Ramping Things Back Up

I was still fatigued on Friday so I decided to listen to my body and take another day off. Cooked an entire skillet of hashbrowns and mixed in 5 eggs, and stuffed my face with all the calories. It seemed to work because the next morning I woke up and didn't feel fatigued for the first time all week.

About 1200 glorious calories. There's more bacon hidden underneath that pile.

Saturday I went to the beach with Liz. I wanted to practice my open water swimming, but the water was far too choppy so I ran a nice 5K barefoot on the beach instead. I felt fantastic for the first half, and when I turned around I realized why: I had been running with the wind. The second half of the run was against the wind and much tougher.

I felt good during the run, but afterwards I noticed my right IT band was a little uncomfortable. It wasn't sore, I was just aware that it was there, if that makes any sense. I woke up feeling the same way on Sunday, so instead of doing a bike-to-run brick I just did the bike, 23.50 miles easy spinning, with the last 4:00 at race pace. Worked on my long ride nutrition: water every 5 minutes, pretzels every 15, and a gel pack at the 45:00 mark.

As of yesterday the Crawlin' Crab half-marathon is three weeks away, and with the pool closed and no more triathlons scheduled until the spring I'm anxious to focus on running/biking. Here's the plan for the week, assuming my IT band doesn't bother me more:

Mon: Run 6.22 miles
Tue: Bike 10.00 miles
Wed: Run 3.11 miles (intervals)
Thu: Bike 10.00 miles (intervals) followed by 3.11 mile run
Fri: Rest
Sat: Bike: 20.00 miles
Sun: Run: 13.11 miles

This would ramp my running up to 25+ miles this week, after only doing 6 both last week and the week before. I'm a little worried about that but will play it by ear. If my legs don't feel up to the half-marathon on Sunday then I'll do something shorter. Either way I want the pace to be moderate, close to 9:00/mile. I would hate to break the 2-hour half-marathon barrier on a training run though, so I might do the first half at a 10:00 pace, and the remainder at a 9:00 pace. That would still be a PR at 2:04:24.

New 5K PR. No Big Deal.

I went for an "easy" 5K yesterday to see how my legs felt, and ended up setting a new PR in 25:39 (previous best was 26:20). I went out hard in the first mile (7:43) and held an 8:30/mile pace for the remainder.

I have nothing more to say, so here are a bunch of reaction gifs to sum up how I feel:

Exhausted.

How my body has felt this week:

When I ran the Shamrock Marathon back in March, it took me just over a day to recover. I ran the race on Sunday, took a rest day on Monday, and was out running again on Tuesday. Well my first triathlon has left me far more exhausted than that. My legs (and calves especially) were dead on Monday and Tuesday, and I took naps when I got home from work both days. I went out yesterday and biked an easy 10.39 miles and legs didn't stop aching until 10 minutes into the ride.

I think I can chalk it up to my heart rate being red-lined almost the entire race. 198 bmp coming out of the water, 180 average on the bike, 183 average on the run. What really shocks me is that I was able to survive with it that high for 1 hour and 38 minutes without collapsing. Normally when my heart rate gets up to 180 my throat starts closing up and I can't breathe, but that didn't happen during the race (presumably because of all the adrenaline).

It makes me wonder what I'm capable of if I really push myself in a half-marathon. I went ahead and signed up for the Crawlin Crab, and when it asked for my predicted finish time I entered 1:45:00. That's a pace of 8:01/mile! I still haven't run a 2:00:00 marathon, so a goal of 1:45:00 is RETARDED, but I hope starting off in a faster group will give me the push I need.

I'm going to attempt to run an easy 5K after work today, but I'm not sure how cooperative my legs will be.

Patriot Sprint Triathlon - Final Thoughts

Before the race I posted some time predictions/goals. Let's take a look at those, with the average pace marked next to each time:

Great Day:

• Swim: 16:00 (2:08/100m)
• Bike: 36:00 (3:00/mile)
• Run: 26:20 (8:28/mile)
• Total: 1:25:20

Good Day: 

• Swim: 17:00 (2:16/100m)
• Bike: 38:00 (3:10/mile)
• Run: 28:00 (9:00/mile)
• Total: 1:30:00

Bad Day:

• Swim: 18:00 (2:24/100m)
• Bike: 40:00 (3:20/mile)
• Run: 29:30 (9:30/mile)
• Total: 1:34:30

Since the swim (1000m) and bike (12.79 miles) were both longer than advertised, I'll compare paces instead of total time.

Swim: 20:43 (2:04/100m)

-How it went: I'm very pleased with the swim; I never felt out of breath or exhausted, though I sure as hell was when I popped out of the water and started running. My strokes were strong and smooth, and I felt like I had my breathing under control. My pace was better than I ever could have hoped. 

-How I can improve: when lining up for the swim, next time I will start in the front instead of the back. I was stuck behind some slow people for the first couple of minutes of the swim and need to be more aggressive and confident in the future. Also, I need to learn to sight better in the water: there were one or two times on the second half of the swim when I realized I was veering off-course a bit and had to adjust. 

Bike: 41:14 (3:13/mile)

-How it went: my pace was between my Good and Bad predictions, but I had not taken into consideration the logistics of racing with other people. During training I'm able to keep a constant pace, but in a race you're constantly passing other people and having to adjust your speed. I pushed very hard on the bike, and am extremely happy with my performance, even if my time doesn't reflect it.

-How I can improve: DON'T SPRINT RIGHT BEFORE TRANSITION! Seeing the crowd pumped me up and I sprinted the last 30 seconds to the transition area, which completely trashed my legs for the beginning of the run. I knew that I needed to slow down for the final minute on the bike and I made a stupid mistake in the heat of the moment. I also want to be more aggressive when passing people in the future; there were a few times where I passed someone and then relaxed for a minute before pushing past the next person. 

Run: 30:01 (9:37/mile)

-How it went: I pushed my body to its limit and left nothing in the tank, so I'm happy with the result of the run even though my time was in the "bad day" category. The first mile was pretty terrible: calves felt on the brink of cramping, quads ached, and I had a stitch in my side. The second mile I "found my running legs", and was able to coast pretty effortlessly. The third mile I felt great and had an 8:30/mile pace, and finished strong. 

-How I can improve: The swim and bike portions felt like races, and I was constantly focusing on catching up to and passing whoever was in front of me. I didn't have this feeling during the run. It's excusable for the first mile while I was hurting badly, but once I found my legs I should have started picking people off one at a time. I need to practice getting into the "race" mentality during individual runs in the future.

Other thoughts

Since I've been focusing on long distance running over the last year, which means going slow and pacing myself, I really wanted to go all out for this race. I didn't want to finish the race thinking "I should have pushed harder". I gave it my all, was near the top of my heart rate the entire time, and had nothing left in the tank when I finished. My legs are evidence of that: they were incredibly sore on Monday, and today they still ache more than they did after I ran the Shamrock Marathon! 

In the 87 days since I decided to do this race I trained 107 times. I bought my first road bike. I started swimming for the first time in 15 years. I woke up sore every morning, went to bed exhausted every night. One year ago the word "triathlete" conjured up images of super-human athletes in a category I could never hope to reach. I proved to myself that with hard work and dedication I can accomplish anything, and I'm proud to now call myself a triathlete. 

Patriot Sprint Triathlon - Race Report!

There were a lot of "firsts" for me in this race:

• First open water swim
• First swim race
• First time swimming in jammers and a swim cap
• First bike race
• First swim-to-bike transition
• First triathlon

The race report is very long, so here's the important stuff for those of you who don't want to read everything. FYI I was in the Novice group, so the number in parenthesis is my rank in that group (out of 38):

Swim: 20:43 (7)
T1: 5:24 (21)
Bike: 41:14 (12)
T2: 0:57 (2)
Run: 30:01 (28)
Total: 1:38:17 (9)

And if I had to sum up how I felt after the race in one .gif:

Starting at the beginning: I picked up my race packet on Saturday and scoped out the course. The transition area is a LONG way away from the beach (1/4 mile, to be exact). Here's the route from the beach:

From there you go up a small hill and head towards the transition area (you can see the tents in the distance):

No worries, I thought, it will just be a nice cool-down jog after the swim. More on that later.

When I went to bed that night it was raining, and when I woke up at 3:30 it was still coming down. I slowly had some coffee and peanut butter toast and the rain stopped sometime around 4:30. I packed the rest of my gear, threw it in the car and drove the 30 minutes to Williamsburg. I was one of the first people there at 5:30, so I had first pick of the bike rack:

Since I had time to spare I spent about 10 minutes over-analyzing my transition space and the most efficient way to place everything. I also went over everything I would need to do in transition in my head. I had body-markers write my race number on my arms after that, and then hit up the porta-potties, and here's what I wrote on Facebook about that:

So I go to use the bathroom before the race, and I see that the handicapped porta-potty (extra large) is available. I think to myself "Excellent, I shall poop like a King!" There are no lights so after sitting down I pull out my iPhone and use the Flashlight app to look around, and see that there's a huge spider in the corner directly above me, and now I'm sitting here wondering why bad things happen to good people.

My wonderful wife Briana arrived shortly after that with her sister Tara and father Wiley. After meeting with our friend Kate (whose dad Will was racing), we headed down to the beach and snapped some pre-race photos:

Can you tell I'm terrified?

Wiley is in the background photobombing me

The race was divided into 6 starting waves that launch 2 minutes apart, and I was in the 6th one, reserved for Novice Men and Women, and Relay teams. This had me a bit worried because I knew I was a weak swimmer and didn't want to be one of the last out of the water. The first wave went off with the airhorn:

All the other waves ahead of me came and went 2 minutes apart, and before I knew it it was time to get in the water and await the starting horn.

Me in the back warming up my arms

I positioned myself in the center in the back to allow everyone to get ahead and give me some room to swim. Suddenly the horn went off and my first triathlon had begun.

A lot of people walked in the shallow water for the first minute, but I immediately went horizontal and started swimming. The first hundred yards or so were uncoordinated because I was afraid of hitting the person in front of me, so I was awkwardly stroking while keeping my head above water to keep an eye on where I was going. Slowly the swimmers spread out and I had enough room to feel comfortable, and I settled into my normal long, slow strokes, switching to breaststroke every couple of minutes. I swam too close behind someone at one point and got kicked in the face, but it wasn't very hard and my goggles didn't become dislodged so I kept on swimming.

In the first few minutes I found myself passing several other people, and I didn't think much of it. But as I neared the turn-around buoy I started passing people wearing purple caps (from Wave 5). Shortly after that I was passing grey caps (Wave 4) as well, who had a 4 minute head start on me. I was a little winded but this energized me, so my swim strokes went from "slow and steady" to more like this:

Half-way back to shore I saw a swimmer floating on her back, and my abs were very sore at this point so I stopped and made sure she was okay. "Yep, just catching my breath" she said, and I swam on. Someone died at Ironman NYC last month and I didn't want to find out later that the same thing had happened here and I did nothing. The karma I felt pushed me the rest of the way until I was suddenly planting my feet in sand and erupting out of the water.

Swim: 20:43. We would later learn that the swim was actually about 1000m, not 750m, so this comes out to an average of 2:04/100m pace.

Bre almost didn't see me at first; she was looking farther out in the river and didn't expect me to finish so quickly until I popped out of the water. I was a little dizzy as I ran up the beach, but I noticed that there was only one other person from my wave nearby, and everyone else was from Wave 5 and 4. Holy shit, I might be near the front of my group, I thought as I sprinted up the beach (I would later learn that I came out of the water in 7th place for the Novices, and that the 6th and 5th place guys were only 15 seconds ahead of me). I forgot to start the timer on my watch when our swim started, so I tried doing quick math based on the current time but my head seemed cloudy and it was tough to think, so I just kept running towards transition.

I got into transition, spotted my bike and ran down one row... only to realize it wasn't my bike, and I was in the wrong place. I stood there confused for a moment before finding the correct spot. It truly is amazing how difficult it is to think when your brain is deprived of oxygen. Once I got to my bike I saw that my previous suspicions were correct: most of the bikes around me were still racked, so I was near the front of the group.

"Where the hell is my bike?"

Since it had rained all night the ground was wet and muddy, so transitioning was a bit tough. I squirted water on my feet and dried them off as best as I could, but putting on my toe-socks was still a challenge. I'm not sure what I'll do in the future, but Vibrams definitely aren't ideal for triathlons. 

My mind was still cloudy, but I managed to put on my heart rate monitor, helmet and sunglasses and head out on the bike. Before I got on my bike my heart rate was 198! No wonder I was so dizzy and confused: that heart rate is on the verge of me passing out. I guess I need to jog instead of sprint next time. Before the race I was debating whether or not to use my heart rate monitor, and I'm really glad I did.

Transition 1: 5:24. I was pretty pleased with this, since at least half of it was spent running to the transition area. When I get real bike shoes this will be a bit faster as well. I forgot to grab my shot-bloc chews, but they weren't crucial.

I took it easy for the first few minutes on the bike to allow my heart rate to get back down into the 170s. Most of the bike course was surrounded by woods, so there was never much wind except at the turn-around. There was one slight downhill in the first couple of miles, and aside from that it was pancake flat. It was a very easy course.

I've been in a lot of running races, and I've always felt like I was racing the distance rather than the other runners. This was nothing like that. I don't know if it was because I was near the front in my group, or because it was my first bike race, but the competitiveness in me kicked-in and I started hammering it. I immediately started picking off bikers one at a time: coast up behind them, pass on the left, then move back over to the right. There's a 2:00 penalty for taking more than 15 seconds to pass someone, so I couldn't just stay to the left and fly by everyone. Over the entire bike course I was only passed once (by Kate's dad Will, who I re-passed near the end), and I passed over 35 people. 

I was ignoring my speedometer and just focusing on the next person in front of me. I kept an eye on my heart rate, which was still a bit higher than I'm used to, but I felt good and kept hammering away. I had one bottle of gatorade with me and drank from that every 5 minutes. I got into a good rhythm passing one person after another, and the bike course seemed to go very quickly as a result. 

One thing that was challenging was traffic. They didn't fully close the bike course to cars, so there were several times where we had to weave in and out of traffic. Near the half-way mark there was a truck towing a boat, and as I passed him on the left he drifted a bit and almost hit me! At a few of the turns there were cars stopped waiting for the traffic cop to let them go, and one driver started to open his car door right as I flew by at 20mph, which gave me a bit of a scare. All of these cars caused the bikers to bunch up a bit too, which slowed everything down several times.

When I got near the end I slowed down a bit to keep my heart rate low for transition, but then I saw Wiley taking photos so I climbed out of my saddle and sprinted for the last 30 seconds.

Bike: 41:14. The bike course was long too (12.79 miles according to google maps), so this averages out to a 3:13/mile pace. Not what I had hoped, but I hadn't considered the logistics of traffic and having to pass people individually.

I had practiced the bike-to-run transition several times during training, but I hadn't considered having to run 100 yards from the dismount spot to the bike rack. When I got off the bike my legs felt like jelly, and it was a bit hard to run the bike back to the transition area. I quickly racked my bike, took off my helmet, and ran out of transition.

Transition 2: 0:57. Second fastest transition in my group, and the top person was only one second faster (0:56). Very pleased with this, though I had a nagging feeling I was forgetting something...

Here are the mile breakdowns for the run, and how I felt for each one.

• Mile 1: 10:30. "WHY DO MY LEGS HATE ME SO MUCH?"
• Mile 2: 10:09. "Okay, feeling a little better, but I'm still afraid to push it."
• Mile 3: 9:22. "FLASH, AHHHHHH, SAVIOR OF THE UNIVERSE"

The run was painful from the start: my heart rate was in the 190s again, my quads hurt, and my calves felt like they were on the brink of cramping. It was immediately obvious that a 5K PR was out of the question. I quickly changed my goal to try to run without walking at all, which I failed when I walked for 15 seconds through the water station at the Mile 1 marker. That short walk helped a lot though, and I felt a bit invigorated as I started running again.

Shortly after that a middle-aged black man with an Ironman tattoo on the back of his leg passed me. "Go Ironman!" I yelled, and he flashed me a thumbs-up. I chatted him up after the race and learned that he was in the 1983 Ironman Championships in Kona, Hawaii. 

I coasted along tentatively on my legs for a while, before suddenly realizing what I forgot in transition: my running bib. I had pre-attached them to a pair of running shorts (you can see them in the transition photo I took before the race) so all I needed to do was throw them on over my triathlon shorts, but I completely forgot. That's a 2 minute penalty, and it meant that they might not be able to identify me in some of the photos that the professionals took along the course. Damn! Every time I passed a race official I nervously hoped they wouldn't notice. 

When I passed the second mile marker I felt like I had finally "found my running legs", so I leaned forward and sped up. In training whenever I ran too hard my throat would start to close up and it would become difficult to breathe, and I ran as hard as I could without reaching that point. As we rounded the corner onto Jamestown road for the final half-mile the adrenaline kicked-in and I ran even faster. One spectator saw me running behind two women and yelled: "WHAT ARE YOU DOING? DON'T LET THOSE GIRLS BEAT YOU, PASS THEM!" I laughed and obliged him, saying "I'm sorry, he told me to!" as I passed the girls, but they weren't offended at all. I'm just glad Bre and Tara weren't there to hear him yell that!

I passed several more people in the final stretch, and finally felt good enough to enjoy myself. I ran down the victory chute feeling amazing.

Run: 30:01. Painful, but I'm happy with my effort. And I wasn't penalized for forgetting my bib!

Finishing Time: 1:38:17. 

I'll post more thoughts tomorrow, but overall I'm very pleased with myself. I finished 9th out of 38 in the Novice Men group, and 208th out of 314 total men. You can see the full results here.

Tara, Wiley, and Bre, gracious enough to ignore how bad I probably smell.

Patriot Sprint Triathlon - Pre-race Predictions

Sunday is my first triathlon, the Patriot Sprint Tri in Williamsburg, VA: 750m swimming, 12 miles biking, 3.11 miles running. Below are my estimated times if I'm having a Great day, Good day, or Bad day. I compared these times to the results from last year's race, so the number in parenthesis next to each time is where that time would rank me in the 2011 race (out of 304 male participants). The Total time listed includes an estimated 7:00 total transition time.

Great Day:

• Swim: 16:00 (133)
• Bike: 36:00 (61)
• Run: 26:20 (175)
• Total: 1:25:20 (124) (7th out of 13 in the 25-29 age group)

The swim time is a shot in the dark. A few weeks ago I swam 750m in 16:13, and open water swimming is supposedly tougher than pool swimming. Wearing my triathlon shorts instead of swim shorts will make me a bit faster, but I'm leaning on the conservative side for this. 36:00 for the bike would give me an even 20mph pace, something I was only 5 seconds per mile away from during my race simulation. Most of the bike is on roads surrounded by woods, so wind shouldn't inhibit me much. I chose 26:20 for the run because that's my 5K personal record from last fall, and I think I can beat it.

Good Day: 

• Swim: 17:00 (183)
• Bike: 38:00 (124)
• Run: 28:00 (216)
• Total: 1:30:00 (173) (9th out of 13 in my age group)

Still guessing on the swim time. 38:00 on the bike is an average of 3:10/mile, which would still be my 2nd fastest pace ever, though I know I can go faster than that with race-day adrenaline pumping. A 28:00 5K is an average of 9:00/mile, something I feel is totally doable. 

Bad Day:

• Swim: 18:00 (215)
• Bike: 40:00 (172)
• Run: 29:30 (241)
• Total: 1:34:30 (212) (11th out of 13 in my age group)

A swim time of 18:00 wouldn't surprise me too much, but a lot would have to go wrong for my bike and run times to be in this range. 40:00 biking time is barely faster than my Z2 pace, and would be an absolute failure in a race. A run of 29:30 is a 9:30/mile run pace, which I may have to fall back on if I push too hard on the bike or cramp up. 

Looking at my estimates compared to the 2011 rankings it's clear that the field is full of fast runners, and I need to mentally prepare myself for being passed a lot in the run leg. But hey, it's my first triathlon so my main goal is to have fun and not look stupid.

After limited exercise last week, and then the half-marathon on Sunday, I wasn't sure how much to exercise this week. I took Monday off, biked 10.30 miles on Tuesday, took Wednesday off (wasn't feeling well), and then ran a 5K on Thursday. The biking was just easy spinning, but the run was at a good speed: race pace for the first mile, slowing down slightly for the remainder. I'll probably bike a bit tonight just to keep my legs warm.

Stay tuned for pictures from the race expo tomorrow!

Rock 'N' Roll Race Report!

The Rock N Roll half-marathon was in Virginia Beach this past weekend, and it was a lot of fun. With my triathlon next weekend I took this race easy and ran with my wife (check out her blog!), which meant I could relax and enjoy the scenery. Glad I didn't attempt a PR... more on that later.

We picked up our race packet at the expo the day before, and everything was pretty standard. Lots of free swag, a cool new technical shirt to add to the collection, and plenty of running gear for sale. While Bre was looking at headbands I bought three new bumper stickers: a 13.1 for her, and two Ironman distance ones for me (70.3 and 140.6).

Everyone came into town later that day: Bre's dad Wiley, her sister Tara and boyfriend Jason, and a bunch of Tara's friends from college. We all went out to get Mexican for the pre-race dinner; I got two beef enchiladas with rice and beans. Mmm.

It took a while to fall asleep, but I felt rested by the time the alarm went off at 3:30. Made some fried egg sandwiches for Bre and I while she prepared a breakfast casserole for everyone else. We weren't rushed, but I still managed to forget my sunglasses and shot bloks. Thankfully Bre took it in stride and didn't panic, and it was cloudy all day so I didn't need my glasses. There was almost no traffic at all driving to the VA Beach Amphitheatre, where we took a shuttle to the race start. After waiting in line for the porta potties for 20 minutes we had just enough time to jump into our coral and hear the national anthem played. I was originally put in Coral 9 (out of 20), but Bre was in Coral 16 so that's where we waited. It took almost 30 minutes to get through the first 15 waves before we finally heard the countdown from Francena McCorory (US gold medalist in the 4x400 women's relay). 

The start is waaaaaay up there.

We came across the first band pretty quickly, and they were playing "Wonderwall" by Oasis, which we had heard a few minutes previously at the starting line. The second band was playing "I Got A Feeling" by the Black Eyed Peas... which we also heard playing at the starting line. The third band was playing some Zeppelin, and from that point on the music was great.

The temperature was cool and cloudy, but the humidity was almost 100% so my shirt was drenched by the first mile. I ended up taking it off and putting it through the hole in the back of my hat, making it look like I had a long pony tail. Water dripped down the shirt down my back the entire race. 

Speaking of water: the first three water stations were out of it. Well technically they were out of cups, and still had hoses to refill water bottles for people, but we didn't have any so it was useless for us. After the third water stop Bre started to worry, so when we passed a 7-11 at Mile 5 I ran across the street, bought her a Gatorade, and sprinted to catch up to her. Oh, and did I mention this was after chugging a cup of beer that some volunteers were handing out? While catching up to Bre I narrowly avoided losing the beer all over the side of the road. 

There were loads of other interesting sights along the race. The woman blaring "What Is Love" from a boombox. The man we saw at Mile 12 (while we were on the other side of the road at Mile 4) running completely barefoot with a ~7:00/mile pace. The man who juggled 4 balls in the air while running. The woman with a "Think this is tough? Try chemo!" shirt. 

The running part was easy, since we were keeping a ~12:00/mile pace plus walking breaks. Bre struggled a bit in the last few miles because her throat kept closing up and she couldn't take a deep-enough breath, but we finished strong nonetheless in 3:10:16. 

Abdominal City USA, population: me

They gave us loads of goodies in the post-race shoot, and I drank all of it pretty much immediately: a bottle of water, 2 chocolate milks, a gatorade, and a popsicle. And that's not counting the free beer from the beer tent! We gorged ourselves when we got home too: several helpings of sausage/egg/cheese/hashbrown casserole, half a dozen cookies, several glasses of milk, pretzels, and nachos. 

I'm really glad I took it easy this race, because most of the people I talked to struggled in the humidity. Running with Bre was a lot of fun and I was happy to be a part of her first half marathon. Stay tuned for more adorable in-race photos from the both of us!

Bre's sister and her friends were AMAZING for coming to the race to cheer Bre on; they had some incredible energy and made the whole thing fantastic. Thank you so much guys! Also, if you have a chance please visit my wife's website at www.StillEasierThanChemo.com and make a donation. All proceeds go to the Massey Cancer Research Center.