The weather this morning was absolutely beautiful for racing. As lousy as it was for my last race, with storms and lightning that canceled the swim portion, it was much appreciated. The wind seemed fairly calm (for Central Illinois), the temperature was mild, and the sun was shining. Actually, overcast skies would have been even more perfect, but with those often come wind and rain, so all and all, conditions were excellent.
There were actually two races this morning at the Mattoon Beach Triathlon: a longer "1/4 distance race" (or 1/4 ironman length) and a 1/8 sprint-distance race. I chose the sprint, since I will do an Olympic-distance race in just 2 weeks (comparable to 1/4-distance, but with an even longer swim). I wanted to be able to recover fast enough to train hard the following week for that race. Some of the strong competitors opted for the longer race, so the door was open for me to place well, though my age group was the largest with 7 racers.
Our race also included a doctor who is trying for a Guiness World Record for most triathlons completed in 100 days - 101 if you can believe that! Hopefully he has his own doctor on his traveling staff. Our race was number 36. The day before, he completed a tri at Lake St. Louis. I think he is mostly sticking to shorter races, but he has a couple 1/2 ironmans in the mix. I imagine he is constrained by which races are available each week and the time it takes to travel to each. He is also raising money for some charity, but I don't recall what it is.
Everyone in the sprint race started together. (There were only 39 of us.) The water temperature in Lake Mattoon was about 75 degrees, which was barely cold enough to allow wetsuits per USAT rules. I do not own a wetsuit and chose not to procure one this year. They take some getting used to, from what I have heard. They do provide a little advantage in buoyancy, but for a short 0.3 mile swim, one has to wonder if that advantage is lost in the time it takes to remove the suit after the swim. The water was certainly bearable temperature-wise - no colder than the Urbana Indoor Aquatic Center where I usually train.
Though I had started 3 organized triathlons prior to today, this was my first true open-water swim in competition. My first race included a swim in the lazy river and lap pool at the Champaign Park District aquatic center. The swim for the last race was replaced with an opening run due to weather. The other race included a swim in a large oval-shaped pool that had something of an open-water feel, as the pool had a zero-depth entry, no lane lines, and was large enough to set 3 turning buoys for a very short 300m swim. But there is definitely something different about a mass start from a beach in a larger body of water. For one, everyone is jockeying for position for the first 100m or so. People are running into each other, kicking, splashing, elbowing, dunking (usually unintentionally, though I have heard tales of less sportsmanlike conduct). This race wasn't so bad, as 39 people made a pretty modestly-sized start wave and everyone sported good Midwestern manners. Another challenge is swimming in a straight line. We swam around two buoys in a clockwise triangle. Murky Lake Mattoon is not as user-friendly as a lap pool with lane lines on the bottom. I had to pick my head up several times and occasionally switched to a few kicks of breast stroke to keep my eye on the next buoy. I was almost always in the middle of a crowd of 3-4 people, so it was also possible to just stay in somebody's wake and hope he knew better what he was doing.
I had hoped to complete the swim in about 9 minutes, based on recent time-trials of similar distances in the pool. However, those efforts involved flip turns with pushes off the pool wall (in addition to the lap line to keep me on track). Also, the lake bottom was a bit irregular and dropped off from the shoreline so that I wasn't able to do much as much running in the water as I had hoped. And who knows. The distances in these races are never exact. Sometimes it runs short, other times long. The top swimmer in my race finished the swim in 9:36.
I exited the water after about 11 minutes and in 10th place overall, though I did manage the best swim in my age group. (A short jog across the beach and into the transition area was also included in the official swim split time.) It was time to get on the bike and reel in a few of those 9 faster swimmers. The bike is definitely my strongest event and my favorite as well. I dried and cleaned my feet, put on my helmet and sunglasses, and got on the road as fast as I could. Transitions are not my strong suit. I guess I am too finicky about making sure everything is just right. Though I removed most of the sand and grass, I managed to get a small rock from the road stuck to my foot just before mounting the bike. (You have to exit the transition area before mounting the bike, and I leave my bike shoes clipped into the pedals and mount barefoot.) I thought it was going to cause some trouble on the nearly 14-mile trek, but fortunately, it quickly worked its way to the side of the shoe and I didn't notice it thereafter. We headed east across the Lake Mattoon causeway for about a mile, then turned north.
Once I got on the main northbound section of the course, my legs were having a bit of trouble getting going. I thought perhaps I was in a spot of bother induced by too much fireworks and not enough ZZZs the night before. Now I was paying the price. It took all I had just to keep the bike moving barely above 20 mph. Considering my goal was to average 21-22 mph, things were not looking good. It wasn't until about 4-5 miles into the ride that I noticed an American flag high on a pole gently rippling southward, toward me. The winds were by no means strong by Central Illinois standards, but I had just assumed they were coming out of the south, the west, or some vector between the two. At least that is the way it works about 80% of the time. But I was in a northerly headwind! A quick 1.5-mile jaunt to the west and back lay just ahead. Then it would be about 4 miles of tailwind - time for "the Piper" to pay me!
Once I made that southbound turn, I noticed the road also started to descend gently. The northbound stretch involved not only a headwind, but some considerable portions of "false flat" that I hadn't really noticed before, where the road was actually turning up slightly. Where I was fighting to hold 20-mph on the way out, I flew at 25-29 mph on the way back, with my fastest mile at a 26.3 mph average. All four miles in the tailwind were 25 mph or faster. My ride was recorded here - what a difference a mild wind and mild grade can make!
I managed to pass 4 or 5 people on the bike, including two females (part human, part dolphin) who swam much faster than me. (I passed a third in the first transition.) Could I hold them off on the dreaded run and avoid being "chicked?" One of them had beaten me in the Lytle Park Sprint Triathlon last August. My second transition took about 1:15, which is terribly slow. A good 20 seconds or more was spent putting on socks. Some people run without them. I tried doing so in training once, on about a 2-mile run, and wound up with considerable pain in my little toes. I have decided for now that it isn't worth it, especially two weeks before my next race. But for the second race in a row, I dropped one position in the standings due to a slow T2.
I started on the 3.25 mile out-and-back run course about 50 meters behind the next guy in front of me (who passed me in T2). I tried to at least maintain that gap, but to no avail. He gradually slipped away and though I kept him in sight to the finish, I could not close the gap. Meanwhile, the next guy behind me was closing. At the turnaround, he was only about 50 m behind. We rounded a left-hand turn at about 3/4 mile to go and he had moved to within about 20 m. But I started to pick it up with about 1/2 mile to go. He did the same. His strategy seemed to be to keep me in his cross hairs and then blow by on the finishing kick. If he would have dropped the hammer a bit earlier, I may have conceded without much of a fight. But the end was in sight and I had managed to avoid being passed for 3 miles. I wasn't going to let go in the last quarter. My breath became quite labored and I was heaving with each exhale. I could hear his footsteps as I turned off the road, where about 50 meters of astroturf runner covered a narrow lane to the finish line. I thought I was safe. Surely he wouldn't try to elbow past at this point. But the footsteps grew louder. I don't know where I found the energy, but I broke into what felt like a full sprint for about 30 meters to cross the line exactly 1 second ahead of my tormentor. To God be the glory! We congratulated each other on a great race. He was clearly the stronger runner, but I opened up enough of a gap on the bike to hang on. And I held off the girls as well - no "chicking" this time!
I finished in 1:12:55.20, or about 25 seconds ahead of my goal! Here are the full results. The splits worked out a little different than I anticpated, with the swim slower and the bike faster. It was good for 2nd in my age group and 6th overall. My swim was 10th best and my run 11th, but my bike was 4th.
Since I am relatively new to this sport, I have pondered strategy and tactics but to this point have not really approached a race with a coherent game plan. A triathlon adage says "train your weakness." I will certainly continue to spend time on the running track and in the pool. Running may be the single most "core" endurance sport, and I believe anyone can improve overall fitness and tri performance by becoming a better runner. Putting my own spin on triathlon wisdom, I would add "train your weakness, but when the horn sounds and the race is on, play your ace." So going forward, I plan to pedal almost as hard as I can - just a notch or two below what I would do if the finishing line was at the end of the bike. The difference between my "A-game" run, when I am 100% fresh, and my "suffer through it until it is over" run is only about 20 seconds per mile, at best. I can definitely maximize the overall outcome by going for broke on the bike!
Though my family could not make the 5:15 am departure from home after the evening of the 4th, there were a few event photographers on course. I'll also post some links to pictures if and when available. There is probably one of me gasping at the finish line barely holding off that dude.
