There is a lot that can happen during the day and you have to be able to take a set back or two, keep your head up and just keep moving forward.

Once I got past the waves in the course and turned the last corner to swim to shore, I kept my head down, kept my pacing a bit better and kept working to dodge the slower swimmers from the previous waves. It really was a crowded course the entire way which was not ideal. As I exited the water, my watch read 38 minutes. Not great, but nothing I could do about it now. Just had to run down the (very long, very narrow) transition to grab my bike and move on to the next phase. My bike was racked near the bike exit so I had a bit of a distance to run to get to my bike. Again, a little bit of a mess as I was trying to get around other people who were walking with their bikes and trying to get ready to leave the transition area.

From my warm-up the day prior, I knew the first 1.5 miles of the course was a climb and that most of the first 3.25 miles was uphill to a quick turnaround point before you really headed out toward Raleigh. I was focused on just trying to settle into my bike, lower my heart rate and try to keep my power numbers in check. Unfortunately, my bike computer was almost completely useless to me on Sunday. When I got on the bike, my HR was not syncing with the computer, my power meter kept saying it was connected but I had no readings coming through, and after the first 1.9 miles the speedometer stopped working. Around mile 5, I rebooted my computer and gained my HR reading. At mile 10, I again hit the reboot and then the computer managed to pick up my distance, but my computer was about 8 miles behind the course all day. At this point I realized that I just needed to go with what I had, keep an eye on my HR and go by feel. One hour into the bike I hit the 18 mile mark – which was a little crazy since with my training my speed has not been the focus and I’d slipped backwards from last year – lately I’ve been averaging about 15-16 mph on my rides so 18 was a bit of a jump. To be honest, I was a little worried that I was going to burn through my legs but decided to just try and maintain my pace as best as I could.

Overall, the bike course was beautiful! Compared to NY, the roads were in amazing condition (in the Northeast we have SO MANY potholes and damaged roads, they’re terrible), and the scenery was beautiful! When we had looked at the elevation profile of the course, we were thinking it wasn’t going to be bad from a hill standpoint – there were no really long climbs and nothing as steep as the Syracuse course – but it was a bit deceiving! Turns out that while the Raleigh bike course is just a series of rolling hills, you’re never really on flat ground anywhere, and by the end the legs were feeling it – especially with the last hill climb into transition before the run. At the end of the day, it was a fun bike course, the last hour was very hot with no shade to speak of and temps rising to the high 80s, also the bike course had about 1,000 more feet of climbing than the Syracuse course! My time on the bike course was 3 Hours, 11 minutes – the same as Syracuse 70.3 last year, which was great, all things considered.

Transition 2 was the one I was least impressed with on the course. Again I was racked at the back of the area, near the run out. This meant that I had to run my bike through 2 parking lots and over a major curb between the lots. I’m not kidding when I say it was hard to even see the bike in sign from my spot in transition. However, this was something completely out my control – but I do think these transitions were a bit un-even for those that ended up slotted near the back end or each of them just due to the length and obstacles. (I’m done complaining now… moving on).

As I was finishing up my bike I could feel that my shoulders were starting to feel a bit scorched. I was starting to wish I had thrown my sunscreen in my T2 bag… normally I would not stop to reapply during a race, but I felt like the sun was especially intense and I knew I was not likely to PR this course. I have to admit I was very happy to see that they had volunteers at the exit applying spray sunscreen to any athlete that wanted it – I hopped in line and then I was off to start the 13 mile run!

Ugh. The first mile of this run was an uphill battle (literally and figuratively). My legs were feeling tired but I knew that I had survived these runs before. Both years that I have competed in Syracuse it’s been a bit of a death march in the heat. So mentally, I was prepared. My plan was to try and settle in at a 10 minute pace, stop at every aid station for water and ice – I was a bit dehydrated coming off the bike… I failed to take in enough fluids and knew I was potentially in trouble – and just slug through the run.

Mile 1: 10:03. Right on pace. Mile 2: 10:01. I was still good. Mile 3: 9:51. My legs were starting to feel better despite the gradual incline. I could tell I had some pep left in them, I just wasn’t sure how much I could push. I had seen some of my teammates from Syracuse and a few of the Betty’s and cheered them on. I find it’s easier to trick my brain into continuing to think I’m ok if I am more concerned with cheering on others… also, around mile 2.5 or so one of my teammates caught up with me and started to run with me so that was fun. Mile 4: 9:29. We had made the turn at 3.5 miles and now were coasting downhill a bit – stopped at the aid station and ended up losing my teammate in the craziness. Continued to push on and I felt good. I mean, really good! Mile 5: 9:49, Mile 6: 9:23. Was back in town and ready to start loop number 2… Mile 7: 9:02 – probably a bit too fast, but it was hard to not get caught up in the excitement of the crowd. Mile 8: 9:35, Mile 9: 10:04, back up the hill in the blazing sun… Mile 11: 9:34, made the turn to return back on the final leg of the course & still feeling strong. Mile 12: 9:10, starting to push it a little but try to remain smart and still stop at the aid stations for water/coke/ice. Was going to pass by the final aid station in the race but was feeling a little light headed so played it smart. Mile 13: 8:15 to finish! A strong finish for me – I’ve been averaging 9 minute+ miles lately so to nail an 8:15 at the end of my half marathon to finish was great!

Total time start to finish on Sunday was 6 Hours flat. Just 3 minutes slower than my time in Syracuse last June. I was hoping that my swimming would have let me go a bit faster, but it just wasn’t in the cards Sunday. Despite the fact it was not a PR, I’m feeling pretty good about it. This was one less month of preparation compared to Syracuse and it was treated as more of a “pit-stop”/training event rather than an “A” race in my training. Also, I am finally starting to feel like my calf is back to being repaired after my injury last Fall, which is a BIG win (now I just have to be smart as we ramp up running mileage over the course of the next 7 weeks (EEEK – this Ironman keeps getting closer and closer!)).

Sunday’s 70.3 race went really well from a nutrition standpoint (the fourth element of endurance triathlon that can make or break your performance) – I managed to eat what I needed to on both the bike and run despite the super high temperatures. I also raced using Salt Tabs for the first time and that went really well – I felt like I was able to manage my electrolyte/salt loss without any huge issues (I’ve struggled in the heat in the past). The biggest area of failure was my fluid intake on the bike. My coach said we should go through about 5-6 bottles on the bike with the heat we had – I managed to get through 2 bottles of scratch and about half of my speed fill which means I only took in half of what I should have. I definitely felt this on the first few miles of my run. This is something I need to focus on as I work on my Lake Placid training – I won’t be able to make it through the run if I skimp on my fluids during the 112 mile bike. Lucky for me, I have 4 more 100 mile+ rides to practice on before July 26^th. (Yes, you read that right. 4 more 100+ mile rides. I already know what I’m going to be doing for 4 of the next 6 Saturday’s of training…)

If you’re still reading this, congratulations. You deserve a gold star. I’m done rambling through my recap and you’re still hanging on! I feel like I’m still trying to decipher and digest the race because I have yet to return home this week… I’m working on my third hotel room since Sunday. Yes, it’s only Wednesday. Super fun.

Weekly Workouts// {Taper Week}

• Monday – Recovery Ride – 1 hour, 15.4 miles
• Tuesday – Swim with speed work – 31 minutes, 2000 yds
• Wednesday – 1 hour, 15 minute Bike, 19.4 miles
• Thursday – 30 minute Run, 3.1 miles
• Friday – Rest/Travel Day to Raleigh, NC
• Saturday –  Pre-race shake out – 20 minute bike, 15 minute run (we were not allowed in the water to swim…bummer.)
• Sunday – Ironman 70.3 Raleigh – 1.2 (+.1?) mile swim, 56 mile bike, 13.1 mile run – 6 hours

Total Time: 9 hours 45 minutes

• Swim: 4250 yards / 1 hour 10 minutes
• Bike: 97 miles / 5 hours 50 minutes
• Run: 17.75 miles / 2 hours 45 minutes

Photo Recap//

Memorial Day project – makeover for the front door!  Should have done a before and after pic but painted the trim to brighten it up and then went from a dirty white door to the grey! Also spray painted the knocker from the rusty gold to silver to match the doorknobs I installed when I moved in – love the way this came out!

Memorial day also brought a nice quick recovery ride around my hometown. Really enjoyed the scenery and the chance to go for a nice relaxing ride. The other project that needs to be done at my house… changing out a timer switch to a normal switch in an attempt to get my front porch lights to work. So far, no dice. Project continues…

This is what packing for 10 days looks like when you have to go to work for 2 days, travel to NC for a 70.3, then head out to Kansas City for 2 days followed by 2 days in Chicago, looping back to Syracuse before actually returning home. …have I mentioned how much I love travel and packing?!

(Although I am actually getting better at packing only what I need… silver lining.)

Flipped my calendar to June before I left for the weekend. This is slightly awkward to have on your calendar at work. Yes. I enjoy looking at girls running on a beach.  Bronco continues to perfect his flop (and some of his “feel sorry for me” looks).     Raleigh or Bust!   Road trip games, spot and take pictures of port-a-potties enroute.   So we missed the state signs for PA and MD. Finally got one in DC while waiting in traffic…  And Virgina!   Then we realized we were doing this road trip thing all wrong…   And there was this. No, we’re not competitive. Not at all. Apparently you can buy liquor at C-stores in Virgina. For only $1.99! Such a bargain.   Missed the NC State sign, but we got this one!   My friend sent this to me on our trip down. Love it.  We’re here!! Checking in to the race!   Bikes in the lobby.

The boys in the background wanted to know why they didn’t get to bring their bikes to the hotel after seeing us roll ours out of the elevator and into the lobby. 🙂   Jordan Lake Saturday Morning. Too bad the lake wasn’t this calm on race day!     Ironman Village – take 2.   Checking out my spot in T2… if you squint you might see where I ran my bike in the next day… (the black arch in the middle of the background)  Picture of T1, standing near my bike… we ran in from the far end… yes I know you can’t see it. I was serious about these transitions being long distances from start to finish!!  Dropping the bike off Saturday afternoon.   Attempting to figure out my transition bags. I was tired, this took a lot of thinking. It was hard.   At the finish line with Heather and Tanya! These ladies rock!           At the start line with 3 of the 4 other Betty’s that raced Sunday. It was great to meet these ladies after talking with them online over the course of the past few months!    And another finisher pic, with Lynn this time! Ironman Raleigh is in the books!  Came back from the race to an email from my dog… you can see Roxie was super enthusiastic about cheering me on.

Post-race dinner. I was craving a salad ALL WEEK. Finally got to order one – this hit the spot!

Also, not sure if it was the pre-race diet, or the nutrition during my event, or the fact that my body is just getting used to all this crazy mileage – but this was the first time that I have finished a 70.3 and had an appetite after the race.

It was pretty amazing.

And if you’re STILL reading, hope you all are having an amazing week!

Thanks for following me and reading about all my craziness – the journey to Lake Placid continues!

2014 Syracuse 70.3 Ironman Recap

I’ve been dragging my feet writing this race recap. For one, I have had a hard time putting Sunday into words. Two, I find writing and reading race recaps to be painful at times.

In short, the race went really well. The feeling of contentment that I have from finishing this race, meeting my goals, and finally getting the experience that I wanted from it has left me feeling happy and at peace (as opposed to the frustration of last year’s experience). Due to this, I’m not feeling the need to rehash each moment of the race – however, I know that I really should document what went well and what went not so well, to remember what really worked so I can replicate it if needed in the future… also, simply skipping over the race recap of the goal race of the season after writing about it for months would be the equivalent of writing a novel but deciding to just leave the last chapter unwritten. Not very nice.

In light of these reasons, I am going to force myself to write a recap – (if you’d rather skip the step-by-step of the race and just scroll through the pictures, I won’t be offended, like I said, race recaps can be painful to read…) .

First, the cliff notes version. My race came together amazingly well on Sunday. I finished in 5 Hours and 57 Minutes. I never dreamed of a sub-6 Hour 70.3 on the Syracuse course. I had figured that if all the pieces fell into place, I would be finishing around 6 Hours, 15 Minutes. Maaaaybe 6 hours and 10 Minutes if I had a really really good day. So 5 Hours 57 Minutes blew me away.

Race Morning

4 am wake up call, breakfast, feed the dogs, allow for ample time for them to relieve themselves, throw the gear in the car, leave the house by 5 am to head to the park.  Some traffic to get into the parking lot, but nothing like last year where I was caught in the “rush hour” to arrive.

Arrive at the park, head to transition to set up, after body marking, prep bike – blow up tires, tape gels to bike stem, water bottles placed, bike computer placed, lay out sneakers, running belt, hat, bike shoes, helmet, sunglasses and nutrition for the day.

Walked transition a couple times to make sure I knew where to find my bike later… (…there were a lot of bikes… and mine blended in waaaayyy too well.)

Hang out and wait for race start, and subsequently wait for my swim wave start (1 hour, 5 minutes after actual start of race…).

I have to admit, I didn’t mind the wait as much as I thought I might. It gave me time to eat a snack, hang out on the beach, relax. Actually, I was so calm it was weird. No butterflies, no nerves, I actually felt just kind of tired. Weird. Weird and not great since the adrenaline kinda needs to kick in to get things moving… However, race morning I found myself really not caring what the outcome of the race was going to be. I learned so much during training, met so many new people, and enjoyed the process of getting to the start line so much this year, it didn’t really matter to me that it was race day. I honestly would have been just as happy not actually racing.

Around 7:30 I gave up my stellar location on the beach (I’d been hanging with this chill dude, Ted the Turtle. We had some bonding time while waiting for my swim wave, he’s really nice – you can hang with him anytime at Jamesville Beach.)

Anyhow, after getting the wetsuit on, I meandered down to the water, completed a 5 minute swim warmup, and then walked over to the start just as my age group (AG) was about to wade in to await our start. (Perfect timing.)

Swim

After wading out to the start buoys and waiting our 5 minutes between the swim waves, the horn blew and we were off for the swim. Again, I was super relaxed (strangely, but thankfully, so).

I had wanted to start at the right side of my swim wave, but unfortunately so did a bunch of other girls. Due to this face, I ended up starting somewhat in the middle of the pack. Typically, this would place a person into the “washing machine” of the pack where everyone is jumbled together and kicking for the swim start, but luckily a lot of people had moved toward the edges of the pack so I did not have many issues with bumping into other athletes.

By the time I reached the first big buoy, the pack had thinned out considerably and I was able to swim the rest of the swim without bumping into too many others.  Another factor that kept me away from the fray of other swimmers was the fact that I really failed in the sighting department on Sunday – according to my watch, I ended up swimming 1.3 miles, and I think this is due to the fact that I kept veering off to the left of the swim course, trying to correct in to the right, only to end up far left again. The good thing about this, no other swimmers to really worry about. The bad thing, my time was slowed a bit.

I don’t know what it is about the swim out, but it always seems to take f-o-r-e-v-e-r to reach the turn, when I reached the red buoy I checked my watch an noticed I was a little over 15 minutes – a decent pace! I swam over to the next red buoy, turned right to head back into shore and picked up the pace a bit. The swim back was much like the swim out, off course but minimal interruptions from other swimmers. According to my watch, I swam 1.3 miles, and came out with this lovely zig-zag pattern…

Official swim split time: 35:10 – nearly nailed it! A bit slower than my best time in LP (32 minutes), but still a really good time for me and much better than my practice OWS had been during the week leading up to the event!

T1

When I came out of the water, I knew I had swam hard – after the wetsuit stripper, I tried to start running to T1, but could only manage a light jog – I was a bit winded!  Also, I totally misjudged and missed my bike isle in transition – there is a first for everything – I had my bike location specked out, ran down to where it should be and it wasn’t my bike! After a few seconds of panic I realized my mistake, ran back down the aisle and over to the correct aisle. I couldn’t believe it – this is the first time I’ve ever gotten “lost” in transition – ugh!

After finding my bike, I dropped the wetsuit, swim cap and goggles, on with the bike shoes, helmet and stuffed my pockets with food. Grabbed the bike off the rack, turned on the computer and I ran up to the bike exit, mounted and I was off for the ride!

Total T1 Time: 4 minutes

Bike

My instructions for the bike start was to take things easy. Even though many others would be hammering down on Apulia, I was told to hold back and to get my HR in check as much as possible before the penitentiary hill and then Sweet Road climb. I must admit this was difficult as others were flying by me, but in the end it totally paid off.  Penn Hill hits at mile 2, and climbs 200 ft during the next 3/4th mile. You get a few rollers between miles 3-5 then its climbing Sweet Road from mile 5 to 11.5 for 900 ft of elevation change. I definitely passed most people that had passed me on the Penn hill, then quickly passed me back and then I passed again on Sweet Road never to see them again.

After being patient, watching my HR and getting through the first 12 miles,  it was time to start to rock and roll. After the initial elevation drop (400 ft in 2 miles), I passed one of my teammates – a few cheers for each other and off I went – the miles seemed to just drop away. I think that I was so concerned about making sure that I ate enough food on the bike, that I didn’t spend a lot of time worrying about how far in the course I was. For my eating plant, starting 10 minutes into the bike, I made sure to eat 100-125 calories every 30 minutes. Before I knew it, I had made it up the Route 80 hill, around Deruyter Lake, and I was popping out on Rt 13. Typically it takes me 2 hours to reach this point, when I looked down at my computer, it read 1 Hour 49 Minutes – I couldn’t believe it – 10 minutes faster than usual! I also had a moment of – “oh crap” – and hoped I was not pushing it too hard… (if you blow your legs out on the bike and leave nothing for the run, you’ve done yourself zero favors). However, after a quick inventory, I realized I was feeling pretty good so I just kept at it!

Once you’re out on Rt 13, the course intensity drops a bit since a majority of the climbing is behind you and if you’ve planned correctly, you can start to push things without doing too much damage for the run. On 13, one of the guys from my team passed me, after some quick cheers, onward we pushed. At the final aid station, with 15 miles to go, I grabbed a bottle of water to dump on my helmet and down my back to help cool off a bit and prep for the run.

As I hit Clark Hollow Rd, I knew I was closing in on the finish of the bike and the prep for the run. Onto Apulia Rd again and it was time for the last bit of food. The final two miles of the course was a no-pass zone, which is super frustrating when you just want to hammer it into the finish, but I chose to embrace the mandatory no-pass/slow down and I took this time to mentally prep for T2, and to try to lower my HR before hitting the run.

As I hit the dismount line, I was ecstatic, I knew I had just shaved off 15 minutes from my PR on this bike course! I also knew I was on target for a 6 hour 70.3 finish if I could hold my run together.

Official Bike Split: 3 Hours, 11 Minutes, 12 Seconds (…15 minutes faster than my prior course PR!)

T2

Luckily T2 was much less eventful than T1 – quickly racked the bike, and it was off with the helmet, bike shoes, switched to my sneakers, hat, run belt and grabbed some gels to get me through the run.

Total T2 Time: 1 minute 56 seconds

Run

As I saw my parents when I left transition, I started to tear up a bit, I was so happy that I had nailed both my swim and bike – I knew I was just 13.1 miles away from finally achieving the goal that I had set out to meet last year – but I quickly also convinced myself that I had to keep calm, keep it together, and run smart!

The running smart part  had to kick in immediately. The exit from the park on the run course was changed this year and I had to focus on strategy for running without burning out. This year, the course left transition, wrapped around the finish line and then out to the parking lot. We ran around the bottom and far side of the lot, up an incline, through a path they made through the brush and popped out onto Apulia. As I made my way through this modified portion of the course, I kept easing back because my HR was going crazy. For the entire first 3.5 miles out on the course, as I dropped down Palladino, climbed the hill, and turned up the hill to Ransom Rd,  I just kept slowing down trying to get my HR in check.

I knew this first section was going to be a struggle to slow it down, but that it would pay off in the end. As I made the first turn to head back to the park, I figured my HR would recover as I ran back down Ransom and Palladino. Unfortunately my HR did not really drop, this was a little strange since in my training runs my HR usually recovers nicely. However, unlike my training runs, this was (a) a race and (b) the temps were starting to rise up into the low 80s with a little wind, but luckily not a lot of humidity.

I had been coached to eat most of my nutrition during the first loop in case I couldn’t stomach the gels by lap 2. With this in mind,  and with the increasing heat, I made sure to walk every aid station to drink water and also treat them like a small buffet. At mile 2.5 I ate my first gel, mile 4.5 I had the second, around mile 6 I just couldn’t bring myself to eat another so I grabbed an orange slice.  This is probably where I should have forced the gel and waited on the orange – but honestly, eating an orange (aka Real Food) just sounded SO good. I finished lap number 1 strong. I was 1 hour into my run and was reenergized by the crowd in the park as I headed out for lap number 2.

For the run out to the turn for lap 2, I tried to pick up the pace a bit but still keep an eye on the HR. Even though I was down to the final 6-ish miles, there is still a lot that can go wrong. At mile 8, I had half a gel and decided that was the end of the gel consumption for me.  Chomps didn’t really sound good either so I stuck just to orange slices and water for the rest of the run (the Perform electrolyte drink just doesn’t go down well for me – too sweet!).

At the turn of lap 2, I knew it was time to try and pick up the pace if possible and bring it home. Heading back down Ransom and Palladino hill I felt good, by the time I was running mile 11, I was running out of gas – I could tell the choice to go without electrolytes wasn’t a great one and I could have used a bit more fuel – but at this point there wasn’t much I could do but muscle through. When I hit the mile 12 sign, there was some small rejoicing in my head, but in the end, that final mile felt forever LONG. As I turned to drop down into the park to run the parking lot loop, I saw that I was 2 hours into the run. I knew I had to finish the run in under 2:10 to secure a sub-6 Hour time so I worked to turn up the running pace as much as I could muster (which honestly was not a ton).

As I hit the pavement for the final stretch into the finish chute, I managed to pick up to a faster pace, and as I saw the clock was at 7:02 I quickly subtracted the 1:05 delay in the start of my wave and knew that I nailed a sub-6 finish! I was elated and astonished that I had achieved a 70.3 race on the Syracuse course in under 6!

Last year, the finish line was a washout from severe thunderstorms that rolled in as I was finishing the race. I’m happy to report that this year was MUCH different.

Total Run Time: 2:05:36

Total Race Time: 5:57:54 (!!!)

My athlete tracker stats from race day:

A negative split on the bike and run! While the bike is easy to negative split due to the layout of the elevation on the course, I am proud of my negative split on the run – while the run was about 45 seconds/mile slower than expected, I think I ran smart given the circumstances. My faster bike split played a little role in the slower running, but so did the heat. I think I raced the best I could have on race day – and I don’t think that I would have run 15 minutes faster if I had slowed down by 15 minutes on the bike… however there is probably a happy medium that could have been struck by a slightly slower bike and a slightly faster run.

Honestly, I’m sure I could argue pros and cons to various decisions made throughout the day, but I am very happy with the way that the race all came together. I saw an 8 minute improvement over last year on the swim, a 15 minute improvement on the bike, and while my run wasn’t the best I’ve ever had, it certainly wasn’t terrible.

Just seeing the improvements that I have made during this cycle makes me want to see how much more time I could shave off, so I’m still feeling motivated to continue training! I think my biggest opportunity moving forward will be improvements on my cycling – there is still a lot of strength for me to gain there and now that I am getting settled with my TT bike, I’m excited to see where things go! But more on this later…

I thought I would close out this post with a few other random pictures garnered from last Sunday’s race:

First, my cheering section.

Second, the bling.

An awesome shot of the swim out on the course.

Finish line with Kristin – she rocked her first ever 70.3 with a 6:07!! 

I finally finally finally met Laura! (We’ve been online friends for a year and a half now!)

Despite my best efforts with sunscreen… I now have a gnarly watch tan and a killer shorts/sock tan.

Finally, the post race nourishment. (I’d been craving this for a couple of weeks…)

And that’s all folks! Thanks for following along in my journey, and stay tuned. I promise there is more to come! 🙂

 

A few updates… long overdue.

Happy New Year! I hope that you have had a fantastic holiday season and are looking forward to a great 2014!

So if you’re a reader of this blog, you would know that my posting fell off here at the end of the summer and has essentially been nonexistent  this fall. And along with the non-blogging came a bunch of non-training. I was still running once or twice a week, but that was about it. I won’t lie, the 2013 racing season along with some other things that were going on, I came out of the summer completely burnt out and in need of some down time. My need for down time turned into a bit of traveling to Alaska in September and Texas in October. Meanwhile, I started a leadership class that is offered through Cornell (which I absolutely love!).

On the running front, Ragnar ADK was at the end of September, and a few of us received our double medals for running both Ragnar Cape Cod and Ragnar Adirondacks in the same year!

After Ragnar, I had one final race on the calendar – the Great Pumpkin Challenge 10K with my mom and sister in mid-October.  This race is in Saratoga State Park, and this year had both trail and road sections to the course – I loved it!  Also, I managed to surprise myself with a PR despite my lack of training (bonus!). I’m still really excited about all the progress I saw during the year with my paces and looking forward to what 2014 might have in store for my running!

The same weekend of the Pumpkin Challenge, I also added to my family by adopting a new dog!! Bronco joined Roxie and I and is Roxie’s (big) little brother, weighing in at a mere 90 lbs! He is a rescue dog which was found wandering the streets of a suburb of Syracuse.  He’s about a year and a half old, and a ball full of energy! And I am happy to report that he loves to run with me!

Bronco has definitely brought a whole new element to life! It’s fantastic, and I love having him around. The rest of the year had a lot of focus on the holidays and spending time with family which is always good for the soul. Now with the passing of the holidays and the beginning of the new year, I have decided to take the plunge in 2014 and give the Syracuse 70.3 another go. I left the race last year happy to have finished but disappointed in how the bike and the run had ended due to the breakdowns and the extreme heat/humidity. So shortly before Thanksgiving I signed up for the race, and I started looking at various coaching programs for the upcoming season. I loved working with Coach K last year, but I’ve decided that I need more of a team and group for training and support, so this year I am excited to share with you that I have joined the T2 Multisport family for the 2014 race season and will be working with a new coach!

I officially start my training for the 70.3 tomorrow (about 8 weeks earlier than last year) and I can’t wait! I can’t even describe how happy I was today when I opened up training peaks and saw workouts loaded and waiting for me – I was like a kid in a candy store… well except  no candy, or apparently cookies since there was a friendly note from my coach to throw out any leftover Christmas cookies and to focus on eating healthy…. so here we go – hours of training and my pending complaints about my longer swim workouts will be coming soon, but honestly I am so excited to be on a set schedule again!

Also, as a slightly random note, I went running outside yesterday – in the snow and wind with the dogs and it was glorious! I forgot how awesome running in 20 degree weather can be. I bundled up and quickly realized I had managed to overdress despite what many would consider terrible running weather (it was GREAT running weather)!

And to wrap up this slightly random post, I’m starting off 2014 with the following reminder to myself and others….

Whether it is reading, running, relaxing, writing, praying, spending time with family and friends, taking a hike, a swim, or cursing around on a bike.

As long as it’s good for the soul, pursue it.

Leave the negative behind.

That’s my wish for myself and for you this year.

XO

Ironman 70.3 Syracuse – The good, the bad & the ugly.

So many thoughts about Sunday, I’ve been having troubles digesting it all – hence the delay in this post… also, I realize that many of you may just skim through this – trust me, my feelings won’t be hurt. Race recaps are more for the athlete that lived through the experience of the day anyway – I’ll try to stick to the highlights of the day, and spare you every little painful detail – since there is a lot that can happen over the course of 70.3 miles.

On Friday, I went to Jamesville Beach for the Tri Club picnic with Ironman. This meant checking in, grabbing my race numbers, bracelet and other stuff for the race. I do have to say they had some great swag – love the bag!! The picnic was fun – gave me a chance to talk to some fellow athletes and meet a couple of the pros – Dede Griesbauer and Lisa Norden (Olympic Silver Medalist who won the women’s race and came in 6th overall!).  Both athletes spoke to give some insights to racing and their thoughts on the race Sunday – they were both so down to earth and friendly.

Saturday ended up being a very busy day – probably busier than it should have been.  Around 10 am I met A and we went for a 20 minute bike and a 10 minute run to just keep things loose for the race. After the quick workout, we headed to a diner for Brunch and chowed down on some pancakes, eggs & bacon. Man do I love breakfast foods…

After brunch, we kicked it for a bit & relaxed before heading to Jamesville for bike check-in. It was nice getting down to the park toward the end of the day. Most of the athletes had already made their way through the check in process and had racked their bikes. It was good since a lot of the craziness of the check-in process was settling down and as an added bonus, it gave me a bit to check out all the expensive bikes & wheel sets hanging around (yea, I’m a sucker for all the pretty bikes…).

After racking my bike, my parents came into town so the evening was spent catching up with them, prepping and eating dinner, packing up my gear for the race and then eventually trying to relax before a restless night and an early morning. After “sleeping” my alarm went off at 4:15 am to get ready – breakfast was an egg sandwich, coffee, a naked juice, a banana, and salt water (in prep for the salt that would be leaving my body throughout the day).

Photo by: Jill French Poniros, CNY Tri Club

I left the house around 5 to roll out to Jamesville, and I’m so happy I didn’t push it any later. Transition was open from 4:30 to 6:30 in the morning with the race starting at 7 and as we approached the park, traffic started to back up.  It only took about 15 minutes for me to get in and get a parking space – not too bad, but I know there were others that arrived just 5 or 10 minutes later to the area and barely made it in by 6:30 to set up their gear… Talk about adding more stress to the morning!

A & me before the start of the race.

Catching up with Coach K before the start.

After transition closed down, I had a little down time until I would be starting the race. This worked out well as I was able to meet up with Coach K to talk through the race, talk a little with my parents, fight the good fight to to put on the wetsuit, get a little swim warm-up and to wish A good luck before we both started the journey through the course. My start time was at 7:25, so I felt like the time raced by and before I knew it I was running down to the water to join my swim wave – seriously, I waited till the last moment to run down there, I only spent about 2 minutes in the water waiting before the gun went off for my wave.  I think this was a good thing since I didn’t have a lot of time to think about the swim.  The swim is my least favorite part of triathlon and this swim (1.2 miles) looked so long when it was laid out in the reservoir with buoys!

My swim wave, heading out.

Exiting the Swim.

Post swim – prepping to leave transition.

Overall, the swim really didn’t go too badly for me, I ended up just focusing on one buoy at a time and just worked to tick each one off.  The course was set up as a rhomboid with the first length being the longest segment, from my perspective, this was helpful as I turned the final corner of the course and knew I was getting close to finishing up the swim. When I tried to kick up my speed coming in on the last 200 yds, my calves started to cramp – holy wow was it painful!  I started to panic a bit but quickly calmed myself down and just swam in using my arms.  I was a little worried about how running would work as I came out of the water – and it was a bit painful but halfway up to transition the cramps eased up and my legs started to feel better. Personally, I was just excited to be past the swim and heading out to the bike!

Starting out on the bike course.

As I started the bike, I was so pumped. I knew of all the hills that were waiting for me and I couldn’t wait to tackle the course. Everything was going great, and I got through the initial 12 mile climb of over 1100 ft – when I reached the top I even saw A’s sister to say hi as I rode by. As I crested the hill and started the first major decent I heard something hit my bike. I thought it was strange since I hadn’t seen anything in the road, so I shrugged it off and kept on going. But that’s when everything started to go downhill – both on the course and with my bike…I reached the first aid station at mile 15 and checked my time – I was pumped since I knew I was right on track for where I had planned to be. As I continued and turned left onto Rt 80, I discovered that I had a problem… my bike would not shift down. Enter the “oh crap” moment of my day. I also quickly realized that the noise I had heard on my decent was more than just debris coming up off the road. I had lost all ability to shift down on my rear gear set and I was stuck in the highest gear. I kept pushing on since I did not see the bike support vehicles in sight and I had hoped that maybe the bike would fix itself (wishful thinking?!?). I knew that the section of the course I was in was the easiest section but did have two very steep climbs – one around mile 20 and another at mile 30. As I approached the first climb, I still had not seen bike support as they were pretty focused on the first 15 mile segment – a lot of people had issues with flats and dropping chains on the climb. I stopped to see if I could see what was broken or fix my bike somehow, but quickly realized the shifter cable for the bike had likely snapped, and with my bike the cables are all internal within the frame so that’s not an easy fix. I wanted to keep going – there was no way I was not finishing this race – so I decided to push ahead and try my best not to tear up my legs knowing that after this bike ride there would still be 13 miles to run.

Near mile 25 – rolling on with only 2 gears…

I will say that as I was stopped, a few people asked if I was alright, which I appreciated. I told them what was going on and got a lot of responses that told me I was in trouble… but again, I was not going to give up and I just kept telling myself things would work out somehow. As I went to tackle the first hill on Rt 80 and only made it about 1/3 of the way up before having to call it quits and walk/run my bike up.  I was so bummed since I had ridden the course so many times and never had to get off my bike to get up the hills.

As I approached the second aid station at mile 25, I kept asking if they could contact bike support – to my dismay, they did not have any way to contact them – so I pushed on. As I exited Deruyter and headed south on West Lake Road, I saw bike support drive by. I tried to flag them down but I had missed them (they were looking for people who were stopped and broken down… I guess since I was moving it makes sense that I looked like I was ok.). Honestly, I was heartbroken as I watched the car drive away. I knew the second steep climb was just around the corner and I would have to be walking another hill. I also started to worry that I was going to really have no legs left for the run, but I kept moving forward.

Photo of climb on W. Lake Rd, courtesy of Liam Woods

As I hit the next climb, I made it about 1/4 of the way off then jumped off to try and save my legs. It happened that Rich from the CNY Tri Club was working his way up the climb at the same time – he asked if I was alright and I told him what was going on. After I got up over the hill, I jumped back on my broken bike and continued forward. A few athletes knew what was going on with my bike by this point and all kept cheering me on which was definitely helpful.  After I took the decent on Rt 13, I finally saw bike support driving toward me. I immediately jumped off my bike and waved them down. When I told them my shifter cable was broken, I was quickly told that I was getting a new bike to finish the race. Jeremy from Bike Loft East quickly grabbed a bike that was close to my size off the top of the car, switch out the pedals to fit my shoes, and pulled the seat up to try and quickly fit me to the bike. A few minutes later he pushed me off to continue the course. It was then that I realized that I didn’t know how the shifting system worked on my new best friend, the Fuji Road Bike, that just joined me for the next 24 miles of the course. Luckily, as I started the next climb I manged to sort out the shifters and get back at the task of finishing up the bike.

Finishing up the bike – with my new friend – the Fuji.

On the climb on 91, I caught back up to many of the people that had passed me on the W. Lake Road climb and by the finish I started to see several of the people that passed me on the Rt 80 climb. I was a little worried that I had torn my legs up during the bike, but I felt great and was so happy I was able to make it through all the issues with the bike. It was also fun since many other athletes told me that they had been impressed that I was smiling and stayed positive even as I was walking my bike – but really, there was nothing else I could do. My only goal had been to keep moving forward.  I was shocked at the end of the bike because I knew I had finished the 56 miles around 3 hrs 30 minutes – which was about the best I had done in training, so I know that I biked much stronger during the race which leaves me wondering what my actual time would have been without the stops and issues.

Starting the Run

As I finished up the bike and got ready for the run, I realized just how hot it was. The last 2 miles of the bike course and the first 2 miles of the run overlapped so I knew a lot of people were walking. I changed into a racing top and my sneakers, threw on a visor and headed out. I felt really strong until about a mile in, then I realized I was a little dehydrated and probably hadn’t gotten the proper nutrition in during the bike with all my issues and distractions. So started the run which simply turned into a march to cross the finish. I started a run/walk strategy to get through the run course, which was anything but flat. I also began to wonder why I had chosen such a difficult course for my first 70.3… although really I knew I couldn’t pass over the Ironman course that was right in my backyard!

I continued on the course, and was a little disappointed when I realized how long it took me to reach the turnaround on lap 1 (39 minutes) but I just kept thing easy and told myself to save it for lap 2 of the course. I stopped at every aid station and would grab 2 glasses of water, a cup of sports drink or coke, a cup of ice and a cold sponge if it was available.  (I also took a little break at one of the porta-johns, a first for me during a race – but it was more about comfort for me at this point!) Lap #1 took me a total of 1 hr 20 minutes, and I knew that I had to readjust my goal for the day. My original hope of a 6 hr 15 min finish had slipped from my fingers at this point… but I knew I would finish. There was no question about it.  All I could do was just get through the final 6.5 miles and reach the finish.  As I went back out for Lap #2, A was finishing up his bike and yelled to me to cheer me on.  I was so grateful for this since I was trying to slog my way up the hill out of Jamesville park. I was also glad to see that A was still going strong and making his way through the course since he was crazy and decided not to train for this event – his second ever triathlon… his first was the sprint Oswego tri we did the week prior… (seriously, who does that?!?).

Heading back from the turn on the course.

On the turn around for lap 2, I finally saw A coming up the hill for his first lap turn – I was so excited to see him that I ran out into the road and we exchanged a big hug and good luck before continuing on. I had a little less than 3 miles to go and I was definitely ready to be done!  I had hoped I would be able to slog out the final 3 miles with a run, but my energy had been zapped by then due to the missed nutrition and hydration on the bike, and then lovely heat (90 degrees) and humidity (70%) that mother nature provided us on Sunday. As I closed in on the park, I heard thunder and realized that the sky was turning pretty dark over the park. I was about 1.5 miles out from the finish, but the storm was definitely moving faster than I was. As I hit mile 12, the thunder kept getting closer and the sky kept getting darker. Entering the park, the rain began to fall as I hit to gravel loop that would bring me to the finishing chute. It didn’t take long for the storm to hit full blast and as I ran up to finish the announcer was telling everyone to head to their cars and that they would no longer be announcing the finishers. I crossed the line in 7 hours and 1 minute – but did not get to celebrate the finish. It was pouring rain and pretty chaotic as people were running for cover. I was handed my finisher medal and a finisher hat, but had to find someone to take my timing chip. Overall it was pretty disappointing after all that work to get to the finish line – definitely not the finish I had envisioned.

Then to make things worse, as we all ran for cover, the race director apparently called the race for safety concerns and the remaining athletes were not allowed to finish up their second loop of the run course. This made the fact that I was able to finish seem like a blessing, as I cannot imagine how that would feel to be told you cannot finish the last 6.5 miles after making it through 63.8 miles of the course – not being able to finish = absolutely heartbreaking. Sadly, this also meant that I completely missed A at the finish line. The experience of finishing and sharing in the finish was just ripped from our hands. This was something we had both talked about for a number of months now, and we were not able to celebrate, or even see each other at the finish because of all the chaos.

Needless to say, it was a very disappointing end to a grueling day.

The past few days have had their ups and downs.  I have a lot of mixed feelings about the day overall. I am happy I was able to persevere and finish the race given all the obstacles that I faced during the day (bike breakdowns, heat, humidity, etc.) but I am also disappointed due to the finish and the fact I feel like I didn’t really get to prove out my training. However, at the end of the day, I still do love multisport and triathlon, even when it does dish out a difficult day. I am grateful for the people I’ve met in this sport including my coach, my training buddies and the help I’ve gotten from the guys at the bike shop.  They were all part of this journey, as were my family and friends that supported me and encouraged me along the way over the past few months.  I truly couldn’t have done this without all the love and support.  So thank you everyone.

I’ve spent a couple days contemplating whether or not I’ll sign up for this race again next year, and I think I will probably end up signing up again – it was a good challenge and it still was a good day overall, despite all the unplanned events – but I also think I need a few more days to think about it. Luckily the registration process doesn’t open for a bit, so I have some time.

For now, it’s a bit of R&R for a few days and then I’ll be refocusing on running again as I have a couple of 15K races in July and a Tough Mudder to conquer. I will possibly be looking at another sprint or olympic tri in August, and I am now contemplating a Marathon (still not sure about that one… but I’m thinking I can convince my cousin to do it with me…maybe… what do you think J, you up for it?). 

It’s Du Time!

For some reason I thought it was going to be fun to race back to back weekends (and apparently thought this for both June and July as well…).  I’m still not recovered from the Ragnar adventure last weekend, but here goes nothing – tomorrow is the Fly by Night Duathlon.  I am not ready for this race, but luckily it’s more of a trial run to prep for the upcoming 70.3. 

During lunch today, I started looking at the website to figure out what the course looks like and what time I need to get my tail to Watkins Glen tomorrow… lucky for me it’s a evening race so I should be able to pull everything together tomorrow morning.  (Hopefully).  In my searching around, I found this video from last year’s race and I’m pumped – the course looks pretty sweet- now I only hope that the weather holds out for us tomorrow!