Heading into this race, two things had been causing me enough grief that I really wanted to not even show up. Thank you coach for not letting me back out!
This would be my first race that wasn’t wetsuit legal, and I had yet to swim even half that distance non-stop in open water. The last time I’d tried, I allowed myself to get overwhelmed with thoughts of what could happen and chickened out of doing the swim.
Like everyone else, I’ve also been fighting the heat, only I’d let my struggles get into my head and diminish my confidence. Heat and dehydration has already crushed one race this year (or at least been a large contributing factor) and cut short many runs.
So, I really didn’t want to do this race, and hinted several times to coach that she should have me pull out. If she picked up on my hints, she never acknowledged them. I knew that if I did well it would be a huge confidence boost, but doing poorly would deepen my doubts. Race day I focused on keeping busy with the details, so I wouldn’t freak myself out. I found stuff to do right up to start time , even giving other obviously new racers pep talks.
So here is what happened:
The swim:
It was another deep water start. Since I don’t float so well, I opted to stand on the shore 20-30 yards behind the starting line. I’d rather swim the extra distance than burn up all that energy trying to stay afloat. This put me way back in the swim pack, a place I’ve learned to avoid because that is where the bad swimmers are. The first 250 yards were a battle trying to get around people who can’t swim straight, or breast strokers who will kick you in the head or stomach and not even notice. Several times I stopped swimming long enough to search out clear water, which would never last because I was swimming faster than most of those around me.
Once I got going it was just routine; stroke and breath, look up every now and then to make sure I was on course. I did lose the seal on one goggle, but smacked it with my hand and kept going without hardly breaking stride! The only real problem arose because of how the race organizers had scheduled the races. I was the in the last wave of the Olympic distance. Behind me was the sprint distance racers. The course was an out and back, which meant that halfway through my “back” I ran smack into a bunch of sprint racers. There were bodies all over the place and I couldn’t find any room to swim. I got kicked in the head and stomach MANY times, and felt like I almost ripped the shorts off of one swimmer! Normally I would have tried to accelerate through the crowd into open space, but no wetsuit meant less buoyancy, and less buoyancy meant less risk taking.
I finally made it to the end and was able to stand up. Because there were only two volunteers helping people out of the water, we were pretty backed up. I think that helped me, because once out of the water I didn’t experience any of my normal disorientation. I took off, running around people trying to get to my bike. I quickly changed into my bike gear, and ran past people to start the bike leg.
Beating #1: that darn gorilla hanging on my back telling me I couldn’t do the swim. It was an unofficial new PR for the swim split by 3 minutes. I know I can do this, and he won’t be hanging around me any more!
The bike:
The first thing I did once I got going was to take a GU and drink some water. I’d forgotten to bring an extra GU for race start, and I wanted to wash the salt water taste out of my mouth. I was now out of the water and on track!
It’s been a while since I rode this distance (all of my recent rides have been longer), so I wasn’t sure how hard I could ride. I wanted to go easier than my last race at this distance so I could have more left for the run. This time I didn’t have any problems with my bike computer and I was able to monitor my activity the entire race. I was in the 20 mph range and passing a lot of people. Having started in the last wave I knew that each person I passed moved me up in the finishing order. However, if people passed me it didn’t necessarily move me down because they could have started before me. This really worked to my advantage.
I was doing most of the passing, until we hit the Kemah bridge. I still passed people, but was passed myself by a couple of riders. I checked my speed, and I was flying. I was averaging speeds of 20-23 and didn’t feel like I was working that hard. I know now that there was a bit of a tail wind helping me out as my speed dropped a bit in the other direction. I had checked the route on paper, but wasn’t that familiar with this area and didn’t really know where I was other than my trip odometer. It didn’t matter though, this was a flat and fast course.
With less than 5 miles left I was passed by one of my racing friends. He is a much stronger biker than I, and since I hadn’t seen him yet I figured he had also beat me out of the water. As he passed me I briefly thought about picking up my pace to try and stay close, but decided to stick with my original strategy: save some for the run!
The run:
I started my run at close to 9 am, which meant I wouldn’t be running in the brutal heat of the day. My plan for the run was to do the second half faster than the first. While that is easy for me to do in a simple running race, coming off the bike I tend to start off faster than I can maintain. I forced myself to hold the pack back, even though I was being passed. I kept telling myself these people were going to run out of gas and I would pass them later on. I also hoped to run the entire distance, that was my final battle of the day.
100 yards from the turnaround point I again saw my friend, coming towards me. I walked long enough to down another GU, drink some water, and douse my head with cold water. I succeeded with the first two objectives, but the water they were handing out was room temperature and didn’t do a lot to cool me down. I had my own water I was carrying that was cool, but was trying to save that in case I started to overheat. I started running again, only 3 miles to go!
I caught up to my friend, asked how he was doing, gave him words of encouragement, and then left him in the dust. I stopped briefly at mile 5 for water to drink and my head, this time it was cold! As we got closer to the finish I caught up to a taller and younger runner. I stayed behind him to draft as there was a nice breeze coming off the water. I tried to pass him a couple of times, but each time I drew close he would speed up and I would pull in behind him again. Right at the end he found another gear I couldn’t match and he pulled away. I wish I could have caught up to him to thank him as he made me work harder than I would have on my own.
Beating #2: I beat my fear of the heat. It wasn’t 90+ degrees, and I did walk through two aid stations, but for the most part I held my own today. I also knocked several minutes off of my previous best run split.
Conclusion:
This was a huge race and mental victory for me. Not only did I record new PR splits for the swim and run (and maybe the bike), but I knocked almost 10 minutes off my overall time. I’m waiting to see the official results, but I think I’m within 15 minutes of the podium. This was almost 30 minutes faster than my first Olympic race 10 months ago!
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