Clear Lake Sprint Tri Race Report

[katinthehat]

First, best race of my life.  Loved it.  Of course I have areas to improve in but I feel I did everything to the best of my ability and left it all out on the course.  I finished 10th out of 25 in my 35-59 age group, my highest non athena placement and blew my goal of sub 1:30 out of the water with a 1:24:14 finish time!

500 m swim - 9:14 (12/25)
T1 - 2:15 (8/25)
14 mi bike - 48:09, 17.4 mph avg (8/25)
T2 - 1:50 (5/25)
2.1 mi run - 22:42, 10:49 avg (17/25)

Second, in the middle of the bike, I came to the decision I'm not ready to an Olympic distance race this year.  Probably ready physically to finish it but not really race it the way I would want to do it and definitely not ready mentally.  So I told myself, there's nothing wrong with admitting you aren't ready, so just say you're not ready and be done with that. I felt super happy when I made that decision and that feeling has stuck with me.  Plus, I'm making that decision at the end of a good race, not a bad race and I don't feel like I'm forcing something to happen which is how I've felt previously.  So, no more angst from me, I promise!



I wrote this verse on my arm this morning and it carried me all day long.  For God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind.  2 Timothy 1:7, NKJV

The swim was great.  I made Kristie do a warm up swim with me and I'm glad I did that because the water was a lot saltier than I was expecting.  It was also perfectly flat which was a great surprise!  Then, the olympic waves started at 7 a.m. but we didn't start until almost 8 a.m. so it was fun having a friend to hang out with.



 The swim was around a dock and so I counted that there were five docks from start to the right hand turn, then 15 boat slips from the turn to the swim exit.  The swim was a jump and tread start, a lot easier than I expected.  The swim was good, really good.  I passed a good bunch of people pretty quickly and then just got in my groove, counting docks as we swam by.  The buoys were on my left but I just sighted off the boats on my right so I wasn't looking at the sun.  Easy peasy.  There was a hard right turn and there was a girl in front of me that kept drifting left despite me knocking her feet.  So I had to sprint past her to get in front of her before the turn so she wouldn't take me out.  The good part about that was it kicked me into high gear and I so I kept up a lot of speed (and I use that term loosely) heading into the home stretch.  This part of the swim was fun because spectators were lining the side of the course and I was able to see Josh and the girls.  With about 100m left to go, the lead 3 males from the under 35 group that left behind us.  I just followed their bubbles to the swim exit.



Not a great picture but that's me in the blue climbing out of the water. Josh told me to pretend I was a Navy Seal going on a mission.  I was just happy not to belly flop back into the water.

T1 was good.  Last race I decided to take a nap doing T2 so this time I made sure to move a little faster.  My only complaint was that there wasn't a water between the swim and the bike and it would have been really nice to have rinsed out my mouth.

The bike was my strongest leg by far.  I wore my HRM and knew my max heart rate from some lactate threshold testing I've done and so I kept it right below that the whole bike.  My computer said the bike was 14.5 which would give me an average of 18mph, so while it's not official, I'm going with that   The bike course included the Kemah bridge which I've done as part of a 10K race twice so it was fun to go over it on a bike.  More fun though was passing the 30 year old man in front of me on a tri bike and a disc wheel while he was standing to climb and I was still sitting.  My max speed on the downhill was 33 mph.

 



That's the bridge.  It was pretty windy up top but fun to come down!  My only complaint on the bike was that I took PowerBar Perform on the bike with me, only to learn the hard way that it's hard to make yourself drink a salty drink when your mouth is full of salt!

T2 went smoothly.  No problems except I had to refix my hair.  I need another two inches then I can stop worrying about it during races, lol.



The run was, um, not so fun.  My stomach decided to revolt against everything I'd put in it (that full bottle of champagne I drank by myself last night had nothing to do with this I'm sure) and so I had to take frequent walk breaks to not vomit everywhere.  I've also been doing some heart rate training and I've come to realize that when my heart rate exceeds a certain point, my body just stops and the only way to recover is to walk.  Usually, I don't push so hard on the bike so my HR is pretty low starting out on the run.  Not the case today the whole two miles was the constant battle of, run, HR flies up, walk until it comes back down, run again.  Rinse repeat a good four or five times.  But, you know, it was only 2.1 miles and over with quickly.



So, finally a great race.  I'm not scared of salt water (well, brackish).  I realized what it feels like to leave it all out on the bike course and blow up in the run but that's a good thing to learn.  I also realized that brackish water requires some different planning in transition and on the bike and maybe even some tums beforehand.  All good things to learn in a race that was a B race at best with what ended up being A race results.

Then it was nap time and we had a babysitter come over in the afternoon and we went grocery shopping where I annoyed my husband by buying three kinds of cheese and four kinds of crackers, grabbing two of every sample and adding a good $70 in post race food to the grocery bill

All in all, I couldn't have asked for a better day.  Minus the bleeding blister on my ankle and the barnacles that sliced up my foot at some point during the swim.  A good race, a great swim, and no more angst I promise!  Thanks for the reminder from all of you but especially from Susie that above all else, this is supposed to be fun.  I had fun today <)

[texassmith]

So proud of you! Awesome race!

LOTS more champagne in 2 weeks

[katinthehat]

Aug 24, 2013 18:35:02 GMT -5 texassmith said:

So proud of you! Awesome race!

LOTS more champagne in 2 weeks

I'm "testing" another bottle tonight!

[trigal]

Awesome!! You've been doing so great! Congrats!

[coconutbug]

Fantastic job! I always love reading your reports w/pics.

[runaways]

Congratulations! You make the tri sound so fun - I may have to go for it and try one sometime soon!

[kams]

So the trick is pre-race bubbly?

Congrats on an awesome race! I love that you pushed it, found limits, and are making a move to improve your overall season. No need to rush the oly.

[grk2012]

Great report, what a fun-sounding day! Congrats.

I came to a similar decision last year about dropping to a half marathon instead of the full I'd registered for, and can surely relate to that peaceful calm weight-off-your-shoulders feeling. That half is still my PR for the distance.

[jene]

Congrats! You killed it!

[emilyj]

Congrats! You did awesome!

[sadlebred]

Awesome race report!! Congratulations!!!

[katandkevin]

Congrats! It sounds like you had a great race!

[oliviapope]

What a great race! It looks like so much fun!

[libbygrl109]

Congrats on a great race!

[emsumm]

Awesome, congrats!!

[cinco]

Congrats! You did awesome!

[Wines Not Whines]

Congrats on a great race!

[sunshinejoy]

Love your race reports--you did a great job!  I loved the reminder you brought up that it is supposed to be fun.  I keep reminding myself of this when I get so hung up on my times and improving them. 

[sassystace]

Great recap and race!! Glad you had FUN!

[keweenawlove]

Great race and great recap!