Turkey Trot 2.0

So, last year M & I ran this little neighborhood race, which I chronicled here. This year, we were joined by my brother, his wife and T, pictured here standing in a long registration line:

I think everyone else must have brought a bunch more people with them, because this was the pre-race scene this year:

It was crazy crowded compared to last year. They tried to do wave starts at the last minute, hence the illegible sign being held up in the above photo. T, M & Nerissa were all planning to run together and debated going in the “joggers” wave, but in the end lined up with Erik & I in the “runners” wave. They sent our wave off and after a cheeky “on your left” to M, Erik and I were off. Despite having run three times in his whole file, Erik’s basketball fitness enabled him to run with me for the whole race, which was nice.

He had a killer sprint to the finish line (watching a 6′8″ guy running all out through packs of “fun-runners” is one of the most comical spectacles I’ve ever witnessed.  I was profoundly sorry I didn’t have a video camera handy… ) and I made it across the line in 29:09 – a one minute and 12 second improvement over last year’s time. (Hells yeah!)

While waiting for the others, I saw these awesome “pilgrims”:

M held T in check and only let him sprint it out at the end, so he finished the race slower than he would have liked but un-injured, a definite plus!

And just behind T were Nerissa and M looking strong:

Everyone had a good time and I indoctrinated Erik into my post-race ritual:

(I don’t think he’s a fan… ) I definitely think the Turkey Trot organizers need to step up in terms of pre-race organization, especially given this event’s growth. But once the race got started, we had a good time and a lot of money was raised for the Ballard Food Bank – a definite bright side.

 

Black Diamond Race Report

After a not so restful night, courtesy of the a$$holes in the campsite across from us, one of whom insisted on screaming at the top of her lungs because “it’s a state park and people expect it to be loud, so f— them.” I mercifully managed to fall asleep eventually, but it was still very annoying. It was a chilly morning and all of us were a bit grumpy after the evening. On top of that, I was in a very strange head space for the race. After IMC, I didn’t do any real organized training. I got out and did a few swims, bikes and runs as I felt like it, but by and large it was unstructured “do what I felt like” type stuff. So, it just felt like I was getting ready to do a half-ironman on no training, even though intellectually I knew better.

So, despite wanting to bag the race, go back to bed and lounge around the campsite eating pancakes and bacon, we set off for the race. There was no parking at the park where the race was being held, so they had to drop me off and take a shuttle from some off-site parking. I hit the porta-potties since the line was never going to be that short again and then went to set up my transition area.

This race had a crazy number of first-timers. And I don’t mean first time half-ironman racers, I mean first triathlon people. The things I heard people say both yesterday and today was crazy. It was definitely going to be an interesting day. One of them was the guy who racked his bike next to mine, with all of his stuff in a plastic milk crate which he proceeded to put behind my bike tire, up against the fence. Ordinarily, this is a no-no and when he asked me if it was okay, I told him that it was fine today but that he shouldn’t do it in the future.

Soon, it was time to line up for the swim. I ran into my friend AndyPants in the transition area, who shared my sentiments on the folly of doing this race. We agreed that it was just for fun and that it was a good thing we weren’t eating pancakes and bacon (however sarcastically) and so forth. On a chilly morning, getting into a lake just seems stupid:

As mentioned previously, with all of the newbies doing this race, there were some amusing sights – such as this woman with Ugg boots:

I finally managed to get in the lake, filled my wetsuit with cold water and did a quick warm-up swim before returning to the beach to wait for the start. Don’t I look psyched?

The nicest thing about the swim was that there were two waves – men in wave #1 and women in wave #2, five minutes later:

The sucky thing about the swim was that it was two loops, which is not fun. The start was a total cluster, craziness everywhere:

I had the fight my way through every kind of stroke imaginable and few that weren’t and I didn’t really find clear water until the first buoy. Eventually, I found some clear water which continued for the last half of the first lap and most of the second. There was the occasional crazy swimmer to deal with, but that wasn’t such a big deal. I knew it wasn’t going to be as fast as I’d wanted because of all the time I lost at the beginning, but it wasn’t too bad.

After the world’s slowest transition, (complete with M & T heckling me) I was out on the bike:

The first few miles of the bike are never fun and this was no exception. It took about eight miles before I could get my head in the game and out of the “This sucks, I want to quit” mode. Finally, I started feeling better and really started enjoying the bike. I was passing people and generally just feeling great. The bike was also a looped course, but it was such an odd course that I didn’t get lapped by the fast people like Lake Stevens and you never really knew where you were in the loop, so it was easy to put your head down and ride.

I came in off the bike feeling great and my second transition was a bit better, still way too long, though. Then it was time for the run. This was definitely where I could feel my lack of training. I definitely pushed too hard on the bike, but the lack of long runs was killing me. The minute I started running, my legs felt awful and I knew it was not going to be a good run leg. I tried to run as much as I could and had some good sections where I could just find a zone and run but there were also a lot of sections where I had to walk. Luckily, I’d already planned to train for a winter marathon with M, so I knew next year’s run improvement plan was already underway.

In addition to the suckiness of my run, the run course was not my favorite. There were sporadic mile markers, aid stations placed at random intervals and all sorts of irritating hills. The worst part was the last mile or so, where you run around the lake on a dirt trail that includes a steep downhill followed by a steep uphill, which really suck after all of the miles that you’ve put in. I was running most of the time by this point, but I was afraid I’d fall if I tried to run those sections. Suffice it to say, I was not a fan. (Sorry about the lack of pictures, my race photographer had to take her sick husband home. But just imagine a tired and grumpy M running across the finish line… )

Before the race, I’d set a goal of 7 hours, which passed while I was somewhere in the last mile section around the lake. I was bummed that I’d missed it but pleased that I would be reasonably close and still faster than last year’s Lake Stevens. I crossed the line in 7:10 – a huge PR for me. Before writing this, I looked up last year’s times at Lake Stevens:

Overall: 7:49
Swim: 49:51
1st Transition: 4:44
Bike: 3:54
2nd Transition: 5:14
Run: 2:54

Compare with the splits from this race:

Overall: 7:10 (39 minutes faster)
Swim: 45:22 (4:30 faster)
1st Transition: 5:25 (a minute or so slower)
Bike: 3:25 (29 minutes faster)
2nd Transition: 4:08 (a minute or so faster)
Run: 2:49 (6 minutes faster)

Overall, I’m very pleased with my performance. Given how I prepared for this race, I know I can improve on it for next year and I know exactly how I’m going to do it. All in all, it was a very good racing season for me.

Seafair Triathlon: a race report

The morning kicked off with Smokey Joe barking his head off very early in the morning. Despite the fact that Smokey Joe never barks at 0-dark:thirty, T still yelled at him to be quiet. Then we heard M’s voice calling our name. CRAP! My alarm didn’t go off! ARGH! So, after a frenzied flurry of dressing and getting ready to go, we were off to the race.

It’s been about four years since I’ve done a sprint triathlon and I was surprised by the butterflies in my stomach. Lately, my workouts have been longer than the entire race, but there’s just something about racing that makes me nervous. M of course was very nervous, so both of us were quite a pair. We body-marked ourselves rather than standing in the line and got our transition areas set up. We were two numbers apart, so we got to set up right next to each other, which was pretty cool.

We made sure we knew where our rack was located in relation to the various entry/exit points and hit the bathrooms. Then before we knew it, it was time to get into our wetsuits and get ready to swim. M was first, in the third wave with the rest of the 30-34 year old women. I was in the fifth wave, so I couldn’t see her too well from my vantage point, so I just kept my fingers crossed that I wouldn’t see a pink cap being brought in on a boat or anything. Luckily, I didn’t see anyone abandon in the beginning so I was cautiously optimistic that she was doing okay.

M’s husband J was on photo duty, as T had forgotten our camera in the craziness of oversleeping. He got a couple pics of the swim start:

I had a horrible swim. There was some sort of rock wall that we had to swim over, which hurt. Plus, I seeded myself as if the swim was 1.2 miles, not 1/2 a mile, so I was too far back in the breaststroking, crazy swimming group and it was very hard to navigate through all of that mess. Oh well, shake it off and get ready to start biking:

I had a pretty great bike. My legs were cold and numb from the swim, but I got down into my aero bars, found a rhythm and started passing people. The course is super flat and winds along Lake Washington and then up onto the I-90 express lane. There were tons of people on the course, so it was pretty crowded.

Then the course goes up a narrow pedestrian path as you go up onto the bridge. Naturally it bottlenecks here as you can only safely ride single-file (not that there weren’t some jackasses trying to pass people despite the volunteers telling them not to.) There were a couple of slower folks when I got there, so it was pretty slow going, and some guy behind me yelled “Oh, come on!” in an exasperated tone. Without even thinking, I responded with “They are doing the best they can. You need to settle down” in my calm ‘Mom’ voice. I was pleasantly surprised that the guy I’d chastised actually came up next to me and said “You’re right, I was a jerk. I’m sorry.” So, that was nice.

As I was cruising along the bridge, I saw a familiar yellow/white/black trisuit ahead of me. I had a decision, do I pass M or do I stay with her. I weighed the pros of racing my race on tired legs from yesterday’s ride or stick with M and get to do her first race with her. No brainer! So, I heckled her for a while and we took turns passing each other with a snarky “On your left” and generally enjoyed ourselves.

We pulled into transition at the same time, and did our transitions pretty much simultaneously. As we headed out on the run course together, I got to hear about her triumphant swim and general excitement about her first race, which was pretty awesome. She ended up dropping me on a stupid hill at mile 2 and I couldn’t close the gap, but J did catch one of the best run pictures of me, ever – don’t I look badass? (Oh, and the uniform I’m wearing was designed by yours truly for our tri team.)

M had just finished about 15 seconds ahead of me, so she was at the finish line grinning from ear to ear. I was so proud of her. She did so good for her first race and with open water anxiety to boot. I think this photo sums it up nicely:

Our final splits:
Me: Total=1:39:32, Swim=19:09, T1=2:51, Bike=44:56, T2=1:42, Run=30:53
M: Total=1:49:16, Swim=26:11, T1=3:05, Bike=47:37, T2=1:49, Run=30:34

All in all, it was an awesome day, in no small part because of the boys:

We finished our morning with a delicious brunch, a nap and for me a 10-mile run in the evening. (Ironman training stops for no one… ) I was surprised by how sore I was after the race, apparently going fast hurts a lot more than going long. Next year, I’ll actually taper for the race and race it properly rather than throwing it in to a mess of Ironman training. So, look out Seafair Triathlon, I’m gunning for you!

Race Report- Lake Stevens 70.3

I would subhead this post “Rolling with the punches” because that’s really the underlying theme of the day. I apologize in advance for the lack of photos – T had to go back and pack up the campground so he wasn’t able to be my race photographer. If my official race photos aren’t too awful, I’ll link to them later. To those who don’t wish to read a really long report – scroll down to the bottom to see my times.

I usually like to be at the transition area super early, but with a 6:30 start time it was really hard to make the call to leave at 4:00 am, so I decided to suck it up and cut my pre-race time shorter in favor of some more sleep. Not a good idea, I arrived at the transition area at 5:45, about a half an hour before it was supposed to close. I frantically set up my transition area and pumped up my tires. I just felt completely flustered and unfocused. T had dropped me off and gone to look for parking, so by the time I found him back in the throngs of people, I was in quite a state. He calmed me down and reminded me that I had another 40 minutes before my wave started, which helped a lot. I got into my wetsuit and started feeling better. Then it was time to bid T good-bye and line up for my swim start.

The way the swim start works for this race is a little different, there’s a long permanent dock that they attach a floating dock to for the swimmers to get into the water and float next to for a few minutes while they wait for their wave to start. The various groups line up before hand in order of their start times, which gives you more time to get nervous, but also time to chat with your fellow age-group members which was nice. I found Jennifer to wish her luck, since her group left approx. 10 minutes before mine (plus she’s a really fast swimmer, so I knew she’d be way ahead of me by the end of my swim… ) Then I went and found my group of fellow 35-39 year old ladies.

I always enjoy having a ladies only wave, mostly because the vibe pre-race is usually so supportive. There were a number of first-timers for this distance, so I got to assure them they were going to do great. Most of them just wanted to finish in under 8 hours (and probably did it way faster than that) and were generally unsure if they were going to be able to do it at all. Before we knew it, the wave before us was off and it was our turn to get in the water. Usually, I do a little swim warm-up before hand, but that wasn’t really an option at this race, so I was hoping that wouldn’t be a big problem. But no time to worry about that, it was time to swim.

For once, I was able to start in the group and not get stuck in the craziness. I started out with a nice relaxed stroke and just tried to find a nice smooth rhythm. I passed a few folks in my group and looked for someone to draft off of that was swimming a nice steady pace in a straight line. There was a small group that looked promising, but after I followed them for a bit, I realized they weren’t going in a straight line. So, after a little course correction, I found some open water and just tried to stay out of the way of the good swimmers from the other waves. The course is pretty narrow and got a little crowded toward the end, but I finished feeling good.

I headed into transition and changed into my bike gear. It felt like it took forever, but before I knew it I was out on the bike course. They’d changed the course, so the scouting ride I’d done a month ago was basically wasted. (I used to drive the course beforehand, and will do so in the future from now on… ) Luckily, it was pretty similar to the previous course start, so it wasn’t too big of a shock. I felt pretty good heading out and just focused on finding a nice comfortable pace to start with. About seven miles in, I noticed that one of my cleats felt loose and I realized that I was going to have to stop and deal with it. I debated the point for a while, then pulled to the side of the road – letting the folks I’d worked so hard to pass in the swim pass me by. I tightened my cleat and hit the road, only to have my chain jam up a little while later. Curse you, bike course!

Because the course is lots of hills – a lot of slow uphills and speedy downhills, I couldn’t calculate my average pace. I was trying to do the bike course in 3:30, but I couldn’t tell if that was going to be in the cards. As I reached the end of the first loop, I discovered the other surprises the course had in store – some stupid big hills. RUDE! When I saw the hills, I realized if I was going to make my time goal, it was going to be very, very close. At the half-way point, I saw that unless I could ride the second loop considerable faster than the first loop, 3:30 was not going to happen. Because my overall goal of 7:30 relied on a 3:30 bike or pretty close to it (or some sort of miraculously fast run) I was forced to consider that I might have to shift my goal and just do the best that I could.

I passed some folks going into the second lap, which was a nice confidence boost. I tried to focus on how much better I felt this year compared to last year. I felt much better on the bike this time, compared to last year where I just wanted it to be over with. The last four miles, after the second lap, were also pretty rolling – again RUDE! I finally made it to the transition area and changed into my run stuff, a little on the slow side and headed out.

My legs were not happy to run after all of those hills, so I walked for a few minutes to let everything loosen up a bit (and it gave me a chance to eat my pancake with peanut butter I had left from breakfast) then I forced myself to run/shuffle. I stopped at aid stations for water to dump on myself to keep cool as the sun was coming out and it got a little toasty on some parts of the run course. The run course was a figure 8 shaped that you ran two times. Because of this, tons of spectators would gather in the middle so there was tons of support which was really nice. It also broke up the course into manageable sections so it wasn’t too disheartening. The second half wound along the lake which was not only scenic, but provided a nice breeze and folks would sit outside their houses and cheer for us, which rocked – especially spritzer girl.

Unfortunately, my legs just didn’t want to run as much of it as I wanted them to and they were winning the battle. I tried to find a zone and just get into it, but it was definitely a struggle. I calculated how fast I needed to run the various sections and it became pretty clear that I wasn’t going to make my 7:30 goal time, so I had to deal with it and try to come as close as I could, which wasn’t close at all. Finally, I was on the last part of my last lap and chugged it on in to the finish line. As always, it was so nice to be done and T was there to cheer me in.

Final times:

Overall: 7:49
Swim: 49:51
1st Transition: 4:44
Bike: 3:54
2nd Transition: 5:14
Run: 2:54

I’m trying to appreciate the positives and figure out how to learn from the negatives. The positives were:

• I was faster on a tougher course than last year’s race.
• I felt better overall than I did last year, in terms of both general fitness level and post-race recovery.
• I was much better about my nutrition. Although I needed to drink more on the bike, I didn’t overeat on the bike so I didn’t feel bloated on the run.
• I took all of the obstacles thrown at me in stride and handled them calmly.
• I found a new favorite pre-race breakfast: cold pancakes with peanut butter and a banana. Also quite delicious after the bike…

The things I learned:

• I need to step up my run training so that my run fitness is better and that it won’t be such a struggle.
• I need to continue to work on my mental skills and have confidence that I can do more than I let myself believe that I can.
• If your shoe feels weird on the pre-race ride, stop and check it out immediately!

Overall, I had a great experience and I would definitely do this race again. It’s a beautiful course and is very well organized (although they could stand to have someone announce the slower folks coming across the line, I thought that was pretty crappy… ) Sorry for the crazy long report, but that’s the price you pay for reading this long-winded girl’s blog.

Now, that’s more like it!

I saw that T posted my results in the comments section of my last post, but I figure I’ll post a little side by side comparison as a good intro to bragging that I knocked 30 MINUTES off of last year’s time – oh yeah!

Overall time – 2007: 3:46:03 / 2008: 3:16:22
Swim time – 2007: 0:43:46 / 2008: 0:37:04
1st transition – 2007: 5:17 / 2008: 4:54
Bike time – 2007: 1:35:40 / 2008: 1:20:53
2nd transition – 2007: 3:50 / 2008: 3:43
Run time – 2007: 1:17:29 / 2008: 1:09:41

So, needless to say it was a much better race than last year. There’s still some stuff I’d like to improve upon, but I’m very, VERY pleased with the results. T also gets points for being best sherpa ever! I rousted him at 5:30 am so that we could leave by 6 (I like getting there super early… )

Before the race, I was pretty nervous and spent a lot of time fiddling around setting up my transition area and visiting the bathroom 47 times. (I know, more than you probably wanted to know… ) But before I knew it, the time had flown by and it was time to get into the wetsuit and line up with the rest of my wave:

Ah, flattering wetsuit. Our wave was the third one, after the elites and the 30-39 year old men.

I actually lined up pretty well this time, but still had a pack of crazy swimmers diagonal into my line. I managed to get though that (apologies to the girl I accidentally punched in the stomach… ) and back into some clear water. It was a much better swim than Hagg Lake (partly because it’s shorter) but also I was better at staying on course. I managed to stay with the back of my group and even passed some folks. And unlike last year I only saw the caps from the wave behind mine and the very speedy swimmers from the next wave.

Here’s me coming out of the swim (note the other yellow cap in the shot!)

There’s a ridiculously long run up to the transition area, during which I had plenty of time to think about how I’d really like a little nap instead of getting on my bike. Another first for me, other bikes still on the rack – in fact I ran past my rack to the empty one behind it, because I’m so used to finding my bike that way! It took me forever because I needed to put a jacket and some gloves on so that I didn’t freeze my ass off, but I managed to get on the bike and get going.

My pacing plan for the bike was to go “one click past comfortable” and push the pace just a little bit, which worked pretty well. I managed to pass some people and get passed by a bunch of others. The bike course is really flat and gets pretty congested with everyone out on the course at the same time. I didn’t see too much cheating, though there were some folks that were definitely pushing it.

Here’s me coming in from the bike:



I was so happy because this is what I was looking at on my bike computer – a ride time of 1:21, a much better bike split than usual:
Then it was time for the run, which was probably the roughest part of the race. My feet were numb coming off the bike, I’m assuming because of the cold and it just took a while to get into the rhythm. (I need new laces for my shoes… ) I’m not a huge fan of photos of myself while running, but this one isn’t too bad:

Around mile 2 I started to feel okay again and was able to pick up the pace and start passing a few people. I was doing fine until I started getting side stitches around mile 6. Then I got this really awful cramp, that felt like one of those chest exploding things in the movie Aliens, which I dubbed “alien baby” and I actually had to walk for a minute – which sucked because I literally had .2 miles left and all of the people I’d diligently worked to pass were now flying past me. Grrrrr! T ran alongside me shouting encouragement while I swore at the alien baby. I finally managed to grit my way through the last little bit and across the finish line.
I didn’t know my exact time, because I’d forgotten to start my watch but even just estimating based on my wave start time, I knew I’d broken 3 hours and 20 minutes and was so overwhelmed and proud of myself, I cried for the second time at Blue Lake’s finish line. Here’s a picture of myself and my amazing race support T:

I couldn’t have done this without him. Not only is he a fantastic cheerleader, but he puts up with my training and it’s aftermath and helps kick my butt out of bed when I need him to. I probably don’t thank him often enough, so just in case – THANK YOU!
After the race, I got to say hi to my friend Erika from Tri-Camp. She had a booth at the expo for her fantastic company TriBabe. (If you need sporty cute clothes, definitely check her out!) She was so sweet and congratulatory (is that a word?) and it was nice to see her again. Her husband Bill also did the race, after doing Alcatraz last weekend, so he gets super-stud points from me! After a little post-race food, we packed up my crap and headed to the car. T snapped this picture of me still grinning from my success: (This is probably one of the only pictures of me post-race that I’ve liked.)

We then hurried home for a quick shower and then off to meet my parents for a Father’s Day brunch at Jam. It was great to see my folks and have a nice breakfast with them. The clouds had burned off and the weather was gorgeous. So we had some great food and caught up with each other, which was nice. Then I had to hit the road and drive up to Seattle. Busy, busy, day!