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August 6, 2006
2006 Pittsburgh Olympic Distance Triathlon
First of all, I have to admit I've been remiss in mentioning that this past August 3rd was my 2 year blogging anniversary! I totally didn't remember but realized after reading Becky's blog, that my date had probably past. A lot has happened in the past 2 years. For one, I changed sports. Oh well, gotta take what life throws at ya right?! :) Regardless, many thanks to Alison for putting up with me for so long! She has hosted this site for all of us running-blogs.comers with absolutely no work on our part (other than writing our own entries). Hmm...maybe Alison would start writing for us too? :)
Moving on - the race today was awesome! It was my first taste of (1) a longer race and (2) some serious competition. I always like telling the short story first for those that don't feel like reading a novel, so here it is - I was 2nd overall. My time was 2:18:39. My (VERY) rough splits were 23 minute swim, 1:12 bike and 42 min run (no official results yets). I was super happy to get under 2:20 when I really didn't even expect to get under 2:30 but I ALMOST caught the winner and so I was kind of disappointed not to win. She ended up beating me by about 40 seconds but she started the run about 5 minutes before me - if only I had a couple more miles! Then again, I really didn't feel like running a couple more miles, so perhaps I should just leave well enough alone... :)
The long version of the story starts in the water - the very yucky looking water of the Allegheny River. When I was swimming I didn't notice trash floating around but there was definitely some nasty looking stuff floating around the water where we got in. Can you say prophylactic antibiotics?! :) Anyway, I really wanted to have a great swim and so I positioned myself in the front and had the plan of trying to stay with a woman I knew was a very good swimmer. That plan worked, kind of. The problem was when we got to the turn around and started catching the wave of guys before us things got all bungled up. I lost sight of her and had to just start focusing on moving in the right direction. Still I felt strong. 1500 meters of swimming seems like a very long way when you just look at it straight out but it honestly went by pretty fast. About 1/3 of the race was against the current and the other 2/3s with the current and so that has to explain why I swam around 23 minutes. I honestly thought my time would be more like 26 or 27 minutes. Either way I wasn't complaining. I can laugh about it now but I was none too pleased to fall flat on my face not once, not twice, not 3 times but 4 stinkin' times as I tried to climb out of the water!!! It was so rough! The mat was all slimy and people were trying to climb out like crazy. It was probably pretty funny to watch. I was so disgusted I vowed to climb out on my knees if I fell again but luckily the 4th time was a charm and I got out to start the relatively long run up to the transition area. O was at the top of the hill entering into the transition area and told me I was in 4th place. Excellent. I'll take it!
T1 wasn't anything too exciting just got on my gear and got on my way.
The bike course was more challenging than I thought. It was 2 loops of basically uphill for 6 miles, downhill for 6 miles and one flat mile to hook you around so you could do the loop again. I thought I knew what the uphill part was like - up yes but more of a gradual grade that I could maintain a steady pace of maybe 17 or 18 MPH on. Um no. The first time up wasn't so bad but the 2nd time up I was hurting. I got into my small chain and spun and actually didn't do too bad but was going more like 14 MPH. Ouch. Luckily you could more than make up for it going down the other side where I pretty much got in my biggest gear, got down into my aerobars and flew. I think my top speed was about 34 MPH but I would say I was mostly going 28-30 MPH down the hill. The bike went pretty fast. I must have passed one woman but it was really hard for me to keep track of who was where since you didn't know who was on what loop. Regardless I got off the bike and through T2 and as I started the run I saw O again who tells me I'm now in 3rd place and the 2nd place woman is 1:30 ahead of me.
Now begins the run. I really have a love hate relationship with the run. You see even though I don't feel like it sometimes the run is my strongest event. And so I should love it because it's my chance to catch all those really good swimmers and powerful cyclists. Triathletes come in all shapes and sizes but you can usually tell who the runners are. Regardless, the hate part of the relationship exists because...well...the run really hurts. Your body is not happy with you at this point in the game and now you are asking it to do what I consider the most physically demanding of the 3 sports. In the few triathlons I've done I get to the run and repeat to myself over and over - you are a runner, you are a runner, they are not runners, they are not runners - which helps but is hard to convince my tired body of.
Anyway, when I started the run I actually didn't feel too bad. I started focusing on the men in front of me and trying to pick them off. And then, about 10 minutes in I saw the 2nd place woman. She is the really good swimmer I was trying to keep up with earlier but not the strongest runner so I knew I had a chance to catch her. I did and when I did I tried to go by hard so she didn't have any notions of going with me. When I say I was going by "hard" realize that my pace was probably hovering around 7 minutes/mile or a little under - not exactly what someone running a 10K running race would consider hard! Regardless, she didn't go with me thankfully and was actually very encouraging. At this point I had no idea where the 1st place woman was so I tried to keep pushing, keep trying to catch guys and when men passed me, tried to go with them. Around 3 miles the runners double back on themselves and I got a look at how far ahead the leading woman was. It looked to be about 2 or 3 minutes but she looked pretty strong. Ugh. And then with about 2 miles to go I started to seriously want to sit down for awhile and put my feet up. Big difference between the sprint races I've been doing with 5Ks on the end and this one with a 10K on the end! I just kept trying to push and push and push. I still couldn't see 1st place. Good thing the race was almost over because things were looking ugly. Little did I know that I really was still gaining on her. With about 400 meters to go I finally saw her again ahead of me! Too late at that point though. She ended up beating me by about 40 seconds. I really wish I could have got her but I also know I ran as hard as I could! I think my run split was around 42-43 minutes which I will not complain about. I was aiming for 45.
And that was that. I felt pretty sick after the race which isn't such a surprise because I usually feel sick after running hard for anything longer than 5K. I sat for a while with O (who is the best support crew ever!) and was eventually able to get a piece of sandwhich down. K, my teammate got 4th place overall and my other teammate E crushed the men's field to win in 1:56. It was a good day for Trizilla! We stayed for the awards which were these really neat hand crafted trophies made out of bike gears. Then O drove me home so I could clean my crusty, nasty self up. I feel much better now although my feet are ripped up from the swim to bike transition and I have developed quite a blister on my heel. I'm sure I'll be sore tomorrow but Coach already told me I get another day off tomorrow! Yeah for days off! :)
And so I leave you with a picture of me and winner getting our awards with the Pittsburgh skyline in the background. Thanks for reading!
Posted by beth at August 6, 2006 4:02 PM
Comments
THis is the coolest thing ever! You are SO great at your new sport/s. I do think you're right-you have an advantage that you're experienced at the run so you can feel confident in your ability to hammer it home at the end.
I love the picture! Congratulations!! (and I am so inspired to do another/longer tri!!!!) Thanks!!
Posted by: Audrey at August 6, 2006 5:14 PM
And the first place woman better watch out next time! (And O is so cool for being an excellent support crew!)
Posted by: Audrey at August 6, 2006 5:15 PM
Congratulations! I think it is so cool that one day (quite recently I should add) you decided to do a triathlon and now look at you! Awesome!
Posted by: Caitlin at August 6, 2006 8:17 PM
Great job!!! I just finished my first Olympic tri a couple of weeks ago, and it was brutal! My time was 3:30 - your time of 2:18 seems superhero-ish to me! Way to go!
Posted by: buckeyerunner at August 6, 2006 9:12 PM
Great job!!! I just finished my first Olympic tri a couple of weeks ago, and it was brutal! My time was 3:30 - your time of 2:18 seems superhero-ish to me! Way to go!
Posted by: buckeyerunner at August 6, 2006 9:14 PM
Maybe you should try out a few more sports...with the way you've taken to this one, who knows, maybe you'll be an Olympian in ping pong (is that an Olympic sport?) or snowboarding.
Congratulations on a great race. I think the PF might turn out to be a blessing in disguise!
Posted by: Alison at August 6, 2006 11:11 PM
wooo whooo... awesome job.... great pic also...
Posted by: Kranky C Dale at August 7, 2006 8:53 AM
Hooray Beth!!!!
What a great race report for an awesome race. You have become a great triathlete, and very quickly!!
Posted by: barb at August 7, 2006 10:45 AM