Liberty 70.3-Race Report (it's long, sry)
It's a weekend late, but it's been a busy week. Figured I would post this before next weekend when I race a sprint tri. :D
I will post more photos when I can, otherwise you can view some here...
http://tinyurl.com/Rachliberty
http://tinyurl.com/Rachlibertybike
http://tinyurl.com/Rachlibertyswim
The week of the Liberty HIM I had a solid plan for how I was going to taper. Take a look at my training log and you will notice my plan went down the drain when the plague monkey onslaught ensued hurling me into a kleenex & pillow oasis. There are worse things to have happen during a taper, like taking a fall with your bicycle several days before a marathon, but having a cold wasn't pleasant.
Friday- The plague kept me up most of the night with congestion, I maybe got 5hrs of sleep. We (Jeremiah, Mother-in-law & me) travel across Minnesota kind of on an intense timeline.
After a bit of navigating we find the race site. It is a beautiful well kept park.
I take a glance at the lake, "it doesn't look weedy, good.". Then I get the chance to eye over part of the bike course. I am one of those that doesn't always want to know what is ahead of me so we don't drive all of it. "It doesn't look nearly as hilly as what I have been training on, good.".
Our timeline gets as congested as I am. We hurry to pick up Jeremy's dad who flew in from Japan at the airport, then to the hotel where I am able to snag a short nap before heading to packet pick-up.
In the line at packet pick-up I hear a lot of triathletes exchanging their comments of being "so nervous about tomorrow" and I realize that beating this cold has kept me so distracted that I haven't had the chance to be nervous. I'm totally okay with that. By the time I make my way through the line I am starting to feel more worn out than I did after some of those long training days.
My hours are limited and I need to get some dinner then crash. Dinner at Chino Latino's is excellent, but all the sinus junk kept my appetite low and I don't eat much. As we leave the restaurant it dawns on the me that I have a half ironman TOMORROW and need to grab some calorie dense food I can stuff in my face at the hotel before nodding off.
My Beloved takes me to Lund's, a more upscale grocery store with stellar cookies. I get a vitamin C smoothie drink,fresh sliced mango,1/2 dozen macadamia nut cookies & one of those obnoxiously over frosted children's cookies. He also grabs me a bottle of Nyquil before arriving at the hotel.
I ingest everything listed above. Yes, everything. By this point I am feeling a little loopy from all the sugar and whatever it is in the Nyquil that makes you sleepy. Perhaps the mango & fruit smoothie will compensate for how unhealthy everything else was. But, I can honestly say I would do that as my pre-race fuel again, it rocked!
Saturday-RACE DAY!
My husband will attest to the fact that I move slow when I'm tired and even more so when I'm sick. So I set my alarm early and actually woke up on my own just a few minutes before it went off. Thankfully the Nyquil helped me sleep through the night & the healing mercies of my God had me feeling the best I had felt all week that morning.
Over five days of worrying if I would be able to actually race & if I could would I be able to finish all of it were put to rest. I knew I felt good enough to race and I was shocked to feel confident enough that with all the adrenaline, cold meds & prayer I would be able to go all the way.
Arriving at the transition area to setup I felt a bit intimidated by all the lean tri-suit clad athletes with their aero bars and Zipp wheel endowed tri-bikes. I had none of the above, but my road bike is very nice and fits me well, not to mention the best shade of orange. While setting up I see a few other simple set-ups like my own and I feel a little bit more like I fit in.
With my transition area set up I get body marked then head down to the beach for the pre-race meeting and to get myself situated in my wetsuit. I decide not to psyche myself out by swimming at all before the start, I was worried my congestion would really effect my breathing during the swim & I didn't want to know how bad it was going to be. There are two waves before mine, they start lining up & before I know it, it is my wave.
Swim - 42:49
As the horn goes off releasing the triathletes in my age group I take a quick glance up at the buoy beyond the olympic distrance's turn around. It seems surreal, it is actually race day, I am kind of in a daze, but I am doing it! I am instantly filled with passion & for a split second feel nervous for the first time at this race. I chug through the water until it is deep enough to break into free-style. Praise God my breathing seems to be okay and to my delight I am actually at relatively close pace to the other swimmers in my wave, even passing a few of them. It wasn't the fist & foot fight in the water I am used to during triathlons, which was nice. Even though I zig-zag a little bit, sighting is good.
I round the turn-around buoy, sight a few times and pick the line I want to follow to shore. In my mind I keep thinking "this is going a smooth as I could have ever hoped, make sure you are breathing to each side so your neck doesn't get sore & you need to do ABC once you reach the transition area.". Reaching the shore I feel great, not worn out but not like I wussed out and took it easy on the swim either.
T1-2:42
Stripping off my wetsuit, goggles & swim-caps then tossing them into the 5gallon bucket like I had practiced in my living room on Thursday went perfectly. The bucket was a great idea. Getting on all of my gear while soaked went fine too, my goal was to stay under 4minutes in T1 and I held to that.
Bike- 3:22:53
The first loop of the bike course went by so fast. I was averaging about 18mph which considering the hills and the 1.2mile swim prior is great for me. Cycling isn't my strongest sport, but I do love it which helps a lot. Attitude is a huge component of endurance races.
My plan to fuel every 15-20 minutes goes well, but I am drinking slightly more because I'm dry from breathing primarily out of my mouth due to all of the sinus crud. Around mile 35ish is when I am supposed to take in my hammer bar, but the idea of chewing something doesn't sit well with me so I take in more hammer gel & make sure I am taking in the Perpetuem drink first before the HEED.
At no time during the bike did I feel poorly trained for the distance. Despite being passed by a fair amount of people & only passing a few others myself. It was perfect weather for the ride, the volunteers at each intersection were absolutely fantastic which helped keep my invigorated.
Reaching mile 48ish on the bike I could start to feel my cold medication wearing off and my pace slowing down because of it. By this point the temps were starting to rise as well and at mile 50 I am low on liquids, but the bottle exchanges have already come & gone so I had to stick it out. Sometimes bicycling miles can feel like longer than running those miles, this was one of those times. In training I worried about bonking on the bike & I encountered a few spells like that while training. Thankfully I managed to keep from doing so on race day.
Yes, it got a little tough towards the end and I was ready to get off the bike, but my pace wasn't that far off from where I expected it to be all things considered.
T2- 1:42
I spot my hubby who is sporting his green spartan kilt as I enter the transition area. Seeing a familiar face who is as excited to see you makes me smile. I chuck my jersey, helmet & sunglasses into the 5gallon bucket, throw on my orange tank, race # & hydration belt, then my shoes before running out. My goal was under 2min for T2 and I held to it.
Run- 2:31:53
As I start the run I am shocked. Why? Because my legs can actually run! It takes the first three miles until I am actually comfortable with a pace/stride though. I also had to stop at one point to shake the sand out of my socks that got into them at T1.
It feels good to finally be at the sport where I feel most at home.
The run course is a black asphalt bike path that circles half of the lake, but is blocked by portions of wooded areas and rolling fields that keep those lake breezes from cooling me of. I can see the heat taking it's toll on the people I pass who are already on their way back from the turn-around point.
In hopes of avoiding my fueling/hydration issue I had during the Fargo marathon I start being proactive early. Taking in fuel every 3-4miles before water stations & topping off my water bottle every other.
The trail while hot & a tad hilly was a wonderful place to run. I enjoyed it. Reaching the turn-around point at mile 6.5 I was told to "celebrate the cone" which marked the spot so I did a little victory dance for the volunteers just to be obnoxious. I figure they have been waiting out there cheering for hours it was the least I could do. :)
Miles 7-8 were prayer miles for me. Not a wall, just time to refocus. I really wanted to finish the race well and have a portion of the run that felt fast. My pace wasn't bad until that point, but I wasn't feeling lithe. I started using the uphills as an opportunity to blow my now more congested nose, it worked. Scriptures of victorious battles & the Lord's provision cycled through my brain.
Then I started to pass people. Sets of two or three at a time. At least 10 ppl in those last few miles. Mile 11 I finally felt the lithe feeling that I knew I could pick up the pace and maintain it, so I did. At mile 12.8ish the route took me through a campground with lit campfires that really dampered my breathing, but Jeremy's Mom was there cheering me on.
The rest of it was literally downhill. About 1/4 mile from the finish I heard a group of people I didn't recognize cheering my name & reminding me to smile at the huge camera at the finish. Or at least I thought it was my name, pretty sure it was. After talking to DH on the way home we realized it may have been "Steve in a Speedo" (& crew) who's blog we've been following.
At the same time my gel flask pops out of my fuel belt & I'm starting to sprint so I just keep hauling.
Crossing the FINISH LINE felt as surreal as the start of the swim. It felt like an accomplishment, but at the same time one that would sink in over the following week or so. Which it has done.
Finishing time was: 6:41:59, Not bad!
