Gateway Triathlon 2014

Gateway Triathlon - 5/18/2014

Temps in the mid 40s in the morning was concerning to say the least. Water temps were 68 degrees, so with a wetsuit that was going to be fine. However, it's the start of the bike that is the worst. Wet, getting up to 20+mph, and clod temps are not a pleasant combination of factors. I've done it several times before and it's a very unusual feeling as you warm up. I can even free the warm blood get pumped out with every heart beat. I decided against any extra clothes, but I did put some gloves on my bike in case I needed them. Hands and feet are the only things that have a chance to stay cold, and possibly go numb, later in the ride.

With the cold water temps they had us get it to get aclimated before sending us off. The water was cold on my arms with the sleeveless wetsuit that I have. We weren't left treading water too long. We're off! My arms felt a bit sluggish and a little numb. I continue to have issues sighting in the water. I don't practice open water swimming enough. I don't practice swimming straight enough either. OK. I'll be honest, I don't do anything swimming "enough". I had only swam one other time, at the Trizou race two weeks ago, since the end of last season. you can see in my Strava swim data the distance I had to cut over during the first stretch out to get to the inside track. I did it because I wasn't sure if it was the last buoy or not.. it wasn't. It wasn't until about 1/3 on the way back that I felt comfortable at all in the water. It had been a horrible swim. I was WAY back. There was no time to wallow in self pity. There was still a lot of race left. In looking at the results, I was 64th out of the water.

I knew there was a lot of ground to make up, but I have been feeling pretty good about my cycling. I heard them announce that the leader was at the bike 5K marker as I left transition. WOW. That's a huge lead. I made the mistake of trying to have my bike shoes attached to my bike. I'd never done it with these new shoes and it was too hard to get into them. It wasn't the best way to start the bike. Once in my shoes though, IT WAS FULL ON! I didn't even bother with the gloves. I started catching and passing people right away. They were making me work for each pass, but that was great to have reason after reason to keep my face high. With an out and back bike course, I was able to count everyone ahead of me and was in 37th at the turn around. There was still a lot of work to do. Each pass was a motivation boost to the system. However, each pass was seemingly getting harder and harder as I caught better and better athletes. I was just hoping that I wasn't burying myself to the point where I wasn't going to be able to run well. By the time I got to the end of the bike, I was up to 25th place! That was a significant jump op the ranks.

I had a quick transition to the run and headed out. The last time I did this race it was a scorcher. This was perfect running weather though. Its been hard for me to tell what my run pace is lately. I just kept my pace rich, tried to continue to pass each person in front of me one at a time, and hoped that I'd be able to keep it up the whole time. I really haven't done much fast run training and certainly not for 10K. I've got tons of long slow miles as a great base though. I was catching people, but it was a very slow process. With the course being littered with both sprint and Olympic racers out there, it was hard to know who was in my race. I could eventually see the "T" or "S" on the legs of my competitors as I came up to each of them. My watch was giving me 1/4 mile splits and indicated a good 7:00min/mi pace. That was good for me if I could keep it up the whole way. Another out and back run course allowed me to do some counting again. I was in 21st place. No passes were easy. I kept picking them off the whole way to the finish and was able to stay strong the whole way through. I was ecstatic to have kept that pace for the whole run. I ended up in 17th overall and 3rd in my age group. There was a 3 minute gap to the next person in my age group in front of me and behind me, so my division result was solidified before the run even started. To top it off, I was the first name called for the raffle give-aways. I won a Rudy Project gift certificate. I needed a new helmet for adventure races, road, and cyclocross racing so that was perfect timing. Congrats to Chris Beuer (2nd overall), Doug Havlin (4th overall), and Holly Ball (3rd AG).

Important Links:
Gateway Triathlon Website
3 Disciplines Racing Gateway Triathlon Olympic Distance Overall results Gateway Triathlon Olympic Distance Age Group results Strava Swim Data, Strava Bike Data, Strava Run Data