I'm an Olympian..

Well not quite but I did complete my first Olympic distance triathlon yesterday and I watched the Beijing 2008 triathlon gold medalist walk down the swim ramp to get ready for the ITU elite competition after ours was over.  Close huh?  Here's the details for those that don't want to wade through the whole blog.  I finished with 2:11:58 so I can say yep, I did a 2:11. :)  I had a 37:35 run split for 15th overall run split.  It was 6:04 pace which wasn't exactly as fast I had hoped for but overall I was pleased.  I did a 27:40 swim in the Potomac.  This was the same pace as my Ironman swim last year.  Not as good as it could've been.  I rode a 1:03:something for a 23.3 average on a pretty flat course.  Exactly my goal.  I ended up 27th overall out of 267 finishers and actually got 3rd in my 35-39 age group.  I had figured at the finish that was time was too slow though so I didn't stay for awards.  Doh!

Now onto the details...

The event was a unique mix of just a normal age group Olympic/sprint distance with the fancy ITU world cup international elites competing on the same day with some of the same course.  This created some interesting aspects to the event.  First, age groupers started at 6am.  Yep super early.  Second, there was a mandatory pre-race briefing and bike racking the day before on Saturday.  The race briefing was a joke as they didn't even talk about the race at all.  There was no discussion of aid stations on the run course, how the swim waves were going to be handled, or much of anything else.

So going in, I knew I'd be getting up super early so I had been slowing preparing all week by going to bed just a little bit early each day and on Saturday sleeping as much as possible.  I prepared all my stuff the night before race day including a bottle of Cytomax that I stuck in the fridge.  I woke up at 3:15 and left at 3:30am with everything except the nutrition bottle in the fridge.  I didn't realize I had forgotten it until I arrived at the transition area.  Doh!  I almost panicked.  Luckily I had already brought 1 gel for the bike course and 1 gel for pre-swim.  I brought a normal sized water bottle for potential foot washing.  It went into my bottle cage and I figured I'd just deal with any gunk on my feet post swim.  My rack neighbor loaned me a old school power bar.  Who knew they still made those things?  I wasn't too picky but figured only half of it was gonna sit well in my stomach an hour prior to the swim.  I starting putting on my wetsuit which was a pain as always.  Somehow during this I scratched the crap out of 2 knuckles and bruised my left wrist.  I don't remember doing this but as I was standing with my wave participants I looked down to see skin missing on my knuckles and nice bump on my wrist.

Swim

This was my first water start.  I jumped in the water was a fine 73 degrees not cold at all.  I had no idea where to position myself in this wave.  I probably made a slight mistake by getting a little too close to the front and middle.  The swim course has you swim upstream first, under a bridge and then back with a slight upstream turnaround to the pontoon.  The only problem was there was only 6 buoys for the entire 1.5k course.

The horn sounded and we were off.  I immediately started to get bludgeoned and on top of that was swimming so fast I could only barely catch my breath every stroke.  It was really a horrible first 200 meters or so.  No rhythm and horrible form combined with barely being able to breath.  I finally got settled down and proceeded to the bridge.  The Potomac was very muddy as we've had tons of rain this spring so you couldn't see past your bicep.  I got into a nice rhythm but really didn't have as much mental focus on my stroke, body rotation as I should've.  Sighting was a problem because of the current on no buoys.  We were supposed to be able to have a practice swim on Saturday but thunderstorms canceled it.  I was hoping to get a feel of the current and angle from that.  I got around the first turn buoy and was actually going quite well and then turned downstream.  I was cruising with the pack to my left about 10 meters.  The problem was the current was taking me to the right.  The course was like a triangle so it took a lot of sighting to stay pointed in the right direction.  The other problem was the sun in our eyes directly on the buoy side.  I had the tinted goggles but it wasn't much help.

I came around the last 2 buoys and up onto the ramp.  I clicked my watch and saw 27 something.  I thought hey it's less than 30 so not bad but really it was pretty bad.  Sure all of my other triathlons so far have been lake swims but still my pace was the same as my Ironman pace.  Ouch.  The pack swim just isn't my thing.  It takes too much focus that I don't have to spare due to my horrible swim stroke.  I need all my focus on it with some on sighting.  Next time I starting on the totally opposite side of buoys and not in the middle.  On top of that, I've only been swimming like twice a week and rarely 3 times so I have been slacking.  My arms are sore right now and were sore getting out of the water.

T1
I made my way up the ramp towards T1.  It was like maybe 100 meters total but I got my legs under me and starting running at a good clip while taking out the arms of my wetsuit and off my goggles and cap.  I got to my rack and started the dreaded wetsuit strip.  This was my first ever hand done wetsuit strip.  It actually came off pretty quick although I did almost fall over.  I put my helmet, glasses, socks, cycling shoes and race belt and I was off.  My official T1 time was 2:21.  Not earth shattering but the fastest T1 time for the age group was 1:52 and I did notice some folks going w/o wetsuits for the swim.  So I was pleased.

Bike
I got out onto the road and luckily we had a 3 lane rode at the beginning because people were weaving everywhere trying to get into their pre-mounted cycling shoes.  I just use cleat covers and remove them on the fly.  I did this and got moving quite well as the first section we had a nice tailwind.  My new race wheels were awesome.  I was flying quite good.  The course was mostly north and south sections and we had a decent wind out of the north.  Luckily the course goes slightly downhill on it's longest section north.  I was able to keep good speed into the headwind and this section is an out-n-back so the last finish miles into transition are tailwind.  Sweet!  I was just flying the first loop.  Probably a little too fast but hey gotta give it go right.  There was one section that the organizers should've did something about.  It was under a bridge where there was this front tire eating bump.  I know DC roads and they completely suck so this wasn't surprising.  Overall they did a pretty good job of keeping us on quite nice pavement.  I bunny-hopped this massive gauge in the road and made a mental note to remember it on lap 2.  There was some drafting but nothing too blatant on the first lap.  I started the 2nd lap and I could feel my legs.  I was getting some pain from my running injury.  I let off the gas a tad and it went away so I started going for it again.  I ended up in legal paceline with 2 other riders.  Legal in the sense that we both going about the same pace and were staying 7 meters or longer away from each other.  With the head wind, you could feel some draft even at that distance.   As we approached the massive rut, a spectator was there this time warning riders.  I bunny-hopped it again and noticed medic tending to a rider.  Certainly a crash victim of this rut.  I saw the 400m to go dismount sign and started backing off a little too early as it seemed to take forever to get to the real dismount sign.  No big deal.

T2
I'm off the saddle and running at a nice clip to rack my back.  I get the bike racked.  Helmet comes off, my running shoes go on, running hat on and empty my pockets of empty gel packs and cleat covers.  I'm off.  It went so fast I was wondering if I had forgotten anything.  I grabbed a cup of powerade as I excited transition.  This was a slight mistake but I really didn't know if I had enough calories to make it through the run.

Run
I started out what felt slow.  My legs weren't clicking.  I could feel the bike ride a little plus my stomach was starting to tense up.  I thought that if I get a sideache again like at Florida I'm running through the bitch this time.  I started getting a little better and by the supposed first mile mark felt like I was up to speed.  My mile time of 6:20 was bad.  Crap...oh well if I can break 40 it won't be that bad.  I picked up the pace.  We had some tailwind sections and some headwind sections.  I was passing people here and there but just moving at what I thought was a slow pace.  I got to a marker for mile 3.  Halfway! Woohoo!  I clicked the watch and it read 11:30 for the last two miles.  I knew then that the markers were off for sure or at least that's what I thought in my head.  I figured there was know way I running sub 6s.  It felt like 6:30s to me.  I just chugged along and then it happened.  During mile 4, I started to feel my bad hamstring.  I was a little worried and really shortened my stride.  You can run through a sidestitch but you can't run through a pulled muscle that well.  It went away which was a relief and then boom goes the dynamite.  I got passed by a guy.  This particular guy I had caught right before the 1st mile marker and he asked me if I was doing the sprint or Olympic.  I said Olympic and motored by.  I had assumed he was doing the sprint because he just let me go.  WRONG!  He came by at a nice clip and I started to hang with him.  Again, I just don't have enough mental confidence and F-U toughness for a head to head matchup.  He slowly pulled away as we were head for our last turn onto Pennsylvania.  Now here's where knowing the course would've help.  Once onto Pennsylvania it really is only about a half mile to the finish.  I saw this and started picking up the pace but it was too late.  On top of this it starting sprinkling and the wind was in our face big time.  Another guy passed me and I tucked in behind in the massive headwind.  With about 400 meters to go, I came around him and started really pushing the pace as I could I see I was catching the Mayor of DC, Adrian Fenty.  He is an avid cyclist, runner, and triathlete.  He started in the top age group way.  The event had TV cameras because of the fancy pro race so I was trying to catch up to him so I could be close enough at the finish maybe to get a bit of me into one of the highlights.

I clicked my watch at the finish and saw 2:11:59.  Sweet just under to 2:12 so I can say I did it in 2:11 when people ask.  The time was pretty slow as to be really a contender you need to go under 2 hours and I wasn't close so I made my way back to my bike which was a good mile and half walk.  I found out via the results online that I had actually gotten 3rd in my age group.  Amazing... there were only 50 something in the age group so not that big of deal but definitely cool.  I had the 15th overall run split with a 37:35.  My standalone 10k PR from when I was 27 was 34:10 so looking at it wasn't that bad.  Sure sub 36 would be friggin awesome but probably right now I might be able to run a standalone in the 35s but nowhere near my PR.  Overall, that makes me happy with my running training despite having a sore knee on every step of every training run since mid January.

Overall, the olympic was great because I was able to actually jog a little back to my bike.  I wasn't completely wiped out and I didn't have to train like a maniac for the distance.  I think I'm going to do Olympics for awhile.  Just so easy plus I need a few standalone 10ks under my belt to try to get back my mental F-U toughness when it comes to battling during the run.