For the first time in my life it totally paid off to be OLD! I won my age group in the beginner division. Don't believe me? You can click here and then choose "results by division" and scroll down to "Female Beginner 35-39."
This was a big jump for me
to do this triathlon last night. I have
been thinking about doing one for years, really, years! But I’ve always had a bunch of excuses and
fears about it. Will my shoulder (that I
had surgery on almost 17 years ago) start hurting again? Will I even be able to run after swimming and
biking? I’ll have to learn how to ride a
road bike, how will I do that? How will
I learn how to transition? What will I
wear? How and where will I practice open
water swimming? I have no idea what kind of workouts to do, how will I figure
that out? Can I even do this without a coach?
Will I be able to stay motivated?
When will I even find the time to train for one sport, yet 3 different
sports? But given time and help from
Andrew I just pushed all of that aside and kept talking myself down from this
being a big deal and telling myself it was just a trial thing (it is called “Y
not Tri”) so I should stop thinking about it and just do it already! And I’m so glad I did because it was so much
more fun than I thought it would be!
I haven’t really competed in
anything in a very long time (I don’t count that half marathon a few months
ago, that was not about competing for me, I just wanted to finish) and I was
very nervous about the competition aspect, imagining all these amazing athletes
in excellent condition. I was relieved
to find a wide array of shapes and sizes and to really see that shape did not
predict ability! And I surprised myself
by getting a little bit competitive as I was racing. As soon as I got in the
water I started to feel that little bit of competitive spirit coming back, I
kept thinking, “well that person is not that far ahead, come on, work harder,
you can pass her!” And that is a fun
challenge!
I definitely wasn’t prepared
for this in the way I would have liked, I feel almost like I was faking it a
little bit because of that. In the last
couple of months I have only done a handful of actual rides on my bike and the
same amount of swim practices. I have
been running 2-3 times a week so at least I had some running training, which is
good since I am truly a terrible runner, I don’t think I’ll ever be fast! (my excuse is that I’m probably 95% slow
twitch muscle fibers, so I have endurance but no speed, at all). I much prefer to feel over prepared, so being
underprepared made me very anxious too.
I was so thankful that Andy really helped me out; he made sure all my
gear was set up right and that everyone was where they needed to be on time and
gave me a lot of encouragement to just get out there and try it. He sent me a text message every couple of
hours while I was working that day in clinic reminding of when I was supposed
to be eating and reminding me to hydrate, it was awesome to have someone play
the support crew role!
Even though I was anxious
and underprepared it felt good to just go for it, and the way I made it through
was to just focus on the part that was right in front of me; before the swim I
was saying to myself, “ok, just figure out how to get into the water, ok, so
where is the buoy? Yes, I see it, just
get to the buoy, just get there.” And once I got there I was thinking, “just
get back to the shore.” And from there I was thinking, “just put on your stuff
and get on the bike.” You get the idea.
I don’t know if this is a good strategy or not, it meant that I probably
road the bike slightly harder than I should have. I came out of the water 3rd in my
heat of 40+ people and that felt pretty good, and while biking someone passed
me about half way (it was a 6 mile ride, so not very long) and I was annoyed by
that and so I kept up with her and ended up passing someone else (which shocked
me). The one thing I was really not
prepared for was the way my legs would feel when starting the run because I
haven’t done any stacked workouts. That
is a bizarre sensation! For the first
mile of the run my legs felt like they weren’t my own, they were moving but I
had very little control over them, they felt like jello, but not in a tired
way, just in a weird nonfunctional way.
I can’t really describe it very well.
The run was only two miles and so fortunately during the second mile
they finally felt like my own legs again and I could move them a little faster
(not fast enough to keep me from getting passed by some people who were clearly
very good runners!).
So here is the breakdown of
things that went well and things that could use improvement, this is where you
are welcome to throw out suggestions that might help me next week when I do a
“real” sprint triathlon!
Things that went well:
-I remembered to bring all
of my gear and I even brought back ups for some things! (thanks to Andrew)
-The pond was not nearly as
gross as I thought it was going to be, I pushed thoughts of all the ducks
pooping in that pond out of my mind while swimming and pretended it was a lake,
which worked.
-I had an extra water bottle
at my swim/bike transition and sprayed my feet off before I put my socks on and
that helped get all the sand off (supposedly if you’re serious you’re not even
supposed to wear socks, you’re supposed to leave your bike shoes clipped into
your peddles and put your shoes on while you start the ride, that is WAY out of
my ability level!).
-I clipped in fairly quickly
without falling down
-The biking portion was flat
so I didn’t have to do much changing of gears, I chose to grind up the small
hills which I “think” was good?
-I really like the triathlon
shorts that I bought, I paid a little extra for nice padding in the butt (like
bike shorts) and I was happy I did that, they were super quick drying too!
-I was faster than I
expected at both transitions, and at the time I was just wishing I could rest
and catch my breath, but I was trying to gain as much advantage as I could
going into the run because I knew it would be terrible.
-I wore a number belt/strap
instead of pinning the number on for the run, so glad I did that!
-I focused on extending my
stride length throughout the run, which always seems to help me when I’m tired
(any other running advice is greatly appreciated!).
Things I didn’t expect/could
be improved:
-I didn’t know they wouldn’t
let us into the transition area during the youth race and so I got anxious
about not being able to set up my stuff and had to wait until just before the
race to do it (the kids started first and had their own transition area but had
to go through the adult transition area to get on the bike course which I
didn’t know).
-I need to antifog my
goggles, I had to pause halfway and do a little bit of breaststroke to clear
them out.
-My shirt could have been
tighter, when I bought it earlier this week (paying more money for it than I
planned, which means I’m pretty much stuck with it) the woman at the triathlon
store told me I might want it tighter but the idea of running in a really tight
shirt didn’t appeal to me (I have postpartum flabbiness that I prefer stays
hidden under a “partially relaxed cut”), but it did feel like it was billowing
around me while I swam.
-I somehow, given my years
of not swimming, have gone back to having a 2 beat kick, which is a habit I
broke a long time ago, but now I guess will have to work on breaking it again
(or should I?) the good part about a 2
beat kick is that I basically don’t use my legs while I swim, so at least I
save energy?
-I could have laid out my
transition stuff slightly better so I could have stood on my towel after the
swim, this wasn’t totally my fault because a girl racking her bike near me was
like, “um, you need to move your bike over because I’m not going to have room
to put on my shoes” so she got 3 feet of space and I got 12 inches. I need to be more assertive.
-I should have had some big
gulps of water in the transition area before getting on my bike. This coincides with the next one:
-I can’t get my water bottle
out of the holder without swerving all over the place. I HAVE to learn how to do this because my
mouth felt like a wool sweater from being so dry during the entire 6 miles of
the ride (worsened by my total sucking of air).
-I almost missed a turn off
into a neighborhood because I didn’t analyze the route enough before the race
(assuming there would be a big group of people in front of me and that I would
follow them). Fortunately I was not too far off from the girl who had passed me
so I was able to follow her.
-I almost hit a person while
on my bike, it was another athlete and he was trying to cross (not at one of
the designated places and he didn’t even look before he stepped into the road)
and I screamed, like a real scream, which I didn’t mean to do, but it made him
jump back, so we avoiding colliding.
Glad to know that reflex was there when I needed it but I should probably
learn to use my brakes and how to handle my bike better.
-My cadence on my bike was
not fast enough, my guess is that it was around 60-70, and Andy has told me it
needs to be 80-90 because it’s more efficient, but I really enjoy grinding it
out, I like the slow and steady turn of the pedals, is that really a waste of
energy?
-I pre-tied my running shoes
so that I could just slip them on, and I purposely didn’t double knot them
because I didn’t know how well that would work.
Ends up both of those things were a mistake, my shoes felt awkwardly
loose AND they came untied, so I ended up wasting 30 seconds retying my shoes
about ½ mile into the run. My husband
had bought me some Yankz earlier in the day but I was nervous about trying them
for the first time during the race, definitely will next time I run!
-My sports bra was really
wet throughout the whole race, anyone have advice on a certain brand or type of
sports bra that is ultra quick drying (and relatively tight but also
flexible?).
-I drank water (from the
little cups they hand out at water stations) while I was running because I was
so incredibly thirsty after not being able to drink water on the bike. Ends
up I’m not very good at drinking water and running hard at the same time
because I choked and sputtered both times, maybe I should have just stopped and
drank my water? (I normally carry a
water bottle when I run so I don’t know why it was so much harder out of a
cup?).
Wow, if you read all the way to the bottom of
this then you could totally do a triathlon, it’s less effort, seriously! And advice about anything triathlon related is totally appreciated!
