kerr lake tri race report

It's been a while since I've done one of these, not sure why but the previous races I guess I just didn't suffer enough to put the effort into doing a write up. I keep thinking I'm going to go back and add them, but I'm not making any promises. And now back to your regularly scheduled programming...

I got to the race site early to pick up my packet and finish final preparations. It rained a bit on the way there so I was hopeful for a cooler than expected race. It wasn't too hot but the humidity was up there. Setup my transition area and talked to some friends then when walking back to transition I saw Mika holding her swim cap and remembered I left mine in the race packet back in my car. ok, one more trip to the car ain't going to kill me. Got the race cap, did a quick warmup run and swim and waited for my wave to start.

The Swim: 37:32 - ( 29:36 in 2007 )
the swim was long to start with but when you add in that the buoy came loose and drifted after the 2nd wave passed by it adds even more. when I got out of the water and say 36 something on my watch ( the timing mat was at the top of the hill ), I was a bit depressed since I was hoping to limit my loses due to my shoulder injury to 2 - 3 minutes, so 6 minutes ( I normally swim 29-30 for oly distance ) was not good. Hindsight being 20/20 in all I can see by the results from this year vs last that the top 15 swimmers, which didn't have the buoy drift, were still 2 - 4 minutes slower than last year, so now it makes more sense. Just another reason why time goals at triathlons are not such a good idea. Any way not much happened on the swim, I started back and left since I knew there was no sprint in me and I didn't want to get hammered. I had one mishap of swimming off course when I was spotting on something yellow ( looked like the turn buoy ) in somebody's yard, until I realized I was swimming all by myself and corrected it. It did start to rain on the final 200 yards which felt kinda odd, I busied my brain with stupid thoughts of I can't wait to finish this swim so I won't keep getting wet from the rain. when I got out of the water I heard a thunder clap and wondered if they would pull everyone else from the water. But it was the only thunder I heard and everyone else got to finish up their swim.

T1: 1:42 - ( 2:52 in 2007 )
last time we had wetsuits, so transition was faster, but I did take a bit longer to put my running shoes in a bag so they wouldn't be soaked from the rain when I started the run.

Bike: 1:09:44 - ( 1:13:58 in 2007)
When I got on the bike I was pissed about my swim time and since my legs felt awesome I just started to hammer. At mile 10 I was averaging 22 mph and reality set in that I still needed to do a 10k after this so I settled into my just below acid level for the rest of the bike. I love this bike course, it's rolling with no major climbs so perfect for me, I can maintain my speed up the hills, then spin to recover before going back into pace. the wind was at our back on the gradual uphill out, so coming back on the gradual downhill it would be in our faces. perfect for fast bike splits. 4 minutes faster than last time!

T2: 1:50 - ( 1:39 in 2007 )
took a little longer to make sure to not forget my race number, put on socks for the run and dig the dry shoes out of the bag.

Run: 54:55 - ( 58:20 in 2007 )
got off the bike with a bit of stomach issue going on so didn't take my last gel, but my legs felt great and I did my first two miles in 8:35 and 8:25, was taking in water and ice for the hat at each stop, mile 3 was downhill so picked it up and had and 8 minute mile, I was at 24:02 at three miles and on pace for a 10k pr (53:14), mile 4 is uphill and I slowed a bit for a 9 minute mile, but with only 2 miles togo I thought if I could do mile 5 at 9 minutes then mile 6 was downhill again and I could ride the adrenaline in. But that wasn't going to happen. my left hamstring cramped up bad just after mile 4. I had to stop and stretch it out for 2 full minutes before I could walk again and then slowly start running, mile 5 ended up a 10:41 so my dream of breaking my 10k pr was gone but 2:45 for the race was still out there if I could just hold on. mile 6 is downhill and my leg was feeling better and I did an 8:20, unfortunately just as I made the turn for the finish and the last .2 I could feel the pre cramp tinglings coming on, so no, there would be no sprint to the finish to break 2:45, at this point I just wanted to make it to the end with being bent over in pain.

total time 2:45:12 - ( 2:46:22 in 2007 )

Before the race I looked up last years results for the master clyde division and thought if I could break 2:40 I could get 2nd, the 1st place MC from last year signed up and he had a 2:27 so I didn't think first was possible. I was totally shocked when I saw I got 1st. The previous years winner didn't show up and it looks like one of the other guys who had finished low 2:40's last year had some bike issues. Just goes to show that you can't put so much faith in time goals for triathlons, they course and conditions dictate time and mother nature is very fickle.