It's over. I've finished a race. I am now officially a triathlete. And for 2/3rds of the race, I have lots to be happy about. As for the other third, I learned some serious lessons.
We got to the race site just after 8, and quickly passed through packet pick-up. With about 30 minutes until the gun, I put on my wetsuit and went for a warm-up swim. I was surprised at the temperature of the water. With the suit on, it really wasn't that bad. I was in the third wave, so I got to wait for six minutes after the elites left, then we were sent off.
This is when things started to go poorly. Unlike running races where I'm good about controlling my pace from the start, I went out way too hard to start. I had an adrenaline dump at the gun, then tried to swim at the pace that corresponded to my heart rate. I got caught up in the rush, and ended up suffering quickly. By about 200m, I was out of breath. With the tight wetsuit and cold water, I just couldn't catch my breath. I would do a breaststroke for a while, then try to swim, and within another 50 strokes, I'd be gassed. More breaststroke, a lot of cursing myself, some freestyle, a little convincing: "just keep moving, you're in a wetsuit, you won't drown", breaststroke, 30 strokes free, "catch and pass the old guy doing backstroke", rinse and repeat until I got to the end. I didn't want to look at my watch at this point, because I knew it was horrible. I'm embarrassed for my coach that this is the performance I put on. I tried to re-gather myself in transition and make the rest of the day successful.
Never let it said that hate isn't a powerful emotion to fuel a bike ride. I was angry with myself, and I directed it at everyone on that bike course. Right from the Bike On line, I was in chase mode. Every person I saw in front of me was a target, and was passing from the start. On Sixth Line Hill, I probably passed 50-100 people, then put the hammer down and dropped another bunch who were recovering. I was out to crush souls. If the number on someone's calf was between 35 and 39, I wanted to pass them so fast they would consider dropping out of the race. I wanted them to wonder, "Was that guy's head on fire?" But mostly I wanted to make myself suffer. With that horrible swim, I earned it. If I wanted back in the race, I had to kill myself to get it. And right to the Bike Off line, I pushed the pace.
A better transition this time, and I was off on the run. I tried to keep the good form I was working on this week, and a good pace. On a flat course, I was shooting for 4:10-4:15/km, but this was anything but a flat course. 80% was off-road, with a lot of steep climbing and descending. I would have a 5:00/km, followed by a 3:53. So pace was out the window, and it became a matter of PE and chasing. I kept moving up the field, including 4 or 5 places in my age group. This held until the final kilometer. All of my marathon training has taught me how to evenly pace a run. Give me a distance, and I can hit and hold my optimum pace. But I have no finishing kick. Two guys from my AG passed me with 500-800m to go, and I couldn't find the extra gear to chase and re-pass them. I was completely gassed at the line, but I couldn't dig out that little bit extra to hold my spot.
After cooldown, I got a chance to check out the results, and I couldn't help but chuckle. This is a year for learning experiences, and "so close" results. The official results:
1:44:30, 105/583 overall, 16/95 35-39 AG
Swim: 16:45, 72/95
Bike: 50:31, 7/95
Run: 33:47, 13/95
Race points: 0 (no cigar), Season points: 5
Can you tell which sports I've been doing for years?
I could be angry about the result, but I'm not. I learned a lot. The first thing I learned, I need to start right at the back for the swim. Rather than be waist-deep and off like a shot to start, I would be better served to take a deep breath, walk in from the beach, and just swim. I need to relax, not worry about anything. Assume I'll be in the back half of the group, accept it, and do what I know I can. I should treat the swim like I would the first miles of a marathon, and make it "painfully slow". If I had done that, and got out of the water at 15:00, with everything else equal, I'd be 11th.
The second lesson, and less important than the first, is to work on finishing runs. I have a run block scheduled for the summer, which will give me a chance to build that speed. It might cost me in the mean time, but it's not like I could fix it next week anyway. It was originally scheduled as a tempo run block, but I may change that to VO2max work to get that speed and pain threshold up. I gave away two places, costing me points, and I can't continue to do that if I want to be competitive.
Now I get two weeks off, then it's up to Muskoka for the long course Chase. Unfortunately, this doesn't play to my strengths, since it's really a swimmers race. The swim is 2km (almost three times today's distance), and the bike and run are 55km and 15km (less than double and exactly double). I have to admit to a real sense of nervousness, if I had that much trouble over 750m this morning, 2000m is not good at all. I'll try to process this over the next few days, gather my energy, and see how my nerves hold up.
All in all, a good day. Mild disappointment, but some real successes as well. I'm still learning, still gaining experience. I'll be back, and I'll be better. Then I'll really be "riding through your town with [my] head on fire."
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4 comments:
Great RR and some excellent lessons learned. The most important being:
- open water swimming is about as much like pool swimming as a Paris-Roubaix is like a track sprint.
- once you're doing breaststroke, it's game over. You gotta pace yourself and keep hammering the freestyle.
That said, for your first big open water swim, "not getting pulled out" is a fine accomplishment.
It seems like the "disappointment matrix" for your triathlon experience is the transpose of mine. I found the swim great while the run was soul crushing... watching all of those people pass me as I hobbled along.
You're right comparing the swim to the differences in cycling (although P-R finishes on a track, often in a sprint, but I get your point :)
And getting myself out of sorts and needing to breaststroke was absolutely "game over". As I said, my new plan, at least for the rest of this season, is start right at the back and swim as slow as I can to start, with long, exaggerated, TI strokes. The wetsuit speed is addictive, but I have to ignore it. I'll do better picking my way through the crowd than killing myself and getting shot out the back.
For a time, my goals were: don't grab the buoy, don't grab a kayak. I'd rather tread water or doggy paddle than hold on. If next race I can be right about the 50th percentile, I can set up a much better bike/run. I'll still try to crush souls, though.
Good point on P-R... I even felt kind robbed when O'Grady won solo last year... would've been great to see a former track racer crush some roadies in the velodrome.
No buoys, no kayaks, no dog paddle, no treading. It was a success.
Nice race report. I feel differently with respect to the breast stroke comment posted by Mark.
For mid level, age group, tri swimmers breaststroke is not a killer. So long as we limit the stroke to 1 or 2 short sessions per race.
15 seconds of breaststroke feels like an eternity in a race. When it happens to me, I feel like i am not moving at all and that minutes are passing. The actual time "lost" is probably 5 seconds or so.
The time/distance loss is even less if I take the opportunity to refocus and resight.
At least that is my experience. I have come out of the water thinking my swim was terrible becuase of a bad sight line or due to the fact that i did some breast stroke. In the end my time are all fairly consistent.
All the best in 2009.
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